Petrichor

When it comes to the lipsticks that I have bought, use, and love...

I keep my faves in my vanity drawer for ease of reach

Sadly, I can never tell what I'm reaching for...

Oh no, I must open every one or read the bottom and hope that my memory serves me well and delivers the right shade to my mind...

If not, I must open every one, still--

Below, we have our palette and we have our 24 well inserts:

The Line Up!

So, I first figured that I would begin the process by showcasing all of the lipsticks that were going to be apart of this little project and then figuring out which of them were permanent, limited edition, viva glam, and already de-tubed.

This helped me confidently decide which lipsticks were to stay and which ones were to go.

(above) Limited Edition

(above) Viva Glam

(above) Permanent

(above) Previously de-tubed

and array of ALL categories

I swatched to decide if i needed in fact, every one i thought i would...

Dupe Alert!

To the left we have YSLs 'name'

& to the right we have MACs 'So Chaud'.

A match... the only difference is that "YSL" has an extreme glossy finish and 'So Chaud' is matter.

(above) with flash

(above) without flash

Our second dupe...

To the left we have a de-tubed MACs 'Blankety' which has an amplified finish

& to the right we have L'Oreals #800 'Fairest Nude' which has a slightly more glossy finish.

These two are a complete match...

(above) with flash

(above) without flash

Back to work!

After deciding which lipsticks were staying after the first set of swatches, i lined them up

from light to dark, i would line them up.

These are all in order by shade, alone.

It made it easier to swatch for finish, opacity, and figure out which lipsticks would go in which well in each palette.

Time to Organize; Categorize!

Above and below are of the last line up for the first palette...

Too excited and impatient to leave one palette solely for neutrals, i decided to truly commit to a basic scale

(nudes, nudes transitioning to pinks, pinks, pinks transitioning to purples, purples, purples to plums)

These were organized in this order:

-Color (following the scale in the parenthesis, above)

-Shade

-Opacity

I then placed them in the order in which they would go into the wells and be shown in the palette:

The second Palette would consist of this basic scale:

(corals, corals to fuchsia, fuchsias to magentas or pinks with an orange-y undertone,

orange-y reds, reds, deep reds, wines)

Kept my palettes sanitized and ready:

When it came down to tools and how i actually filled the wells, well...

#1 - I took a cosmetic spatula and palette(not shown)

#2 - I took my lipstick and in a diagonal motion, i slid my spatula through the lipstick, being sure to only remove 1/3 of the visible lipstick(this applies to brand new lipsticks but i recommend you take small amounts as not to waste product that won't fit into the wells)

#3 - I took my little 1/3 of lipstick onto my palette (steel disk but anything of a flat surface will do) and i mashed is up to the best of my ability)

#4 - I then scraped up the mashed up lipstick and put into the desired well and made sure to do my best to smooth it out without messing up anything outside of that articular well

Continuation of steps...

#5 - After I had filled my wells and palette to my liking, I went along with several q-tips and slowly, carefully cleaned up the borders ( you want to make sure you do this before step 6)

#6 - On a low-medium(NEVER HIGH) setting, i held my blow-dryer above my lipsticks (about 3-7 inches) and worked around in steady circular movements to melt just the top layer of product and sort of evenly spread out the product in each well

#7 - I then, softly cried to myself, all in memory of the old display of my pretty babies...