Worth The Hype? BPerfect Stacey Marie Carnival Palette

I'll be honest, when this palette first found its way onto my Facebook news feed, I had never heard of BPerfect or Stacey Marie. I'll be honest, even after doing some research I can't actually fathom how this palette is being sold for £40, but we'll go into price later on.

BPerfect are an Irish brand, established by Brendan Macdowell in 2013. Over the past five years they seem to have grown rapidly in Ireland (perhaps why I have never come across them), and their products are stocked in shops around the country, and some stores in the UK too. The brand seems to focus mostly on tanning products (another reason they may have passed me by, I look like a paracetamol with pink hair), but they do stock some cosmetics too.

The Stacey Marie Carnival palette is the most expensive product that BPerfect stock. This is probably down to the higher number of shadows in the palette, and also I assume a commission will be paid to Stacey Marie. That being said, they also stock another palette which appears to be a collaboration with a makeup artist and that retails for £24.99. The Carnival is £39.99 plus £3.50 shipping. This product is available in some shops, so you can save the shipping cost if you can find it in stock near you, and it is also available on Beauty Bay who do student discount and free shipping if you spend over £15.

I do like this palette, actually. I think its so refreshing to see a palette which focuses on bright shades, rather than shoving one or two in there for the "pop effect". This palette has 24 eyeshadows in a range of matte, duochrome and metallic finishes and two highlighters, one which would suit light to medium skin tones and one for medium to deeper skin. I am never really a fan of palettes that have highlighters for a range of skin tones as I just don't get use out of the darker ones. I have seen a lot of girls on social media buy this palette for their makeup kit though. I personally don't use Chinese produced shadows in my kit, but I guess that's where the different highlighter shades might be useful.

The packaging is nothing special. It's a black cardboard component that came wrapped in clear film. There is no outer box or slipcase, and for £40 I'd personally like to see a little more attention to detail on the packaging, but then I am a total packaging junkie!

These shadows mostly swatch nicely. I did struggle with the purples and one or two others, but purple shadows are notoriously difficult to formulate so I'm not going to be too critical of that. They do, for the most part, perform well on the eye with a good quality brush although I did experience some patchiness and blending issues with a couple of shades - mainly Naked, Basic and Wasted. I didn't notice any staining to my eyes, but the brighter shadows (particularly the greens) stained my white bristled brushes really badly which I found to be quite disappointing.

As I've said previously, my main gripe with this palette is the price point. Don't get me wrong, I absolutely understand that smaller businesses can't afford to buy in the quantities that the likes of Morphe and BH Cosmetics do, but I just don't think that this palette is worth £40. If it was £25, or possibly even £30 I'd be telling everyone to snap it up. That said, this palette has been received extremely well on social media, with makeup enthusiasts and artists alike raving about it. So take my opinion as you wish, but I'd probably wait for a sale or try and find one with light usage on a makeup selling group or app instead.