Thanks Tanya! or bareMinerals Nude Beach Eyeshadow

One of the perils of working at the mall is the knowledge about all the current sales and deals going on at the other stores, which inevitably results in a lot of shopping. Example: Bare Escentuals Friends & Family sale that was going on for a couple days last week and the subsequent purchase of the bareMinerals Eyecolor in Nude Beach, very much inspired by Tanya from pixi2woo, who might as well be the sweetest make-up guru in the history of YouTube.

 I knew I wanted to look at Nude Beach because of Tanya's recommendation, but what immediately sold me on the shade was the fact that it is actually a very light... taupe. As you probably know by now, that's all it takes for me to buy an eyeshadow on the spot.

Ordinarily, I'm not a huge loose eyeshadow wearer - it's not that I don't like the effect, it's just pure laziness that stops me from reaching for my gorgeous little pots of sparkle and shine. However, I've been quite bored with my eyeshadow choices as of late, so in the hopes of breaking my little routine, I decided to give this one a try.

Nude Beach is a very light golden taupe with fine multidimensional shimmer; as you can see in the arm swatches, there's a little bit of silver, gold, pink and even green and blue sparkles. The formulation is finely milled with minimal fall out and very decent wear time on top of a primer - it also works very nicely foiled or used with a 'pigment glue' like Fyrinnae Pixie Epoxy. On the eyes, it reads as a shimmery wash of champagney taupe and makes a beautiful inner corner highlight, just as Tanya said.

The eyeshadow also inspired me to start using my other pigments a little more often and so far I'm really pleased with the result. Nude Beach also pairs gorgeously with another bareMinerals purchase I made on the day, but more on that later...

Do you ever wear loose eyeshadows? What are your favorite brands and shades?