Suqqu Shinjuku Isetan Exclusive Blend Color Eyeshadow and Bright Up Lipstick Swatches

On Monday of this week I went to Shinjuku Isetan to spy on their Suqqu exclusive LE releases, namely the Blend Color Eyeshadow EX-29 光絹織 (Koukiori) and Bright Up Lipstick EX-02 染柘榴 (Somezakuro).

 

***Screencaps from Isetan JP.

To be honest I was hoping to swoon and be wowed and sold. I mean, just look at those stock photos above. Doesn't that split pan look gorgeous? And the rosy pink pan is pretty, yes? And OMG that red lipstick! And then I saw them in person and walked away feeling totally ambivalent. What's wrong here?

All pictures taken in indoor lighting without flash.

- Blend Color Eyeshadow EX-29 光絹織 (Koukiori): my first impression was that these eyeshadows didn't feel as buttery and smooth as the 2016 Color Collection released in January. The top left silver pan is metallic with lots of sparkles, both of which I love, but it's somewhat gritty as a result. The rest of the pans are soft but I've had much better from Suqqu--fellow split pans 10 梢茶 Kozuecha and 12 紺瑠璃 Konruri! Thankfully, pigmentation is on par, excellent.

I know I've beaten this dead horse over and over, but I really hate that the only color pan I'll get is the split pan. The other 3 are all base/highlighter and lid shades and I feel so cheated paying so much for so little! Finish wise, the top left silver pan pleases me being metallic and the taupe brown half of the split pan has complex shimmers, but the rest are kind of meh.

Let's talk about the colors. I'll admit that the Suqqu counter at the Shinjuku Isetan was poorly lit, so may be, just may be, that colored my opinions of these LE releases. I like that top left silver very much, not just because it's metallic but also because it's green and pink tinted at the same time. But the top right pink is a total let down. It looks rosier and livelier in the promo pictures but turned out to be a bland and boring pink, both in terms of color and finish. Same with the bottom right peach pan, yawn worthy and nothing special. So it's really that bottom left split pan that really hits my fancy, but even then only partially with the taupe brown with complex multi-colored shimmers. While I love the bluish purple half, I don't love that it's a barely-satin base with scattered shimmers, which will probably turn muddy on my lids. 

Straight and slightly angled shots for your analysis.

- Bright Up Lipstick EX-02 染柘榴 (Somezakuro): a semi-translucent but very pigmented neutral red. It certainly looks blue-based in the tube and the promo pics as well, but it swatched rather neural on me. I don't have much negativity on this lipstick other than that it's bloody expensive at 5,400JPY, ~$47 a piece! I'm not sure I'd bite the bullet just to test drive the formula, especially when I already found love in Coffret D'Or and Lunasol at half that price!

So there you have them both. What do you think? Would you go for these?