Beautycounter Desert Sunrise Collection | Review & Swatches

I am seriously obsessed with the Beautycounter Desert Sunrise collection (limited edition, sadly). I don’t know if the shades in both the palette and the lip glosses could be any more “me” and I’m absolutely loving it all! I’m pretttttty sure that this palette is going to be the ONE palette I bring with me to Southeast Asia- I get one palette for an entire month and I choose this one? It’s gotta be good. Keep reading to find out why I’m loving it so much!

Let’s start with the star of the show, shall we? I keep calling the Beautycounter Desert Sunrise palette (no longer available but the Velvet Eyeshadow Palettes have similar, equally gorgeous shades and are way more pigmented!) an eyeshadow palette, but it’s really more of a face palette, as it has six eyeshadows and three cheek shades. Let me start by saying these are not the most pigmented shades on earth (with the cheek shades being a bit more pigmented than the eyeshadows). With that being said though, over top of primer these have the perfect amount of pigmentation to make them extremely easy to work with for day to day makeup, which is honestly all I really look for in an eyeshadow palette these days.

I love that this palette includes a variety of shades, whilst all still staying in the same neutral range. This allows for several different eye looks without having to have a bunch of different palettes to mix and match with! Each of the six eyeshadow shades are perfect for both warm and cool skin tones. On that note though, I personally think that this palette is more suited to fair to light/medium skin tones, mostly due to the level of pigmentation and the shades included.

All three of the cheek shades are stunning and are exactly the kind of colors I reach for on an every day basis as well. Since getting rid of the majority of my beauty products over the past few months, I have really learned to stop hoarding products that I will rarely/never use just because they’re pretty, and instead save the space for products like this that I know I will use all the time. The Beautycounter Desert Sunrise palette is most definitely a welcome addition to my little collection!

From left: Pearl (illuminating white), Champagne (illuminating gold), Dove (dusty lavender), Khaki (golden olive), Bark (luminous brown), Pinot (luminous eggplant), Tawny (warm peachy tan), Bloom (soft pink), Flamingo (vibrant pink coral)

Onto the glosses ($36 each)! These are both so gorgeous and I don’t even think I can pick a favorite between the two of them. They are both so well suited to my color preferences (hollllaaaa if you like peaches and corals as much as I do!) and they’re comfortable to wear. There’s a bit of shimmer in the nude shade, Beeblossom, but it’s not gritty OR gaudy. Coming from a girl who doesn’t like shimmer at all in her lip colors, I honestly don’t mind it!

From left: Coralbell (vibrant coral), Beeblossom (shimmering nude peach)

Lastly, I want to give a quick shoutout to the Beautycounter Lengthening Mascara ($29). I’ve tried a few “clean” mascaras since purging my beauty stash (and having to get rid of several of my old go-to mascaras), but up until trying this one, there was nothing that came close to how well my old mascaras used to perform.

This mascara though… it’s a game-changer! It gives length, some volume AND holds a curl- all without flaking or smudging throughout the day. In fact, this mascara goes on major lockdown once it has dried, meaning it’s easiest to use some sort of oil remover to get it all off without having to rub at your eyes like crazy. It’s not marketed as waterproof, but I’ve been making it through the pouring rain we’ve been having here (basically non-stop, ugh) without any issues whatsoever.

My only qualm with this mascara is that there is a bit of a learning curve if you are one of those people (like myself) that likes to layer their mascara on and really work with it to get your lashes to look exactly how you want. This mascara does NOT layer (and dries very quickly, so you don’t really have any time for a second coat) and will start to clump if you do try to go in for a second coat, so you have to make sure you get as much on as you’re wanting as fast as possible before it dries. It takes a couple uses to get used to this, but once you figure out how to best work with it, your lashes will look fab!