So I think I have been teasing about this palette for too long of a time, so here is is; my beautiful and most prized possession - the MAC 15 Pan palette, custom picked by me. It was an amazing present from my lovely Mum + Dad for my birthday in April, which I got off the MAC Cosmetics US site and used YouShop (a mail forwarding service) to get it to NZ. Now it was my first time using YouShop, so the whole process was a little nerve racking but everything went well and I'll be sharing a few insights of my experience later on in the post. Buying from the US store meant the prices were so much cheaper than if I was to have brought it here in NZ, and it basically was about half the price, so I'd really recommend giving YouShop a go.
I had been keeping a wishlist of MAC eyeshadows I wanted for a really long time, I would often just go onto the site and browse through all the shades compiling them into the perfect palette, so I was pretty darn excited when I actually got the chance to make it a reality! I used the custom palette builder on the website, where you can choose the size and if you want blushes or shadows etc. Then you pick the shadows you want, making a virtual one online and then add it to you cart! The palettes don't come assemble and come in their separate parts and it just adds to the fun of building it all yourself when it arrives! I had about 10 shadows I was certain I wanted to get and spent a very long time contemplating, reading reviews and looking at swatches to choose shades I knew I would love and get a lot of use from.
It's a beautiful sight really!
The eye shadows come simply in a a little cardboard casing, with the pan sitting in it which I didn't think was overly secure, but they all survived the trip. The single shadows that come in the pots are USD $15, or the easier way to buy them I think is in pan form for only USD $10. It already comes with the names printed on the back as well so you'll always remember the colour names. Tomorrow's Part 002, I will be talking all eye shadows and showing swatches of each shade I picked, so stay tuned for that!
By using the Custom kit builder, you instantly get the Pro Palette and the insert that comes with it and you don't have to add it into your cart when you buy. The Pro Palette Large/Single is simply its housing, which you can purchase individually for USD $8.00. The Pro Palette Eye Shadow x15 Insert is only USD $2.00. The overall palette cost USD $160, inlcuding the 15 eyeshadows and the palette case and insert.
The Insert has all the magnets and it slots into the housing very securely. I have noticed that the magnets don't seem that strong, as the pans swirl and move around quite a bit, although they don't fall out. The overall palette feels strong and sturdy and the clear lid makes it easy to the see the colours and just generally looks pretty amazing!
And here is the final product! Tomorrow I will have more details on the actual eye shadows with swatches of all the shades, for now, can you guess them all?!
YOUSHOP//
Now I also want to get onto my YouShop experience as well, as it can seem pretty confusing and is nerve racking to use it for the first time [note - this not sponsored at all, I just want to share with you all my thoughts and advice]. Basically YouShop is run by New Zealand Post and it acts as a forwarding service between the online shops in the US (or UK) that don't offer shipping to NZ, or is just really expensive to ship here. All you gotta do is sign up and you are given a unique number and an address which goes to the YouShop warehouse and then it is sent onto you from there, once they calculate how much the shipping will be.
Use the YouShop address as the shipping address (obviously) but then use your NZ address for the billing, so it matches your credit/debit card details or else they may not allow the payment to go through (for fears of fraud etc). MAC ship within the US for free, so that is a bonus - once it arrives at the warehouse they measure the box and determine the shipping by weight, so keep that in mind.
Shipping starts at $12.50 and the adds $4.75 for each 500g , you can use the calculator on the YouShop website to suss it out if you aren't sure. The shipping for this ended up being $32, I paid the $6 compensation cover for insurance, as it was my first time and this was some precious cargo, so if I hadn't it would have only been $26. For something that would have cost me double the amount here in NZ, $26 is really only a very small price to pay, especially if you are buying a number of items. The shipping took way longer than it should of - first the actual UPS driver from MAC to the warehouse had some big delay for 2 or 3 days which held it up even getting to the warehouse, then once I had paid for the postage, it got delayed being sent out from the YouShop warehouse for some reason - but in the end it finally got here in one piece. The great thing is they keep you up to date each step of the way so you know exactly where the parcel is and if there are any issues. It is a really awesome service and I will absolutely be using it again (I already have my eyes on a few more MAC products... somebody stop me!)
Wow that was a long one, but I really wanted to share that with you all and I hope that it helped at least one of you! Keep your eyes peeled for tomorrows post where it will be swatch-tastic and full of some serious MAC shadow lovin'.
Have you used YouShop before and have any pearls of wisdom, please share them below in the comments!
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