Urban Decay Ammo Palette

I am one of these girls that seems to stick to the more neutral shades of shadows - give me a 100-pan palette of nudes, taupes and golds and I'm set for life. The Ammo Palette from Urban Decay looked a little scary to me at first sight - my eyes instantly darting to the end, golden toned shades. The thing is, I have brown eyes and I know that greens and purples are good colours for me to wear - it's just hard to step out of that zone I have got so comfortable in for every-day make up.

When I swatched the shades from the Ammo Palette I had a nice surprise - for these are such beautiful versions of green, pinks and turquoise that it made me want to give them a go. The ten shades are all best selling Urban Decay shadows, and it's easy to see why.

The palette is a thin, compact (easy to transport and put in your make up bag) mirrored palette, which comes with a travel sized 11ml sized Primer Potion - which is a great, colourless eyeshadow primer which helps to show the intensity of the colours, and helps them to last longer without creasing. There is also a small synthetic Good Karma eyeshadow brush inside the palette, which is a nice tapered shape making it easy to use (although not that great for blending),

 I had to do two lot of swatch photos - my kids are off school and wanted to get involved, natch!

There are some truly amazing colours in this palette. My favourite has to be Maui Wowie - it looks so metallic, like no other powder shadow I've seen before. Mildew is an amazing mossy green colour with hints of gold - just beautiful, and Last Call is a gorgeous cranberry shade - those are the stand out shades for me, although I think I can get good wear from all of the colours.

I like that there are neutral shades thrown in there with the colours - it means you can shake up a neutral look, or go for full-on colour. The colours have been laid out in a way that the shade opposite it compliments it perfectly - all of these pairs could be used with the lighter colour on the inner part of the lid, the darker on the outer part, and a little Oil Slick in the crease or outer V for definition. You could add some Polyester Bride to the tear duct and under the brown bone too - there are so many options!

The palette has been around for a while, but it has recently been re-released with a new formula for the shadow - they feel really creamy and velvety and really do pack some punch colour-wise. You do have to be careful when you apply - there is micro glitter in a few of the shades, which can fall down when you apply, so apply in thin layers rather than loads of product in one go - they're so pigmented anyway that you really don't need much.

Here are a couple of looks I created using the colours from this palette

For this look I used Maui Wowie all over the lid, then added chopper to the middle of my eye close to my lash line and blended it out to the outer corner of my eye. I then did the same with Last Call a little further over, and added black eyeliner which I blended out with a brush. I added Last Call under my lower lash line too.

For this look I applied Sin to the inner third of my eye, then Smog in the crease of my eye and blended out. I then added Mildew all over the rest of my lid and blended the colours together, then a small amount of Oil Slick in the outer corner. I used Mildew under the eye and finished with liquid liner and mascara.

There are really so many combinations that could be created with this palette - for £23 I think it is amazing value for money!

Urban Decay is available at House of Fraser, Debenhams and online at lookfantastic.com and beautybay.com