Safety Wardens, Old Boyfriends and the Dior Eye Reviver Palette

There's nothing safer than a slightly shimmery nude palette. Nude palettes, like brown shadows, are a safety warden in the makeup world; a pleasant smile, a quick hand across the street, and you're good to go. Nude palettes, giving guidance for non-offensive eye looks since Day 1.

Testing new products can be a gamble. Eyeliners can smudge and foundation can disappear or be the wrong shade (nothing builds confidence quite like suffering a day of Oompha-loompha skin tone), And during a week of important work and personal meetings, I knew I wanted to be 'safe'. I also really wanted to dive into the Dior VIP goodie bag so I made the zero risk choice to test the Dior Eye Reviver Palette ($63CDN). Safety can be a good thing especially when one of my personal meetings was with an ex-partner I hadn't seen in 4.5 years.

A combination of three things created a interesting confluence of events last week. Firstly, life can be extremely unexpected. Secondly, I often force myself into awkward situations in order to 'grow up'. Thirdly, an ex was in town and suggested we grab coffee. Not hearing from him for an extremely long time and ending the relationship on a somewhat tumultuous note made me hesitate but I agreed. Meeting exes always seem like a bad idea in the movies, but I had a number of reasons to reach out and was genuinely curious to catch up.

 No girl goes into this situation without considering what they're going to look like. My aesthetic should immediately say, I'm doing so awesome right now (which I am) and I look great and you missed the boat (even though we've both moved on to better partnerships with no regrets). My makeup had to looked easy, effortless and classic. It's always nice to make an old partner miss you just a little and bold colors all up in their face isn't the way to do that (especially when they knew you pre-blog). For such an occasion I needed a safety warden palette.

Honestly, the palette worked out quite well during the whole week. The colors were very pretty and the shimmer is just right, they also blended extremely well. My favorite is shade 4. The color combination didn't give too much variety but I managed a few different looks and opted for dark smokey taupe eyes over catch-up coffee with my ex (I hate calling him that). The lighter shades were great for my work meetings.

The liner took multiple passes to reach some opacity. The brush was good but the top liner layer had to be penetrated to reach product that smoothed on easily. The color wasn't very intense and resulted in a soft liner finish which didn't smudge or disappear during the day. I'm not a fan of going over the liner repeatedly but I do enjoy the resulting softness.

This palette is a super effective safety warden. It would be the type of a warden that truly enjoyed their job and chatted with the street crosser before wishing them well and along their way. As far as safety with personal meetings, this also excelled. The smokey taupe gave me a sultry look without being too sexy and the lighter shades made me looked polished and put together. In case you're on the edge of your seat about how it all went, after some clearing of the air and explanations on how it turned out the way it did, we had a great time catching up and I'm glad we've grown up enough to move forward as friends (and yes, David knows and is perfectly fine with it). This has been an expected but positive shift in my life trajectory for sure.

How do you feel about meeting old partners? Do you have any Safety Warden products?