City Color Glo Holiday 2011 Collection

City Color is a brand that's been stealing my heart lately when it comes to ridiculously affordable drugstore cosmetics. Found at Rite Aid (recently there have been Walgreens sightings as well), I still contend that City Color makes my favorite mint green polish of all time. Also, their pink jelly polish is the one that enabled me to do those Deborah Lippmann Candy Shop dupes a while back.

Recently I spotted the City Color Holiday 2011 collection, Glo, at Rite Aid (click here to see the nail colors). All of the products in the Glo collection retail for $2.99 each.

City Color was kind enough to send me a few products from the Glo collection recently, which I'd like to show you today.

First, here are the displays:

 City Color Glo Bronzer and Blush Trios

(retail: $2.99 each, 0.169 oz)

 City Color Glo Eyeshadow Palettes

(retail: $2.99 each, 0.067 oz)

City Color Glo Lipglosses

(retail: $2.99 each, 0.2 oz)

Here are the products I received for review:

Let's start with the lipglosses:

 City Color Glo Lipglosses

(retail: $2.99 each, 0.2 oz)

 

In real life, the darker shade is actually more of a blueish magenta as opposed to the hot pink shade you see here. The lighter shade is very accurate in these photos.

I'm sorry that I couldn't photograph the ingredients labels--the ingredients are printed on clear stickers placed on the side of each gloss and it was impossible for my camera to pick up the tiny white font.

I believe that these glosses might be the LEAST sticky glosses I have ever encountered at the drugstore. I literally cannot feel one bit of stickiness when I wear them, which is great if you don't like your glosses sticky. However, because of the lack of stickiness, I didn't experience good staying power with these--I could get about an hour of wear-time from each shade before I felt the need to reapply. Each shade provides a medium amount of pigmentation (not extremely sheer, yet not insanely pigmented). Both shades contain shimmer and sparkle:

The flavor is pretty much nonexistent, but the fragrance is a sweet strawberry that reminds me of Bonne Bell lipglosses.

Next up, the Bronzer/Blush trio:

 City Color Glo Bronzer and Blush Trios

(retail: $2.99, 0.169 oz)

There are actually two different bronzer/blush palettes in this collection, and I received the one with a pink shade in it (the other palette contains more traditional bronzer shades).

As you can see in the pic above, each shade had a subtle sparkly sheen to it, but on the skin there really isn't too much sparkle:

I was quite pleasantly surprised with the wearable shades in this palette! You could easily wear each on its own, but my favorite way to wear them is to run my brush across all three and wear them mixed together like this:

When all three shades are combined, they produce a beautiful pinky-peach-bronze shade that I think would be flattering on a variety of skintones. I found this compact to be finely milled and easy to apply and blend, although it does produce a bit of fallout which will mostly be evident on the compact itself. Once I apply it to my cheeks, I don't experience powder flying everywhere--it's just a bit powdery when you're picking up the color from the actual compact. The staying power was impressive given the low retail price of this trio. I can get about 4-5 hours on my oily skin before I start to see fading.

And finally, the eyeshadow palettes:

 City Color Glo Eyeshadow Palette (blue)

(retail: $2.99, 0.067 oz)

All of the shadows in these palettes have the same finish--they've got the same type of shimmery sheen that I've seen in other drugstore shadows from brands like LA Colors, Princessa, etc.

When worn alone (without primer), the pigmentation of these shadows isn't spectacular, but over primer the colors do become a lot more vivid and intense.

Swatched on bare skin, no primer:

Swatched over my CoverGirl Intense Shadowblast Primer in Beige Blaze:

Next up, the grey palette:

 City Color Glo Eyeshadow Palette (grey)

(retail: $2.99, 0.067 oz)

Swatched on bare skin, no primer:

Swatched over my CoverGirl Intense Shadowblast Primer in Beige Blaze: 

I found that some of the shadows in these palettes were a bit more crumbly and powdery than others. The darker shades seemed to be more firm and easier to work with.

All in all, I think the City Color Glo collection has a few gems that might make a nice addition to your makeup stash, and they certainly won't break the bank! I was very pleasantly surprised by the bronzer/blush trio, which had nice pigmentation and was easy to blend. The glosses have no sticky factor to them, which is nice if you don't like your glosses sticky, and the shadow palettes contain some nice shades that come alive with the help of a primer.

Have you spotted the City Color Glo displays in your area yet? I can't wait to try some of the polishes next.

A sample of this product was given to Nouveau Cheap for editorial purposes, either directly from the manufacturer or from the agency that works on behalf of the manufacturer. All reviews on NouveauCheap.blogspot.com are the honest opinion of its author and editorial samples do not, in any way, affect the outcome of product reviews.\