Updated MAC eyeshadow palette

Apologies for the overkill in eyeshadow products lately, but I’ve been on a massive eyeshadow kick. I went shopping in Amsterdam not too long ago and decided to bite the bullet and update my MAC palette. I still had one of the old ones, which I wasn’t using anymore anyway. There were a few MAC shades that I had been eyeballing as well and so I decided to kill two birds with one stone. I will do a more thorough review of the 4 new shadows I bought, but today I would like to take you through my brand spanking new MAC palette.

My new MAC goodies!

I decided to go with the double sided MAC palette rather than the single ones. The main reason why is because of the price. The single palettes + inserts are much more expensive than the double sided one. Since I hardly travel with my MAC shades, I didn’t mind the palette being slightly bulkier. A double palette costs 12 euros for the palette and 3 euros per insert. A single palette costs 10 euros and 3 euros for an insert. Since I needed space for 30 shadows, I knew I had to double it up. In short, it was the difference between paying 18 euros or 26 euros.

For comparison I decided to show the new palette against my old one. I used this for years. I first bought MAC shadows a few years ago when I first got into make up. At the time they were THE shadows to get and I still love them. That’s why I decided to invest in a new palette that looks sleeker and is much more practical than the old version. For one, I took out the insert to fit more shadows in my old palette, but that proved so impractical after a while, that I placed my MAC shadows in a Z-palette a while ago.

My second reason for wanting to update the palette was because I figured that with a double palette I would be able to have all shadows in one place and an overview in a glance. I was unhappy with the layout of my shadows which resulted in my always grabbing for the same shades. Moreover, I felt my palette lacked a few good basics and in order to add those I needed more space in my palette.

Meet my old Z-palette filled with MAC shadows. I plan on reusing this and take the plunge to try some Make Up Geek shadows. I have had this palette for years already and love how easy it is to change things round. Because my MAC palettes had 2 empty spots however, my shadows slid around a bit too much and that just became a nuisance. As you can see the shadows didn’t fit all that well in this palette.

The shades from my MAC shadow collection were: a gold, a dark matte brown, a deep liner shade and a neutral toned crease shade. I felt my shades were too middle of the road which made the palette not as versatile. I started this palette back when I had little to no clue about shadows or how to use them. Luckily for me, I mostly bought shades that I felt very pleased with over time. But I just had to fill in a few gaps.

I ended up picking: honey lust, embark, beauty marked and corduroy. To determine the layout of the palette, I first grouped all similar shades together. Then I divided them up again into rows of 5 to see which shades could go together in a row. I decided on making one row with light highlight like shades. Then another row with shimmery all over lid shades, followed by a row of matte shades that could be used for adding definition or for blending. My fourth row became all super shimmery lid shades. Rows 5 and 6 became my colorful and darker shadow rows.

Row 1: Naked Lunch – Nylon – Dazzle Light – Vanilla – Yoghurt
Row 2: Arena, Woodwinked, Patina, Satin Taupe, Shale

Row 3: Wedge, Malt, Swiss Chocolate, Corduroy, Blackberry
Row 4: Retrospect, Honeylust, Amber Lights, Cranberry, Star Violet

Row 5: Green Smoke, Humid, Paradisco, Expensive Pink, Coppering
Row 6: Antiqued, Mulch, Embark, Sketch, Beauty Marked

I then reshuffled all the shades to make it a pleasant looking whole. I put my matte highlighters on the outsides of the first row, with a bit of a gradient in every row. In general, the shades go from lightest to darkest from left to right. A bit like a general reading direction. I tried to keep purples/ greens and browns/ neutrals on different sides of the palette. That philosophy worked for most of the palette. The bottom two rows needed some adjusting because of the green and reddish brown shades. It makes sense to me though and I liked this basic lay out.

So it was time to put them in the palette! I like the overall feel this gives off. You can also clearly see which shades I’ve been loving the most in these past few years. There are quite a few with quite a dent in them. I wouldn’t be surprised if I’d be hitting pan on some of these some time soon. In any case, now that I have reorganized my MAC shadows, and they are neatly packed away in this new palette I know I will be able to enjoy them again for a long time to come.

What MAC eyeshadow(s) do you own?