Elizabeth Arden Summer 2014 Swatches: Summer Escape Bronzers, Gloss Stick, Highlighters, Cream Eyeshadows

I have lots of swatches from Elizabeth Arden's Summer 2014 Summer Escape Collection for you guys! This includes the Pure Finish Summer Escape Bronzing Powders, Pure Finish Cool Radiance Highlighter, Pure Finish Cream Eye Shadows, and Beautiful Color Gloss Sticks! I was at a bloggers' event, and we were supposed to give ourselves a makeover using the Summer 2014 products. And I did that, but I was also busy swatching, because that's what bloggers do, right?

Elizabeth Arden Summer 2014's Summer Escape has a wide range of products to offer.

As you can tell, I pretty much swatched everything I could get my hands on! So yes, there is a lot for us to get started on, so without further ado, let's start! The swatches are in indoors warm lighting, and I've tried to correct them as much as I could, but if they aren't perfect (and they aren't), please forgive the lighting!

The first thing that caught my eye was the Pure Finish Summer Escape Bronzing Powder, just because it was the biggest product. These are shimmery bronzers, and there are two shades, Warm Glow and Deep Glow.


Elizabeth Arden Pure Finish Summer Escape Bronzing Powder.
From the swatches below, you can see Deep Glow is a bit too dark for me (roughly NC20-ish skin colour), but Warm Glow looks pretty alright blended out.


Elizabeth Arden Pure Finish Summer Escape Bronzing Powder Swatches
After that, was the Pure Finish Cool Radiance Highlighter. Now I happen to have a weakness for highlighter and blush, so I was all ready to drool over this. As it turns out, this is a stick form cream highlight, and is a very sheer pink with large bits of gold glitter. So not exactly up my alley, since big glitter isn't my favourite type of shimmer. I know my camera is all out of focus in the photo below, but you can sort-of-see the discrete specks of gold glitter. It's large enough to see with the naked eye.


Elizabeth Arden Pure Finish Cool Radiance Highlighter: Look at all that glitter!
Below, swatches of the Cool Radiance Highlighter. Sheered out, it looks fine (if a tad glittery), but I wouldn't layer this on. The plus is that because the Highlighter stick goes on very sheer, so just a swipe or two is sufficient to get a dusting of the glitter. I think this was, honestly, the most disappointing of the products, because I really don't like big discrete glitter bits in my highlighters. But if you do, feel free to disregard my preferences and dig in!


Elizabeth Arden Pure Finish Cool Radiance Highlighter Swatches
Next, the Pure Finish Cream Eye Shadow. There are three shades, Sand Dollar (beige), Overboard (blue), and Anchors Away (taupey brown), all with some level of shimmer, although the shimmer is not a lot by any means. These are probably one of my favourite items - they have a nice light mousse-y, bouncy feel to them, not like the thicker or creamy-type cream eyeshadows. Anchors Away is totally my favourite - can you see that pretty taupe brown calling my name?


Elizabeth Arden Pure Finish Cream Eye Shadow: Beige, Blue, and Taupe!
Swatches are below. You can see that all the colours are very wearable, even the blue. I think this is partly because the shadows are pretty sheer, so you could wear just one layer of Overboard, and it would actually look fairly subtle. Of course, you could do like I did for swatches and layer the product to full opacity. And yes, isn't Anchors Away so gorgeous? When I tried them on my eyelids, they had pretty good lasting power, staying throughout the night, without shifting or fading.


Elizabeth Arden Pure Finish Cream Eye Shadow Swatches
Lastly, my favourite product from the Summer Escape range, the Beautiful Color Gloss Stick! Elizabeth Arden is on trend with these Gloss Sticks, because the whole world has been putting out these. These are good - I tried them on and they have nice pigmentation and texture and aren't drying, and all three colours are very pretty and wearable. The photos below show samples, so the actual products will look waay better than the below. I mean, Elizabeth Arden products don't come with labels stuck on with tape, so don't worry.


Elizabeth Arden Beautiful Color Gloss Stick Samples: The actual product looks way better.
Below, swatches of the Beautiful Color Gloss Sticks. It's so hard for me to decide on a favourite. I love Pink Sky, as it's absolutely perfect for everyday since its' a rosey-brown-pink that goes with every skintone, but I also love Sunset, which is not orangey as the name suggests, but rather a nice wearable red that's buildable, so you can wear it sheerly or to full opacity. And Coral Reef is one of the standout shades of the summer - a nice wearable coral with a hint of brightness. If there was only one thing I could get from this summer collection, this would definitely be on my to-buy list, for sure.


Elizabeth Arden Beautiful Color Gloss Stick Swatches: All lovely, wearable colours.
So there you go, quick swatches and my first impressions of the products! Below, I've included a photo of myself and some of the lovely bloggers at the event, because we gave ourselves a makeover with the Summer 2014 products, and Elizabeth Arden's new Flawless Finish Foundation, so I thought it's worth showing you guys how the makeup looks on (if you can see it in the photo). This is the only photo in my camera of me with other people (because, you know, I spent most of my time swatching like an anti-social dork), and I'm with Patricia and Charissa, both lovely, friendly, and just all-around relatable, nice personalities. I always love meeting them at events, they are super cool and easy to talk to.


In this photo (L-R): Patricia, Charissa, and yours truly.
Anyway, for makeup, all three of us are wearing our respective shades of Flawless Finish Perfectly Nude Makeup Foundation with SPF 15. I'm wearing shade Alabaster #2, I'm not sure what my friends are wearing but we didn't have all the shades available to test, since only 8 shades are available in Singapore. We had Linen #1, Alabaster #2, Vanilla Shell #3, Cream Nude #4, Natural #5, Warm Sunbeige #6, Buff #9, and Cameo #14. If I had to guess I'd probably guess that Charissa was wearing Vanilla Shell (the other lighter colour in the range) and Patricia was wearing Linen or Cream Nude (the two medium shades). Anyway, Patricia and I are both wearing the Sunset Beautiful Color Gloss Stick, and I found it interesting that the same shade looked different on both of us - I think the fact that it's not totally opaque means that our natural lip colours show through as well, which makes the shade slightly unique to each of us when worn. Charissa is wearing Coral Reef on her lips - and she looks great! I'm also wearing the Anchors Away and Sand Dollar Cream Shadows, but I don't think anyone can see it on my eyes in this photo. The blush I'm wearing is also an Elizabeth Arden colour which I can't remember, but likely was Beautiful Color Radiance Blush in Plum Perfection.

So, what would my picks be from the Elizabeth Arden 2014 Summer Collection? I'd say the Pure Finish Cream Eyeshadows, because they can be worn sheerly or layered and stay on pretty well, as well as of course the Beautiful Color Gloss Sticks, for their range of gorgeous, wearable, goes-with-any-skintone colours. For base products, the Flawless Finish Perfectly Nude Makeup Foundation also works well - but that's for another blogpost! All the Summer Collection items swatched here are limited edition (just to be clear, this doesn't apply to the Flawless Finish Perfectly Nude Makeup Foundation, so don't worry about that), so if you're thinking of getting any items, don't hesitate!