Lancôme Color Design Palette in Desert Sunset from the Bronze Diva Collection for Summer 2012

Lancôme is featuring a beautiful new Color Design Palette on its Bronze Diva display for Summer 2012: Desert Sunset ($49.50). How could I leave it at Saks?

Infinitely luminous and sensationally smooth, this limited-edition, all-in-one, six-shadow palette will brighten your eyes with shades of golden pink, orange, copper, and brown. Inspired by the desert sun and exotic mirages, this versatile new palette will allow you to create a full eye look for day or night. 

Wouldn't these shades catch your eye? The whole summer display is gorgeous, and I want more pieces. For now, I'll have to be content with the eye shadow palette. The other pieces I wanted had not arrived at Saks. A stick cream bronzer and two brilliant liquid eyeliners, along with Hydra-Balms are still calling my name.

I swatched the palette clockwise from top left to bottom right. I swatched all shades heavily with a sponge-tipped applicator, and I took my photos in full, late afternoon sun.

The shade at the top of my arm is the base shade. It has a creamy texture and isn't shimmery. It's called Light Beige, but I'd call it Light Pink. The pink shade, called Pink Coral, does shimmer and is a gorgeous pink. I see no coral in the shade. I can wear it without looking like an albino bunny.  The peach, called Shimmer Pink Peach, doesn't have as much shimmer as the other shades, but it is shimmery - not glittery - shimmery. If it has a pink hue in it, I have to wonder about the individual who "saw" that when naming the shade.

The perfectly named Deep Brown has a touch of charcoal in it. I love the shade. Copper is a vibrant shade; it will make blue and green eyes pop. The shimmering white gold (boringly called Beige) is a great highlighter.

The shadows have a nice creamy texture, allowing for easy application and adherence to the skin. Most of the shades apply lightly and sheerly with a brush. Layer them for a more dramatic look.

Lancôme suggests you create a warm eye for summer by applying the soft peach tone all over the lid as a base and then applying the copper shade to the lid, extending the color up to the crease. For a smoky eye, apply the bronze shade across lower lid and up to the crease. Sweep the deepest shade around the lash line, then sweep the gold shadow from the brow down to the crease color to highlight under the brow bone. You can line your eyes with the deep brown shade, applied wet or dry.

Use them however you like; these are pretty colors that will give you a beautiful complement to the eyeliners, bronzers, and lip colors for Summer 2012.  Lancôme's new collection is definitely worth a look-see. I recognized some of the items as repromotes (for example, the large Tropiques Minérale Bamboo Bronzer Compact), so make sure you know what you have from 2010 and 2011 before you choose. I'll buy more of the Bronze Diva Collection - the new releases - when they arrive at the store.

The collection should be currently available at a Lancôme counter near you. I purchased this palette at Saks and found it online at Macys.com.

Photo at top courtesy of Macy's; other photos by Best Things in Beauty