Sleek Au Naturel Palette Swatches

Sleek, the UK-based drugstore brand known for its wild array of bright colours (if you don't believe me, check out the Curacao Palette) has finally launched the first ever colour collection based on neutrals! The Nude Collection, released sometime last month, also has the distinction of being the first permanent collection - so if you've been despairing that you may not be able to get hold of the Au Naturel Palette before it sells out, don't worry!

As a neutrals kind of girl, I am so excited for the Au Naturel Palette, and if you saw my tweets online, you would know how excited I was. I am definitely glad that this gorgeous palette is going to be permanent! The palette comes packaged in the usual paper box, this time adorned with neutral beige flowers and decorative motifs on the box. Very pretty and feminine.



The Au Naturel Palette has a range of neutral shades, all named after things that are supposed to be reminiscent of the colour. It comes with a plastic sheet with the names over it. From what I can tell, it isn't exactly the same as Urban Decay's Naked Palette. The Sleek Makeup version has more matte shades, for one, and also, a lot of the beigey shades lean a little more yellow than the Urban Decay version. But seeing as I don't own the Urban Decay Naked Palette, I can't comment on much more than that.



First Row:
L-R: Nougat (light creamy matte beige), Nubuck (light creamy matte grey), Cappucino (matte light warm brown), Honeycomb (matte yellow-beige), Toast (matte orangey-beige), Taupe (light shimmery beige-brown-pink)

Second Row:
L-R: Conker (deep shimmery purple), Moss (shimmery olive green), Bark (matte dark grey-brown), Mineral Earth (deep shimmery cool brown), Regal (matte deep purple), Noir (matte black)

And here's a shot of the shades in the Au Naturel Palette, close up.



My favourite shades are Conker, because I love a good deep shimmery purple, and Moss, which is such a lovely deep olive green shade, which I also love. I also feel like these two shades have a certain dimension in them that gives them that slightly multi-dimensional look. I also like Mineral Earth, because a good cool brown is always a gorgeous staple to have in your wardrobe. My only complaint is that Taupe isn't quite taupe at all - it strikes me as being more of a colour along the lines of Stila's Kitten, but darker and more brown. To me, a taupe shade is more of a grey-brown with some purple thrown in - not quite what was in the palette.

But enough of my over-excited rambling. Here are swatches of the Au Naturel palette in all its gorgeousness:



First Row:
L-R: Nougat, Nubuck, Cappucino, Honeycomb, Toast, Taupe

Second Row:
L-R: Conker, Moss, Bark, Mineral Earth, Regal, Noir

And here are swatches of the right and left halves of the palette, respectively, just so you can see the neutral goodness up close and personal! Let's start with the left side of the palette:



First Row:
L-R: Nougat, Nubuck, Cappucino
Second Row:
L-R: Conker, Moss, Bark

And here's the right side:



First Row:
L-R: Honeycomb, Toast, Taupe
Second Row:
L-R: Mineral Earth, Regal, Noir

All in all, I feel that this is a pretty well-balanced palette of neutrals, and I do think that Sleek Makeup has done a good job of making this palette versatile despite being exclusively filled with neutral shades. The Au Naturel Palette has a good range of light and dark, shimmer and matte shades, so this palette easily multitasks as both a palette that can be used for work looks, as well as for deeper, smokey looks with a touch of drama. I'll be doing a few looks with this palette, both the light, wearable-in-the-office ones, as well as the more night-appropriate deeper looks, and I'm definitely looking forward to sharing them with you guys in the next few days!

(Product was sent for review. Review is my complete and honest opinion. I am not affiliated with/compensated by the company.)