Deal? Sephora Makeup Studio Blockbuster @ US$49.50

Deal? Sephora Makeup Studio Blockbuster @ US$49.50

(General Availability from early Oct' 11)

---

Yea or Nay?

This mega-kit from Sephora boasts 193 products.

- 96 eye shadow shades
- 84 shiny lip glosses
- 6 cream eyeliners
- 2 eyeliner pencils
- 3 blushes
- 1 bronzer
- 1 mascara
- 4 applicators

Quality-wise, I am not about to compare this with MAC or Urban Decay shadows in terms of pay off and texture. I do own a couple of Sephora eyeshadows, and they work ok, but assuming the ones in this kit come from the same manufacturer, these won't be too finely-milled or pigmented. (Other reviews online seem to concur as well.)

Their lip products, on the other hand, I like. The quality has generally been very good, and my guess is the 84 glosses in the palette will be similar to their sheer lipsticks in opacity and texture.

Their liners are good as well, but I cannot speak about Sephora's mascaras as I do not own any yet.

Format-wise, I prefer not to mix powder and cream products as the creams tend to go off or get moldy much faster than powders, which means you will need to either dig out and clean out the lip pans when that happens, or (if you're a bit of a clean-freak) throw the whole kit out.

The other thing is that none of the shades are numbered or named, and Sephora does not say if the shades are drawn from their regular line, so if you fall in love with a few of the items within, you may not necessarily be able to find a replacement in full size.

Variety-wise, I'd say this definitely gives you lots of colors, but not in textures. As mentioned, Sephora shadows don't tend to highly-pigmented, so you won't be able to choose between sheer and strong shadows.

Also, for lip products, what is listed are all glosses. I would have loved to see a mixture of glosses and lipsticks, especially as Sephora produces some really good, creamy opaque lipsticks.

Still there are some REALLY nice-looking pinks and corals in this baby.

Recommended If:

• You are starting out in color makeup and would really like a wide range of options to experiment with before investing in full-size products and shades
• Want to gift this to someone and make their eyes pop when they open it up
• You prefer softer shades and textures (as opposed to really bright and pigmented), even when you are wearing color makeup
• You want a big collection of lip gloss shades, along with eye shadow shades. (If not, you should just buy a "pure eyeshadow" palette and skip the glosses.)
• Huge makeup kits remind you of playing with your aunt, grandma, mother, cousins' makeup as a kid, and make you happy as a june bug...
• You're a makeup maniac, and you collect everything that can be used to color your face.

---

This is not a new product as Sephora released it (and multiple variations of it) previously.

If you've bought one, what are your thoughts, and would you recommend it?