♥ Daytime Eyes | Urban Decay Naked Smoky Palette

When the Urban Decay Smoky Palette was announced I was so excited. It was the first palette they had released since I'd really, really starting liking my makeup and I wanted it so badly. I was aware of how much of a cult status the original Naked palettes had become and I desperately wanted to jump right on the band wagon with this palette. I already owned the Naked 2 palette, and adored that so I knew exactly how brilliant this would be. Now that I've had it for almost a year, I realise, I've fallen short. I've never really found enough excuses to put it to really good use for what it was designed for - a killer smokey eye look - maybe because I don't go out of an evening and I don't drink. Instead, while I was home, I bought it with me and I was determined to use it as much as possible. Here's the great go-to daytime look I created with it...

As always, I use my MAC Paintpot in Painterly to prime my lids. I used the shades at the right end of the Smoky palette as a base, focusing Combust on the lid to further neutralise it and Thirteen under the brow, to highlight. I blended in a tiny bit of Whiskey into the crease, but mainly on the outer v area of the eyelid to darken it up a smidgen. Out of habit, I used a little bit of Creme Brûlée by Make Up Geek to warm it up a little, and blend all the shades together. On the inner corner of my lid I placed the second shade in the palette, Dirtysweet. Then, over Whiskey, I added Radar, into the crease and blended it all in together. After all that blending, I felt I lost a little bit of Dirtysweet, so I pressed some directly onto my lid with my finger to get a really good opacity to the light shade I wanted right in the middle of it. I finished the entire look off with my trusty Glam Eyes liquid liner from Rimmel and a coat or seven of mascara! Of course, I added more highlight to the brow bone, in the form of High. I really love the shade of it, it's a beautiful frosty pink and works wonders.

I really have enjoyed using this palette for the last week or so and surprisingly, it's given me everything I needed. The mattes are nice and neutral, and the shimmers are very, very shimmery and really eye catching - meaning that even for a daytime look like this, you still look super glam. My favourite shades in this palette are definitely Dirtysweet and Combust, though I am determined to put together the bright silver grey tones. I think the shade Smoulder is great, but I think I'd struggle to use it if I only had this palette to work with. I don't think the random hint of purple works well at all here and there could have been something much more fitting in it's place!

Is there a palette you've been neglecting lately? Tell me more about it and why you just haven't got much use out of it down below.

Em x

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