Wishlist Wednesday: 2017 Highlight Palettes

Have you seen the new Anastasia Beverly Hills glow kit coming out?  YouTuber Nicole Guerriero is doing a collaboration with them on a highlighter palette.  The glow kit features six new highlights in a pinky peach theme.  

My initial thoughts-

1. Love the packaging!
2. Why did they choose Nicole? She is gorgeous and one of the first youtubers I began watching around 2009, but she seems to have lost her passion for filming makeup videos and rarely even uploads.  She seems to avoid makeup trends and the hyped up products that come out, so I was just surprised they chose her for this project. When they announced they were doing a collab with her, I thought it might be a gloss, since they have an amazing formula and she loves wearing lip gloss.
3. I don’t need any more highlighters, but I do love the ABH Glow Kit formula so this peaks my interest.

This weekend the inside of the palette was revealed.  ABH’s official swatches looked very pink.  Personally I get more wear out of gold, pearl, and champagne toned highlights, so it wasn’t super appealing to me.  This certainly suits Nicole’s makeup aesthetic- she has done many dusty pink and pink lip makeup looks.

Then more photos were released from snapchat. The snaps showed a very different look from the official Anastasia swatches- some cool toned champagne, taupe, gold, and then pink and silver colors.  This made me want the palette.  Plus, Norvina (head of ABH and Anastasia’s daughter) commented on Instagram that the formula is the same as the ABH Sweets Glow Kit. I have their Riviera single highlight, “That Glow”, and “Sweets”.  Sweets is THEE best- so pigmented, creamy, and you get so much with just a tap of the brush.  When I originally saw it was more than the four pan glow kits, I immediately began to think that it would be like The Ultimate Glow Kit which is a chalky dry glitter bomb mess. Hearing it was like the Sweets kit, I was immediately more drawn to it.  

The pink shades may look pretty much the same on when they are applied. The silver seems a bit chalky. The ones that are more gold/ champagne will probably also look very similar on.  Honestly, all gold highlighters look a bit similar.  Highlights can look very different in person than in photos, so I am curious how this will look if I see it in- store.  Sometimes there are products that I absolutely am not interested in when I see the release photos, then I touch the tester at the store and it blows me away.  

My personal conclusion about the Nicole Glow Kit is that I don’t need it since I have the Sweets kit. Sweets has two beautiful gold colors that are some of my favorite highlights ever, a pinkish copper, and a pinkish almost- purple shade.

Another thing that is swaying my opinion is the release of another highlighting product.  Casey Holmes is pretty much my favorite makeup youtuber and is doing a highlighter palette collaboration with Smashbox.  It releases the same time as Nicole’s.  The Casey x Smashbox Spotlight Palettes come in two versions- Gold and Pearl.  These are more up my alley in their color schemes, and they look ultra- pigmented. These area a new cruelty free product for Smashbox.  I like the concept of them- two creamy highlights in each palette, and an ultra metallic sparkly topper.  I read that these will be a part of the permanent Smashbox line, but that could be wrong.

Overall, if you are weighing your options when it comes to the Nicole Kit and you don’t have Sweets Glow Kit, I think getting the new palette could be a good addition to your collection. I guess the highlighting trend isn’t going anywhere. Right when I thought that every brand could do just about every highlighter they possibly could, we get more. Nars released Hot Sand and Banc De Sable, Make Up For Ever just came out with two Pro Light Fusions… the list goes on.  Ugh, so sparkly they’re tough to resist!

-Kim

***All photos are screenshots from @Trendmood1, not mine.