Urban Decay Naked Heat Eyeshadow Palette Review & Swatches
The new Urban Decay Naked Heat Eyeshadow Palette arrives just in time for the warm, sizzling days of Summer with a selection of twelve brand new Urban Decay Eyeshadows. Mind you Naked Heat is far from being naked as this palette contains a selection of smoking browns, reddish oranges, and sizzling hot sienna shades. It’s an interesting release since it toes the line at being both a Summer and Fall 2017 launch considering the shades are quite versatile for either season.
Urban Decay Naked Heat Eyeshadow Palette launches for pre-order June 12th on the brand’s website and will be officially available June 30th with online retailers like sephora.com and ulta.com getting it July 10th online and July 13th in stores.
This is a very appealing palette to me as I favor warmer shades. I especially like them because they remind me of autumn and falling leaves.
Let’s take a look at my review and swatches below.
The Naked Palettes have since involved from the original velvet compact to some rather slick tin ones and Naked Heat comes housed in a plastic sturdy plastic compact with a generously sized mirror tucked inside and a double-ended eyeshadow and blending brush. The palette includes 12 shades that are 0.05 oz each and costs $54 just like past palettes.
The most unique aspect about the Urban Decay Naked Heat Eyeshadow Palette is the selection of shades. As I said above there is nothing “naked” about this palette! It’s filled with a selection of intensely pigmented and bold shades. I didn’t feel like any of these shades were easily duplicated across other any other Naked Palette outside the base colors like Ounce (ivory) and Chaser (creamy nude) both of which seem to have a knack to not only find themselves in Urban Decay Palettes but also many brand palettes as your standard run of the mill brow highlighter and/or base colors.
Shades include:
- Ounce (ivory shimmer)
- Chaser (light nude matte)
- Sauced (soft terra-cotta matte)
- Low Blow (brown matte)
- Lumbre (copper shimmer w/gold pearl shift)
- He Devil (burnt red matte)
- Dirty Talk (metallic burnt red)
- Scorched (metallic deep red w/gold micro-shimmer)
- Cayenne (deep terra-cotta matte)
- En Fuego (burgundy matte)
- Ashes (deep reddish-brown matte)
- Ember (deep metallic copper-burgundy)
Before I start the review, for those interested, the palette is Bulk made in the USA and assembled in the Dominican Republic with the brush being made in China.
Nearly eight of the colors here are matte with the rest being shimmers or micro-shimmers but no worries I experienced no issues with chunky shimmer or glitter. The only sheer shades here are Ounce and Chaser as the rest are intensely pigmented with excellent color pay off. Lumbre, Dirty Talked, Scorched, and Ember all had a soft yet not powdery texture that was very velvety and applied easily onto my lids and blended well. Sauced and Low Blow had a soft, silky texture that applied easily as well. I struggled a little with He Devil, Cayenne, and Ashes as all three can be difficult to apply all over your lid without proper prepping and priming. They can apply patchy since the formula runs a bit drier however, a creamier base helps ease the way for application and blending. En Fuego was very, very patchy and the formula ran quite dry. I had the same experience with Ashes but it wasn’t as dry and blended a little easier over a creamy base. If you’re used a lot of the shades as accent colors within the crease or at the outer v they blend fairly easily but some shades applied all over the eye can be patchier so I would recommend a MAC Paint Pot or some sort of cream eyeshadow to get the smoothest finish.
I had a few growing pains with the blending process but I was still pleased with these shades (I have some looks I created that I’ll share with you soon in another post I have upcoming). However, I did have one major problem. The shade selection is fantastic but the main problem is you can’t get away with this palette alone to create looks. So, example, you’re headed to Cancun for a fun, fabulous vacation. The beach, the sun, it’s going to be a blast and you want a gorgeous sunset eye look to go along with your fabulous vacation. Of course, you need to pack the Naked Heat Palette right? Sure! But the problem is you can’t just pack the palette and be done. You’ll find yourself needing to pack other palettes to make up for the fact that Naked Heat doesn’t have a good selection of transition or contrasting shades to create a single look. I found myself struggling to create a look without wanting to reach for another palette to get in some golds, some other browns, etc…These shades work well individually but when you start combining them they begin blend into the same color. It’s difficult to get a contrasting look with them. For example, He Devil and Dirty Talk seem to be the exact same shade but just with different finishes. There just aren’t enough lighter contrasting shades to compliment the bolder fiery ones. I realize you can’t fit everything and the kitchen sink into one palette but I do think there are a few shades lacking here with too much concentration on colors that run together and look the same even though they aren’t identical duplications of each other.
Urban Decay Naked Heat Eyeshadow Palette is without a doubt a highly unique and gorgeous eyeshadow palette but it isn’t without faults. You’ll find yourself wanting to reach for other eyeshadows in your collection to complete looks using this palette. You’ll also notice not all of the shades have picture perfect application. It has quirks that’s for sure. I’m not going to sway anyone from buying this one, it’s too gorgeous not to indulge and it’s a great companion piece to other palettes I own. I liked it but it isn’t a perfect palette by any means and I think that deserves to be mentioned in this review.
Will you be purchasing it?
Urban Decay Naked Heat Eyeshadow Palette arrives at sephora.com.