I picked up the brand new holiday set from Too Faced at the Sephora VIB Rouge event this past Saturday and I'm so glad I did!
The Chocolate Shop ($58) is the perfect gift for anyone who loves Too Faced (or makeup in general) and is also a great way to get acquainted with the brand if you don't own anything from them yet. It's got it all...eyeshadows, blush, bronzer, highlighter, eye primer, mascara, and a lipstick, for only a few dollars more than the cost of an eyeshadow palette. Not to mention everything is chocolate scented (well, except the mascara or primer)!
Let's take a look!
The packaging is beautiful! The set comes in a pink box complete with a festive scene of snowflakes falling over New York on the front and on the back it has all of the ingredients and information about what's inside.
This year's theme is Christmas in New York (last year was Paris, I think) and I may be biased as a native New Yorker, but for me, there's no better place to be around the holidays than New York City. If you've never been, it's definitely something you'll want to experience if you get the chance.
Anyway, back to the product! After you open the outer box, the set comes in another box that's made out of really sturdy thick cardboard. It has a lid and when you open it...
...the entire set folds out into a little 3D chocolate shop scene and looks like this:
The part that stands up has deluxe sizes of the Shadow Insurance Eyeshadow Primer, Better Than Sex Mascara, and Melted Chocolate Liquid Lipstick in Milkshake (a cocoa nude shade). In the bottom section of the set is the palette.
The packaging of the set is pretty large and bulky and would be difficult to store, so thankfully everything is removeable if you don't want to save the whole thing. The palette itself is very thin and flat with a magnetic closure, so it'll be easy to slip into a drawer. However, it is wider than a typical eyeshadow palette (it's about 7.5" x 6.5").
When I first opened the palette, I was hit with that delicious chocolate scent! To me it actually smells like hot cocoa mix...it's chocolate but there's also that powdery element to it. This set is
made in the USA and seems to be the regular Too Faced formula, which is awesome! Sometimes holiday sets can be hit or miss so I was happy to see that this one didn't skimp on quality.
To be honest, there are some dud shades but everything else had great pigmentation.. The metallic shades have a lot of fallout though...I'm talking lots of chunky flakes coming up, but I guess that's often the case with really glittery shadows so it didn't bother me.
The first two rows are more cool-toned eyeshadows and neutral with a mix of matte, shimmer, and glittery shades. At the end of the row is a pretty peachy gold highlighter called Inner Light. The only shade I had issues with was Cookie Dough...it seemed a little bit drier than the others and I had to really build it to get it to show up. I'm not sure if that's because it's so close to my skin color or if it's just not that pigmented. Otherwise, these are gorgeous!
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| Left to Right: Dessert's On Me, Indulge, Cookie Dough, Raspberry Rose, Sugared Raisin, Guilt-Free, Tootsie, & Inner Light (highlighter). |
Rows 3 and 4 are warmer toned eyeshadows and include the Chocolate Soleil bronzer. The only shade I wasn't too impressed with in this row was Glaze (matte white cream)...it applied a bit patchy/streaky. Otherwise these shades are really pretty! The shimmer shades Gingerdoodle and Butterscotch are standouts in that they were
extremely buttery, soft, and pigmented.
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| Left to Right: Glaze, Gingerdoodle, Chocoholic, Cake Batter, Butterscotch, Toffee Crunch, Lava Cake, Chocolate Soleil (bronzer). |
Rows 5 & 6 contain brighter, bolder shades as well as a candy pink blush. Every shade in these two rows is beautiful and highly pigmented, with mostly shimmer finishes.
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| Left: Banana Date, Honey Dip, Pound Cake, Sugar Bells, Mint Chip, Jingle Berry, Huckleberry, Chocolate Covered Strawberry (blush). |
The Melted Chocolate lipstick in Milkshake is described as "nude cocoa ink" and it's a warmer nude that won't make you look washed out. It also smells just like chocolate...yum!
Overall, I really like the
Too Faced Chocolate Shop! The packaging is adorable and the quality is better than holiday sets I've tried in the past (although it's not quite as good as their permanent eyeshadow palettes). You are getting a lot here though, so it's a great value. A Too Faced Chocolate Bar palette is $49 for sixteen shades and here you're getting 21 eyeshadows, a blush, a bronzer, and a highlighter, plus deluxe-sized mascara, eyeshadow primer and lipstick for only $9 more.
If you're going to grab one of the new Holiday sets, I recommend this one!
