Growing up I think it is fair to say that the first celebrity Make-up Artist that I can remember was Barbara Daly. I have seen Barbara Daly makeup in Tesco for a while now and It is something that I have not paid a great amount of attention to.

Barbara Daly

However recently, whilst I was on the hunt for a replacement lipstick, ( see,What happens when your favourite lipstick is discontinued aka Lipstick Dramas) I decided to give Barbara’s line a go. I was most happy to see the quad I first picked up was made in Italy And so was the lipstick. So I merrily put three items into my basket thinking that all her products were made in Italy. in fact her quad eye- shadow  palette said produced in Italy for Tesco stores.It did not say anything about Barbara Daly. And another product did not say where it was made at all, so this got me wondering just how much involvement the make-up artist had in the manufacturing of the makeup line.

And if a makeup product does not say where it is from, you can pretty much guess it is the PRC The People’s Repulbic of China. Yes I have recently seen that some makeup lines are now just putting ” made in PRC.” for those of us who actually care where the make-up is made.

I decided to try out the quad. My thinking is, that if you can get your browns sorted or give a customer a good smokey eye, then it is worth trying out other products. I mean, how hard can it be? And the answer to that question is very hard Barbara, I am soooo disappointed.

I tried the colour first without a primer, but there was no colour pay-off.So I reached for my trusted Elizabeth Arden primer. This primer does help the colour stay on all day. I know because I have been using it on and off for years. I used this primer because it was colourless and I did not want to give the quad palette a helping hand.I had to work very hard to make these eyeshadows work. The darker colour does work,but lighter tones really needed water to give them a helping hand.

The best use for this palette it so use the highlighter wet, and the darker tone wet as a subtle under-eye liner. But it really needs to be used wet. My opinion is that far too much talc has been used in these eyesadows. In fact, on the ingredient list after MICA, TALC is the next ingredient listed.I cannot remember how much this quad was. I think they were only around the seven pound mark. But they are a very poor substituent for the Laura Geller Italian Baked colours that are very highly pigmented.

So the search goes on, not only for a good Italian makeup product that is an alternative to Laura Geller, but also for my lipstick replacement.