Maybelline Lemonade Craze Eyeshadow Palette Review & Swatches
Maybelline Lemonade Craze Eyeshadow Palette ($13.99) is a new citrus scented eyeshadow palette inspired by a cool drink of lemonade on a hot day. But I’d go so far as to call it an Arnold Palmer kind of eyeshadow palette though since there are nods to ice tea in the shades of this palette which to me makes it all the more wearable.
Let’s take a look at my review and swatches below.
The Maybelline Lemonade Craze Eyeshadow Palette is a unique offering in the realms of drugstore makeup. For starters the bold shades of yellow, fuchsia, and metallic copper isn’t something you run across everyday at the drugstore. Because let’s me honest, bold, bright shades aren’t something that pop up at the drugstore often! Scented eyeshadows aren’t either but Too Faced already cornered that market and Maybelline is just riding along on the coattails of that the success they’ve had with the Sweet Peach Eyeshadow Palette (L’Oreal is too as they have their own tropical scented makeup collection launching soon too!). Love the idea or hate it scented makeup is having its moment in the sun at the moment. I’m actually in the love group. I think the idea is novel and it brings back some of my childhood obsession with morning with scratch and sniff stickers and scented erasers, etc….! The scent is quite weak though so if you are sensitive it’s nothing to worry about. But it is disappointing if you expected a tart lemon-y scent. There’s a very weak citrus-like scent here that wasn’t terribly pleasant to my nose. Oh well!
The palette features 12 shades and arrives in a portable square palette with a cute little glass of lemonade decorating the front. The total weight of the shadows is 0.26 oz in size. On the back of the palette there are three get-the-look guides to create looks they called Lemonade Pop, Pink Lemonade, and Peach Lemonade. I think the palette’s packaging is well designed as not only are the get-the-look guides very helpbul but also, the name of each shade is printed below it which is quite helpful. It’s a nicely designed and presented palette.
I felt like the eyeshadow range was really gorgeous and really worked well together. Don’t be scared of this palette. I realize people are thinking, “OMG yellow eyeshadow! I can’t pull off yellow eyeshadow!” Yes, there’s a bright shade of yellow in this palette but that isn’t the focus of the entire palette. There are some lovely subtle peaches, corals, browns, and golds in the palette. To me it’s like a peach lemonade ice tea assortment of shades. I was absolutely in love with the golden peach shade Citrus and the beautiful warm metallic brown called Sugar Coated and the lovely light gold of Main Squeeze. There are just so many pretty shades here that are completely wearable.
The shadows are a mix of mattes and shimmer finishes. Although mattes do dominate with seven of the twelve sporting the finish. This makes me sad because although soft and silky these mattes sheered our and faded away quickly on my eyes. A good solid cream base helps to intensify the color but during the blending process they still sheered out considerably. You’ll have to built quite a lot to get the best color pay off but I was honestly willing to work since I loved the shades so much.
The real stars of the show here are the shimmers which have a creamy slurry-like texture that blended easily, had excellent pigment, and really accented the sheerness of the matte and made them much more wearable. I piled on the bright yellow shade Lemonade Crazy all over my lid for the look below, used the bright fuchsia shade Ice Pop on the outer v, and popped Main Squeeze on top of Lemonade Crazy to intensify the yellow and add a bit of shimmer to my completed look.
Maybelline Lemonade Craze Eyeshadow Palette is not the best quality eyeshadow palette around but I don’t regret the purchase in the least. I can get some really fun and even subtle looks from this palette and can combine it with other fun shades from my own collection to create some great Summer looks. Would I recommend a purchase? Yes, despite the sheerness and poor quality of the mattes I’d still say go out there and buy this and experience it for yourself. It’s fun and makeup should be fun right?
P.S. I only created one look for this review but I plan on creating a few more looks. Would you like to see them?
Maybelline Lemonade Craze Eyeshadow Palette is starting to launch in a lot of different online stores including at CVS’s website which leads me to believe it’ll get a wider launch soon at drugstores. But if you can’t wait you can get it now at ulta.com and amazon.com.
If you own it, do share your thoughts!