Benefit Cosmetics CheekParade

Benefit Cheek Parade palette is by far one of the best DEALS that I've seen this year. You get 5 full sized powders and brush in a very cute and stable packaging for $58. 

In the palette you get the following powders:

Hoola
Hoola Lite *NEW*
Galifornia *NEW*
Dandelion
Rockateur

I checked and double checked, you do get the same size of each powder as you would if you  bought the individuals. Which again comes out to a great deal. An individual powder is $29 and you get 5 so that's $145, individually. This is $58 and thus a saving of $87. What I thought was strange was some of the powders are quite a bit different in size than others. Same individually. For example, Galifornia and Rockateur are .17 oz. Hoola and Hoola Lite are .28 oz. Dandelion is .25 oz. And yes, just to confirm, I did check the palette AND the individuals and it was the same. So if you bought Rockateur you'd get .28 oz of product for $29 and then if you bought Hoola you'd get .17 oz for the same price ($29). It's not a big deal it's about a 3 gram difference though. 

So like I said this is a really really good deal there is no denying it. Here's my issue, which I feel bad for even saying cause it is such a good deal. I bought it because I really didn't have an Benefit powder products except for a few. I love them but they just aren't ideal for storage. They're quite bulky. I digress, this palette is much easier to store, I got to try two new powders, one blush I hadn't tried before (Rockateur), and I get two that I already know I like Hoola and Dandelion. I only have those two in the mini version. So I was sold. 

When the palette came it was beautiful, heavily fragranced though. Which I don't mind. Just be warned it's really heavily perfumed. I looked at it and it was goreous. The duochrome on Galifornia was so stunning because it wasn't chunky glitter it was just a sheen of gold over coral. The with Rockateur is was stunning as well with a more shimmery finish to it. The rest were as expected since they are all matte. 

When I finally went to use it for the first time, after I was done just looking at it lol, I went in for Galifornia. Turns out  in my palette, that golden sheen was  a golden over lay. Like a spray of gold on the top layer and not throughout the whole powder. Also turns out that it's not very pigmented. I was super bummed so I swatched the rest of the shades really quick and they all have good pigmentation (even Rockateur did great when applied although it swatches on the more sheer side). So I did what I could with Galifornia but ultimately had to finish it up with Dandelion, because you could not see it except one cheek had a golden sheen and the other did not. 

The next time I used it I went for Rockateur because I wanted to know if it was an overlay of shimmer. It was not, it's actually my favorite because I love plum-y blushes and it's a buildable blush as well. So it swatches kinda subtle but it applies beautifully and you can control how deep it gets so easy, plus it's great combined with cooler toned contours. So, I tried Hoola Lite the other new shade and it had very nice pigment. I don't particularly care for the shade of it, but it's the true shade and there's nothing wrong with the formula that I can find, it just doesn't look right on my skin tone. Obviously I love Dandelion and Hoola. 

So I will provide finger swatches, brush swatches won't be helpful in my opinion with cheek products because you just dust blush on, you don't pack it on like you do on an eye lid. All in all because I love the other shades, I do love this palette and will keep it. It's a bummer that Galifornia is a dud because it looked stunning in the pan. If you're wondering yes the gold sheen is gone from the blush so it really was just an over spray or something. I wouldn't even be that irritated if the blush at least had pigment because I genuinely like the corally pink color but it doesn't unfortunately. 

My thoughts are it's still a good deal, if you like the other shades, even if mine (I won't say all because who knows maybe I have a dud, it's happened before.) had just four or even three good powders and one that wasn't because I will use those powders for sure. I might exchange it for the same palette and see if it's the same case because in reality I would love to be able to use Galifornia, however I might just leave it as is.  It's not like I don't have that shade in some other blush. I won't tell you to go buy it or save your money because it's personal preference, I'll leave that up to you. I will say I'm not exactly happy, but it's not a complete loss. So I wanted to get this review up before the sale on the 18th in case you were planning on getting it. My recommendation is possibly swatch it in store if you can.

Swatches down below

So from the top to bottom we have one layer of:

Hoola
Hoola Lite
Galifornia
Dandelion
Rockateur

Now this was taken with the flash on. Dandelion looks pretty light, because it is a paler pink of a blush and I have pale skin but it's very noticeable in person and does great on the cheeks. Rockateur is a darker blush in the pan but it's a buildable blush with a sheen to it and that's why I love it. It's very noticeable on my skin when I apply it and I don't build it up much at all. It's also not glittery on my cheeks. Hoola Lite doesn't fair to well with my skin tone. Hoola is lovely. Galifornia doesn't show up at all on my cheeks no matter how much I layer. 

This is my palette now. Taken with flash as the one on top was of when I first opened it. You'll see that the golden sheen to Galifornia is completely gone and Rockateur being the other non-matte shade still looks the same and has the same sheen or shimmer to it after using it several times. I just wanted to add this so that you could visibly see that the golden sheen was completely gone without the pattern being disrupted at all from over use, or tampering with it.