I’ve been trying out a bunch of products from essence over the past few months. Some of these things truly surprised me because they were just so good but as always, there were a few duds. I’m going to start these reviews will my favorite, the Dancing Green Eyeshadow Palette.

The Dancing Green Eyeshadow Palette is $4.00 and contains six shades; two mattes, one satin and three metallics. The packaging is plastic with a snap closure and a mirror. This is a small palette, about the size of a credit card.

I typically do pros and cons for most of my reviews but I truly have no cons for this palette. I think the color story is beautiful and all of the shades work well together. The shadows are also very blendable, despite being pigmented. While you’re not going to be able to create a ton of different looks with this tiny palette, it does provide enough versatility to get a few solid looks. I’m going to share the two I created with it after the swatches and shade descriptions.

Swatches & Shade Descriptions:

These eyeshadows do have names but no shade descriptions so I will describe them. I’ll be going from left to right, top row to bottom row. This photo was taken with flash to show off the sparkle.

• You Can Dance- satin cream
• Feel The Beat- metallic olive toned gold
• Rock Music- metallic forest green
• Watch That Scene- matte taupe brown
• Night Is Young- matte forest green
• Only Seventeen- metallic olive toned silver

Eyeshadow Looks:

I created two looks using this palette. I almost always use an eyeshadow primer and set my primer with a cream or white colored shade, which this palette does contain.

I love both of the looks I created with this palette but this one is definitely the more neutral of the two. Looks like this are an easy way to incorporate color but still be “wearable.”

1. I set my primer with You Can Dance.
2. I blended Watch That Scene into my crease and applied it on the outermost part of my lid.
3. I applied Feel The Beat over the rest of my lid.
4. I applied Only Seventeen in my inner corner and on my brow bone.
5. I lined my water line with Night is Young.
6. I smudged Rock Music on my lower lash line.

For this look, I wanted to really focus on those beautiful greens and I was SO impressed. I did use the e.l.f. Mint Melt Eyeshadow Stick in Ice Creame in my inner corner. That shadow stick goes really well with this palette.

1. I set my primer with You Can Dance.
2. I blended Night Is Young into my crease and smudged it on my lower lash line.
3. I applied Rock Music on to my lid.
4. I used my finger to lightly tap Only Seventeen on top of Rock Music; over the inner half of my lid.
5. I lined my water line with Watch That Scene.

Brushes Used:

• Crease Brush
• Flat Eyeshadow Brush
• Small Angled Brush
• Smudge Brush
• Eye Crease Brush
• Blending Brush, I used this brush to blend out the edges and set my primer.

If you are curious about any of the other products on my face, you can find these looks in my recent posts on Instagram.

I truly don’t understand how this palette can be so good and only be $4.00. I’m really curious about the other palettes in this collection but I’m going to hold off on buying anymore for now. I highly recommend this mini palette, though, if you’re wanting some excellent shadows.

Next up is the Pretty Natural Hydrating Foundation. This foundation is $7.00 and you get one fluid ounce of product. It’s packaged in a squeeze tube bottle, my personal favorite. It’s available in 29 shades and I have Neutral Ivory. This is supposed to be a neutral tone but I think it leans more warm. This foundation claims to have medium coverage with a natural finish. It also contains hyaluronic and aloe extract.

My skin type is combination with large pores and acne scars.

I like this foundation. I would even go so far as to say I really like it but I don’t know that I love it. First of all, this is not a hydrating foundation. I found it to be a satin, almost matte formula. That is my favorite kind of foundation formula so I liked this aspect of it BUT if you’re wanting this for the hydration, you’re not going to get that. I did find this foundation to be easy to blend and long wearing as long as I used a primer and plenty of powder. If I didn’t take steps to lock it in place, it wore off like crazy around my nose and chin. However, even though it wore much better with primer and powder, it still didn’t look great at the end of the day. It also wasn’t totally crease proof, even with powder, but most foundations aren’t.

The first two pictures are of my skin with nothing on it and the second two are with one layer of the foundation. You can still see some blemishes and darkness peeking through but the coverage is a pretty solid medium.

These four pictures are of my finished makeup on different days. I am wearing various concealers because this foundation didn’t always have the coverage level that I wanted. I really liked how my makeup looked all of these days and liked how this foundation looked on me overall.

In the picture on the left, I was wearing the e.l.f. Matte Oil Control Primer and in the picture on the right, I was not wearing primer. The difference was pretty significant, at least to me. The foundation on its own really breaks down and doesn’t last past four to six hours.

Overall, this is a good foundation… but not great. I don’t think people with dry skin would love it because it’s more matte but I don’t think people with oily skin would love it either because it breaks down so easily. To really like this formula, you would need normal to combo skin and have a primer and/or a powder that really works well for you.

I picked up two of the brand’s new primer releases, the Skin Lovin’ Sensitive Primer and the Poreless Putty Primer. Both are $6.00, contain one fluid ounce of product and are in squeeze tube packaging. The Skin Lovin’ Sensitive Primer is moisturizing and non-comedogenic. It’s also free from fragrances, alcohol, silicone, parabens and mineral oil. The Poreless Putty Primer uses coconut oil, squalane and hyaluronic acid to smooth the skin.

I don’t like either of these primers but I LOATHE the Poreless Putty Primer. It is so unbelievably sticky and it’s impossible to blend foundation on top of it. The Skin Lovin’ Sensitive Primer isn’t really bad, it simply does nothing. It’s basically a moisturizer so it adds an unnecessary step because you could just… use moisturizer. I don’t recommend either of these products.

The All About Matt Fixing Powder is $4.00 and you get 0.28 ounces of product. Its packaging is cheap plastic that can break easily so be careful if taking this powder in a bag. This is a pretty straight forward product; what you see is what you get. There’s nothing fancy about this powder BUT it does work really well. I don’t tend to use it all over my face because it can leave a white cast but I do like to apply it where I get the oiliest. This is a solid powder and I recommend it.

essence recently came out with a skincare line so I decided to pick up a few things. My favorite product of the three is the Hello Good Stuff Milky Face Moisturizer. This moisturizer is $7.00 and you get one fluid ounce of product. It’s packaged in a glass bottle with a pump. It contains turmeric to help with inflammation and vegan oat water to help with hydration. I don’t use this as a moisturizer on its own and instead use it as a serum. It has a very thin consistency and doesn’t quite provide as much moisture as I need but I still love using it. If you’re looking for a moisturizing serum type product or a thin moisturizer, check this one out.

My next favorite product is the Hello Good Stuff Depuff Eye Serum. This serum is $6.00 and you get 0.5 fluid ounces of product. It’s packaged in a squeeze tube bottle. It contains hyaluronic acid, caffeine and vegan collagen; all help with moisture, skin elasticity and inflammation. I wouldn’t say that this a great moisturizing eye cream but it has a cooling, gel formula that makes it perfect for helping with puffiness. I think it’s good in addition to using other moisturizers.

Last, I picked up the Lip Care Booster. It’s $3.00 and you get 0.17 ounces of product. When I bought this, I thought it was just a lip balm but it’s actually a lip scrub/balm… supposedly. The scrubbing particles are too fine to really scrub the lips and the balm is garbage. This product really dried my lips out and I don’t recommend it.

Final Thoughts:

Since buying these products, I’ve actually been testing out a couple of more things from the brand so you’ll see another essence post soon! I’ve found some true staple products but also found some that just went straight in the trash😬 Let me know what your essence must haves are! Thanks for reading and have a great day!