Oh baby, have you ever seen a palette so beautiful? Because I for sure haven’t (unless we’re talkin’ a Marc Jacobs palette but that’s not the point). I have been DYING (bringing on the dramatics today) to get my hands on a Tarte blush palette. Tarte makes my ALL TIME favorite blushes and I always wanted to grow my collection a little bit more. However, I am cheap and poor and can’t allow myself to spend money on makeup. That’s why these Tarte Blush Books are such a great idea. Tarte releases a new one every year and I’ve desperately tried to get my hands on one for the past two years, but they sell out so darn fast. They’ve must have really upped their production this year because they didn’t even sell out (smart, Tarte, smart*.)
But I didn’t even pay full price for this Blush Book, which made me all the more happy. I believethe original price was $79CAD which is a hefty price for any makeup item. But it is a good value. With 8 full size blushes included in the palette, that’s a value of $304CAD, which is insane. But you know what’s even more insane? The deal I got on this baby. Tarte does a week long Friends & Family sale where they do an additional 25% off the entire site. However, each day during that week, they did an additional sale on one item for only 24 hours! And on this particular day, they put the Blush Book on sale for 50% off – $39 buckaroos. But that’s not all. The 25% off still applied so I got this beauty for $30. That’s less than the price of oneof their blushes. Yes, I still can’t believe it. God, I love a good deal.
But enough about bargain hunting. We need to talk about the actual palette. So this Blush Book comes with 8 shades of their iconic Amazonian Clay 12 Hour Blushes. These are amazing blushes. They are so smooth and buttery with the perfect amount of pigmentation and blend in perfectly on the skin. All eight shades are new and limited edition so even if you have one of the other Tarte Blush Books or a blush palette, all o these shades are different! I plan on collecting them for years to come. #blushhoarder.
But as much as I just want to drool over this palette and rave about it, there are a few things that I wish they would have done differently and I think y’all should know before you buy it. First the packaging is CHEAP. And I know that’s probably to be expected since the price was cheap as well. But this palette is just cardboard. And not even nice cardboard. It’s just two circle of cardboard connected by a pin. No mirror, no closure, nothing. If I had of bought this palette at it’s full price, I think I would have been a little more chapped. Another thing is the shade selection. Now, don’t get me wrong, all eight shades are stunning and I have been using this palette loads since I got it, the shades are extremely similar. There are so many peaches and corals (as seen by the swatches above). I would have lovedto see a burgundy or a plum thrown in for a bit of variation. But with that being said, I have been in the need for a good coral so now I have an abundance of them. I ain’t mad. Just something to keep in mind if you do already have a lot of peachy blushes. And my last issue is the bulkiness of this palette. It’s HUGE. Like massive. There’s no real way to store this thing. But the nice thing is that all of the blushes are remove-able from the palette so if you want to store them in another palette or a Tarte single compact, you totally can!
Okay, that seemed like a lot of complaining, but I really do love this palette. Aside from it’s few issues, I have used this palette so much since I got it and I am continuously impressed by the formulation. They sit so nicely on my cheeks and blend out amazingly. I also love that this palette came with a highlighter shade (Spirited) because it’s great for swirling your brush in before you pick up a blush colour to add shimmer to any matte blush! It’s my new favorite thang.
*(In regards to Tarte’s decisions about the shade selection of their new Shape Tape foundations, I was incredibly disappointed by their actions. In a time and age where the beauty industry has undergone a huge change and finallyare releasing shades for everyone, I was shocked to see that Tarte wouldn’t do the same. I hope that this“scandal” by such a huge company will send a big message to other companies that the new standard in beauty is being inclusive and making shades available for ALL skintones. As a non POC, I know that I can’t even begin to relate to this issue, but I didn’t want to talk about a company’s products without addressing the bigger issue at hand.)