I adore the German brand Essence all their products are cruelty free and extremely affordable. I have so many favourites from their makeup range and since it launched into Wilko stores a couple of years ago its so much easier to get hold of all my Essence essentials.

Essence recently collaborated with four bloggers as part of the bloggers beauty secrets trend edition and gave them the opportunity to design their very own makeup palette & nail polish. I have been testing out the two products designed by the lovely Mary, who blogs over at Strike a Pose.

Essence Cosmetics Shape & Shadows Eye Contouring Palette

This palette is a multi use eye & brow palette and was inspired by glamorous Hollywood women who influenced style and fashion. It comes beautifully packaged in a sturdy cardboard flip top palette with a magnetic close and it has a fun geometric print.

Inside you get a fab sized mirror, which I did not expect to find as Essence is a more affordable brand but its nice to see that they have included one & I like the unusual shape of it.

Inside you get 4 shadows, a highlighter, a prime & fix brow wax and also a small dual ended brush. One end has an angled brush and the other a cute brow spoolie, I have to say I’ve been using this brush and its great, ideal travel size and the spoolie is fantastic as brushing through your bows to tame them and even out the product. Very cute indeed.

Three of the shadows are lovely neutral matte shades and these double up as both shadows and great brow colours too. I mix the two darkest colours to make the perfect shade to fill in my brows. The powder is pigmented and quite soft so they’re easy to blend and create that natural full brow. I don’t really use the wax as I prefer to set my brows with a clear gel but if you like wax then it is included in here.

These matte shades also work really well as eyeshadows and are great either all over the lid or blended out in the crease. They do take a little work to build up a good amount of colour on the lids and Hazel Grace is quite light so isn’t going to give yo too much payoff but I like to use this shade as a transition shade.

Marilyn Metallic is a beautiful copper rose and is my favourite shade in the palette. Its not too sparkly but it has the most pretty metallic finish and when the light catches it looks really nice. I have been wearing this packed on top of Audrey Highbrow and I love the two together.

The highlighter Billie Vanilli is a frosty cream and it looks nice under your brows and in the inner corners to add some brightness and add a little lift to your eye look. Its not a subtle highlight but if you like to add that extra illumination to your eyes & definition to your brows then its a pretty shade for that!

Essence Bloggers’ Beauty Secrets Nail Polish in All Eyes on Me

The nail polish wasn’t for me, its a pretty grey beige shade but it has a matte finish and I’m not personally a fan of that trend so I have passed it on to my sister in law & she loves it. So it wasn’t a complete fail. The nail polish was easy to apply, it dried evenly, the colour was pigmented and only needed one coat. I didn’t wear it for long so I can’t tell you if it has good staying power, but I did like the colour just not the finish.

Above are all four of the palettes & polishes from this collection. Which ones do you like the look of?

Essence is available exclusively nationwide at Wilko Stores & online at www.wilko.com