Omorka's Lair

This was Aromaleigh's Halloween collection from last year, and I'd be surprised if at least some of these colors (or something very much like them) didn't come back in next year's collection. They're all fairly dark colors, which is a little awkward for me, as I don't go to a lot of events that require a good smokey-eye, and everything in this batch of four is somewhat difficult to apply evenly and/or blend out, but they're also all very striking. Again going through the collection in alphabetical order:

Alichino: In the bag, soft graphite grey with some pink glitter. On dry, it's a soft stormcloud grey with coppery-pink sparkles; on wet (and over primer; I couldn't see a difference with this one), it has a cool pewter undertone with a coppery-pink duochrome shimmer top layer. Probably wouldn't have re-ordered it even if I'd had the chance, although it actually looks okay on me - I just wouldn't wear it very often; it's not dark enough to make a good eyeliner and it's too dark for a regular eyeshadow shade, so I'll always have to pair it with something lighter.

Barbariccia : In the bag, dusty greyish-blue with some gold sparkle at the edges. On dry, it's a slightly greenish-grey with lots of bass-gold glitter. On wet, splits into an olive-grey underlayer with a metallic brassy duochrome top layer. On over primer, the underlayer is a more neutral grey and the metallic overlayer is more gold. The blue completely disappeared in all three applications; this is a tricksy one. Having said that, I like it; it'll pair up nicely as an accent shade with some of the other brassy/gold eyeshadows.

Cagnazzo: In the bag, deep reddish-purple with some blue/teal sparkle. On dry, a deep dusty warm raisin with scattered bluish sparkles. On wet, a smokey matte raisin with a very gentle blue frost overlayer; over primer, it's pretty close to that, but the base layer is substantially darker and the blue frost is less coherent. Complex and intriguing. I'm not sure if I like it on me, but it's a very elegant color.

Ciriatto: In the bag, a slightly brownish grey with lots of green and gold sparkles. On dry, a warm smokey grey with multicolored sparkles, mostly green but several other colors too. On wet, it's a deeper warm smoky grey underlayer with a peacock-ish iridescent frost layer. On over primer, the underlayer has some metallic frost of its own, and the overlayer is a little more golden and somewhat less coherent. I love this color, but I have to admit it's not very practical; it's more or less a clubbing color, and a goth one at that.

One thing I tried with these was a three-shade smokey eye with a slate-blue eyeliner (I probably should have used a charcoal grey), Barbariccia in the inside corner, Ciriatto in the outside corner, and Alichino on the middle lid and up past the crease. It looked okay, but blending them without getting blotches was difficult and then sweating underneath it made that problem worse. I think using Ciriatto as the outside corner contrast with some of the shinier greens might work well, though, and Alichino makes a good smokey-eye shade.

The other three from the discontinued pile, all from the "Ancient Magick" collection and named after the Neterou (the deities of ancient Egypt):

Hequet - Named after a fertility goddess whose sign and symbol were the frogs of the Nile. On dry, a soft, pastel green with gold and pinkish sparkles. On wet, has an olive-green undertone, a forest green middle, and a slightly metallic green frost with gold and coppery sparkles. On over primer, the undertone is less olive and more forest, but the other two layers are identical. This isn't all that far from Uktena, although it's tipped more towards forest than olive. It's a little showy, but I like it, and it'll go well with other colors with gold or coppery notes.

Isis - On dry, a slightly bluish lavender with magenta glitter. On wet, has a deep blue-violet underlayer and a shinier red-violet overlayer with some pink glitter. On over primer, the underlayer is deeper and a little richer, and the pink glitter is less separate from the rest of the red-violet layer. Very nice, and appropriate for Her; faintly reminiscent of lapis and amethyst, although oddly it's much less shimmery than many of their other colors.

Anubis - On wet, a deep warm brown-grey with some greenish shimmer and copper glitter. On wet, a very deep smoke color right on the border between charcoal and burnt umber with a layer of pewter frost and copper sparkles. On over primer, the same as wet except that the base color is slightly warmer and the frost layer is shinier and slightly greener. I'm not sure if this is deep enough to be used as eyeliner, but it'll be a great smoky-eye color.

I might also pick up Shu and Tefnut from this collection at some point, if they don't sell out first.

Another group of samples while I decide whether to do the Diabolique or Saturnalia collections next (they've both expired, so from a practical perspective it doesn't matter much).

First up, Chupacabra. In the bag it looks like powdered red gumbo clay, sort of a light brick red. On dry, it's a slightly orangy terracotta red with some lovely gold sparkle. On wet, it's a terracotta earthy-red with coppery and gold overtones and a little bit of a bluish shimmer. On over primer, it's wet gumbo clay red-brown with a coppery-metallic overlayer and a bit of gold and blue sparkle over that. All three effects are really pretty, and I'm honestly thinking this makes a better blush than an eyeshadow, although I'll try it with a contrasting liner as an eyeshadow and see if I like it better that way. I might end up ordering a full jar specifically to use as blush, though!

Next, Alcyone (the name annoys me; in English transliteration this should be Halcyone). In the bag, this is a slightly greyish shimmery medium blue, just a little bit on the purple side of the green-purple line. That's pretty much what it looks like on dry, too; a slightly lavender-y medium blue with some blue frost. On wet or on over primer, it's a smoky lavender-ish blue with a brighter and slightly greener blue duochrome overlayer. It's very striking and I like it, but I'll have to be wearing blue or purple for it to work on me. Right now it's out of stock, but it'll be coming back in the fall, so I have plenty of time to make up my mind about it!

Elisabetta is a discontinued shade, but it's still available on the website in the clearance collection. It's an interesting near-neutral buff-rose with rose-gold shimmer in the bag, and it's fairly consistent across dry application, wet application, and application over primer - the base color is a little darker buff in each case, and the rose-gold a little shimmerier in the wet application than in the other two. I might jump on this before it's gone - I don't normally get excited about neutrals, but this is really nice!

Vittoria is from the same discontinued group as Elisabetta and doesn't appear to be available at all anymore. On the one hand, that's a shame, because I like it; on the other hand, it's very close to Les Bon Temps Rouler, and I have that already. In the bag, it's a very shimmery sage green. On dry, it's a frosty green somewhere between a deep sage and a lighter pine green. On wet, it's a medium pine/forest green with a slightly teal-ish frosty shimmer. On over primer, the base shade tilts towards forest and the shimmer layer is a little more metallic. The biggest difference between Vittoria and Bon Temps is that the latter has more gold overtones and the extra red-violet sparkles; the undertones are also a little bit different (Bon Temps is warmer and has more brown in it), but not hugely so. I like this, and if it were still available I'd be tempted to get some, but I already have the Bon Temps, so I'm not too disappointed.

Well, this is going to be interesting; the Lupercalia shadows have disappeared from the webpage. I hope they do come back next year, since some of them are quite nice. Anyway, on with the show:

Feronia is a slightly difficult color to describe in the bag, somewhere between puce, raisin, and chestnut with a bit of sparkle. On dry, it's a very soft plum-brown with copper and fuchsia sparkles. On wet, it's a soft raisin-brown with a copper-fuschia glittery overlay. On wet over primer, the base is a little deeper but the overlay is the same. It's pretty and I'll probably use it up, but I'm not at all upset about not being able to order more. Ihuaivulu had a very similar effect, although it was more brown and less raisin than Feronia is.

Juno is a medium-dark grey-violet-blue in the bag, with very little visible shimmer. On dry, it doesn't stick to me very well; I had a difficult time getting an even layer, which makes it hard to talk about what it looks like, but the patches where it came out reasonably even are a light dusty blue-charcoal with some multicolored sparkles. On wet, it's a very deep blue-charcoal with a light oilslick iridescent layer over the top, with magenta tones the majority in the oilslick layer. Applied over primer, the charcoal is a little deeper, and the iridescent layer is broken up a little more, into multiple patches instead of just one. I'm going to try this one as eyeliner; I suspect it will work stunningly in that capacity, but as a main color of eyeshadow it looks bruisy on me.

Lucina looks like slightly shimmery chalk dust in the bag, stark and ivory. On dry, it's a thin winter white and all but invisible against my pale skin, with pink and gold sparkles being pretty much all that's visible. On wet, it's a light silvery-ivory layer, still hard to see on me, with a rose-gold nacreous overlay. It looks pretty much the same over primer, except that the overlay is a little pinker. This is going to be a highlight shade on me; it's too subtle to be seen otherwise.

A quick note on three free samples from the second order: Laissez Les Bons Temps Rouler, Angelique, and Aurelie.

Laissez Les Bons Temps Rouler is a mossy green with some satiny sheen in the bag. On dry, it's a warmish deep green with some light brown undertones, a slightly frosty finish, and some magenta sparkles. On wet, it's a rich green between moss and forest with bark undertones, a frosty white-gold overlayer, and a sprinkling of magenta sparkles. My reaction was something like "Where have you been all my life?!" This is the first immediate re-order, and I was so not expecting that from a Mardi Gras shade, I tell you what. It pops especially nicely with the pearl eyeshadow primer.

Angelique is a soft pastel peach with some light gold frost in the bag. On dry, it's slightly lighter and warmer than my skin tone, but not very visible, with a sort of golden pearlescence. On wet, it's a near-neutral slightly darker and oranger than shell pink, with a lovely nacreous iridescent overlay that's hard to describe. It doesn't appear to still be available on the website, although Lyric looks like it's in the same color family. I like it, but I like Shimchong better, and it's also fairly close color-wise; I'll definitely use up the sample bag, though.

Aurelie is a deep warm metallic color in the bag, somewhere between brass and well-polished bronze. On dry, it's a warm metallic brown with lots of pink and orange sparkles. On wet, it's a rusty brown with a metallic overlay on the coppery side of antiqued rose-gold; the gold pops more over a primer layer, and the orange and pink sparkles are visible at the edges. It also appears to have been discontinued, or at least I can't find it on the website, and nothing appears to be very similar either. I like it but I'm not in love with it, and I suspect it would look better on someone with warmer skin tones than mine; I'll probably finish the sample bag, but I won't be too upset about not being able to order more.

Also, in the realm of nail polish, Zoya's FeiFei is really brightening up my week. It's a very difficult color to describe - glittery metallic oilslick blue? - but it seriously makes me happy.

A couple of quick addenda to the last couple of these posts: First, Akurra does not work for me at all as a main shade but does work as a highlight color for some of the other greens. I probably won't ever need more than the current sample bag, though. Second, Gargouille is definitely on the re-order list now - having played with it a bit, it's pretty flattering and is neutral enough to match well with a number of other colors as highlights.

We're now into the second batch I ordered from Aromaleigh; this week's colors are Kolowissi, Kinabalu, and Ihuaivulu.

Kolowissi is a fairly deep raisin with some turquoise shimmer in the bag. On dry, it's a soft plum-brown with that same shimmer (sort of a lighter version of Mass-Produced Sentiment with turquoise replacing the pink). On wet, it's back to that deep raisin with a cocoa undertone and the turquoise as a satiny overlayer, much more prominent. The website claims there's some teal/green in the overlayer, but it looks more turquoise blue to sky blue to me. I like it, but there may be too much light blue to harmonize well with my eye color; this one may be outfit-dependent, which will probably mean as a practical matter I won't want to order more even if I like it. On the other hand, the base tone really is nice, so more experimentation will be required for sure.

Kinabalu is a soft shimmery violet in the bag. On me dry, it's a pinkish-mauve with a slightly frosty sheen and some pink and light blue shimmer. On me wet, it's a violet-mauve frosty underlayer and an overlayer of the pink and blue shimmer. I really, really like the underlayer color, but once again I suspect that the sky blue in the overlayer may make this one a "Lovely but not for me" color.

Ihuaivulu (or possibly Ihaivulu; the website doesn't match the label on the bag) is a medium reddish brown with a lot of pink and copper metallic shimmer in the bag. On me dry, it's a lot lighter brown but otherwise pretty similar. On me wet, it has a fairly deep brown underlayer, more medium roast coffee bean than chocolate, but the dominant color is the overlayer, which is a rich red-copper metallic with just a tiny bit of magenta sparkle. That sounds like the orange in the copper would fight with the magenta, but it really doesn't. It's delightfully complex, and while it would probably work even better on someone with slightly different coloring than mine, this is probably going to end up on the re-order list.

There are three more colors in the Serpens collection, all of which have fairly dark undertones. The next collection I ordered samples for is also mostly dark. I may have to rethink my color selections after these!

Here's the last two in the original order, Akurra and Ukasima - the next post will probably not be until the middle of the month, and will start the second order. Just for grins, I'm also doing the three free samples from the first order, which we'll get to in a minute.

First, an update from the last one of these: worn without a primer, Uktena breaks on me interestingly - the coppery note of the metallic migrates to the lid crease, but the olive and brass/gold tones don't, which makes it a satiny green metallic. I kind of liked the effect, honestly.

Okay, onward: Akurra is a golden chartreuse in the bag, with a lot of visible shimmer. On me dry, it's kind of hard to see; there's a gold shimmer with some green-gold sparkles, but the base color kind of blends in to my skintone, which I would not have expected. On me wet, it's mostly gold shimmer with a bit of chartreuse undertone and those same green-gold sparkles; the website describes it as more green than gold, but I'm getting the opposite ratio. Right now, I'm at "lovely color but not for me" with this one, but I'll have to wear it out instead of just hanging around the house to really get a feel for it.

Ukasima is grey-white with a soft luster in the bag; to be honest, it reminds me of chalk dust more than anything, although chalk isn't that satiny. On me dry, it's a very light neutral grey with a sprinkling of iridescent sparkle. On me wet, it's a soft silvery color, not quite as light, with a satiny finish, more of the iridescent glitter, and a tiny bit of gold in the shimmer. I really like it, especially the wet effect; it's on the "maybe" list to re-order, though, because I'm having trouble thinking of cases where I would want a shadow color this light for anything other than highlights. I might just order another sample bag.

The first sample is called Mass-Produced Sentiment, and it's a color I can only describe as cocoa plum in the bag, with a light shimmer but no visible glitter. On dry, it's a cocoa brown with light magenta-pink sparkles. On wet, it's a duochrome, with a dark-chocolate undertone and a shimmery plum overlayer, with a few pink sparkles. It's an interesting effect, but I'm not sure it looks good on me, and I doubt I'll order more.

The second sample, Cephisso, is a light silvery lavender in the bag, a little lighter than Tarasque was. On dry, it's a medium-to-light silvery grey with some light pink sparkles and a little bit of metallic sheen. On wet, it's silvery-pewter with a satiny pink highlight sheen. Nice, but covers a lot of the same territory as Tarasque, and the color appears to no longer be availalbe even if I did want to re-order it. I'll probably use up the sample bag, though.

The third sample, Neptunalia, is a deep-ish seafoam green with visible glitter in the bag. On dry, it's a little thin color-wise and the glitter is more clearly aqua and gold, but there's very little change. Applying it wet makes the color deeper and greener, and the glitter pops a little more, but of all the ones I've tried so far this one has the least change from loose to dry to wet. The shade is a little too cool to be really flattering to me, although I might be able to pull off the wet shade if I henna my hair again.

This week's shades are Jormungandir, Gaasyendietha, and Ryujin.

Jormungandir is a rich, deep, vibrant purple with a hint of a metallic shimmer in the bag, and I was really eager to try it out - I love those sorts of royal purples. On me dry, though, it's a deep smoky blue-grey with just a hint of deep violet shimmer. On me wet, it's a sort of duochrome - deep matte blue-grey with an overlayer of satiny metallic magenta. It's pretty enough, and the website warned me this would happen (although they phrase it as a feature), but boy, is it a disappointment not to get that rich purple from the bag. I probably won't be ordering more, and I'm not even sure I'll use up what's in the sample bag, although I do like the wet effect (dry it's no use at all).

Gaasyendietha is a matte navy blue in the bag, almost velvety and with no visible sparkle or shimmer, although a few sparkles are visible when it's out of the bag and loose. On me wet, it's a deep smoky grey-blue (visibly bluer than Jormungandr was) with multicolor glittery sparkles - mostly gold, teal, and pink. On me wet, it's a velvety midnight navy blue with lots of multicolor glittery sparkles; they were going for a starfield effect and pretty much got it. It's nice dry and very pretty wet; I'll have to wear it a few more times before I decide whether or not I think it's flattering to me specifically, but right now I'm thinking it'll be on the re-order list.

Ryujin is a shimmery soft teal-green in the bag, almost but not quite verging on metallic. On me dry, it's a soft grey-green with a light teal shimmer and some magenta and gold sparkles. On me wet, it's a rich teal-green with a light gold metallic overtone and scattered magenta sparkles. Both the wet and dry effects are flattering to my skin tone; the wet effect is gorgeous in its own right. The website claims that there are cocoa undertones, but I don't see any; regardless, this is very much on the re-order list.

I'm going to order more of Shimchong, Ryujin, and probably Tarasque, and order the remaining samples in the collection, I think. The next three colors all have a lot of green in them, although none of them are pure greens.

The first three colors in the set I've tried on myself were Nidhoggr, Shimchong, and Coatlicue.

Nidhoggr is a metallic bronze-brown with brassy highlights in the bag. On me dry, it's just a plain cool-ish medium-brown with a bit of metallic sparkle; applied wet (I'm using a glycerin & rosewater blend as the moisture, but plain water should work just as well) the bronze/brass metallic aspects come to the fore. I like it, but I don't love it. I'll definitely use up the sample (a sample bag is enough for about ten applications depending on how much you use), but so far this isn't on my list to order more.

Shimchong is a very light salmon-pink with a gold shimmer in the bag. On me dry, it's all but invisible except for some green-to-aquamarine sparkles and a subtle gold shimmer; the base color spread thin is a remarkably close match for my skin tone. Applied wet, the pink base is more apparent, but so is the gold, which becomes something closer to rose-gold. (The website claims that there's some violet in the shimmer as well; either it doesn't show up on me, or it just looks pink against my skin.) I didn't expect to like this much at all, since I'm not a fan of pinks, but I was absolutely wrong. It's a lovely highlight shade on me, and I will almost certainly be ordering a regular jar at the end of the testing cycle.

Coatlicue is a soft rose-red with a tonal shimmer in the same hue in the bag. That's pretty much what it looks like dry on me, too, except that the rose darkens a bit and the shimmer takes on some gold highlights as well as the rose. Applied wet, the rose base hue darkens, the rose shimmer takes on more of a magenta hue, and the rose-gold shimmer comes more to the fore, making this a bit metallic, almost coppery. I'm on the fence about how I feel about this one; I have enough reds in my skin tones that adding more doesn't always look good. I have the feeling that this is a great shade, but not for me. On the other hand, I have a shade of nail polish that I think it would look great with, and layering it with Shimchong got me some interesting effects. I'll have to try it with a few other highlight colors, I think.