*Disclaimer: I own every single one of these products, so I am speaking from first experience of how great these products are*
With the obsession of becoming a beauty influencer on YouTube being in full effect, more and more makeup brands are collaborating with them to promote both the influencer and their own brand. Brands like Morphe, Colourpop and Anastasia Beverly Hills are three brands that continue to do collaborations with different beauty influencers, or beauty gurus.
Beauty influencers are the YouTubers that make videos for a living by reviewing makeup and doing makeup tutorials, which seems like a dream job for most nowadays. They even get free makeup, known as PR (public relations) packages to review on their channel that brands send them to hype up their product.
Some of these YouTubers are lucky enough to get in contact with a popular brand to create an eyeshadow palette, or even a whole collection. This can be huge for most Youtubers because they are able to boost their following and they get to create something most dream of doing.
Kathleen Fuentes, known as KathleenLights on YouTube, has been collaborating with Colourpop for more than four years, now. Starting off with a couple simple “lippie stix” and liquid lipsticks, Kathleen was able to get her name out and create some of her own things. With colors like Point Zero and Aquarius, she was able to dabble in the creations, which lead her to greater and bigger collaborations with the brand. Within the past two years, she has created two eyeshadow palettes which have all sold very well. Her Dream St. Palette and The Zodiac Palette were made about a year apart, yet both palettes can be used as one cohesive palette, just like Fuentes has mentioned in multiple of her videos. The Dream St. Palette has more of a theme with neutral colors with a fun pop of pink and a couple warm tone blues. The Zodiac Palette has more of a variety of color channeling everyone’s inner zodiac sign. Each palette is different in their own way, yet they are both extremely pigmented and there are so many looks you can make with either. She now continues to expand her Zodiac collection by adding pigments and lipsticks and even branches out to make different collections. You can find her collections here.
Before collaborations were even a huge thing, Nicole Guerriero made a highlighting palette with Anastasia Beverly Hills. ABH is known for their blinding highlighting palettes, so making your own was a huge deal. In early 2017, the palette make its way around the internet having many other influencers reviewing her palette. Her palette may not come out of a lot of people’s mouths anymore, but it was definitely a big step for the brand and the YouTuber. With six amazing highlighting shades, there is definitely at least one shade for everyone to have blinding cheekbones. You can find this product at Sephora or the Anastasia Beverly Hills Website for $40.
Jaclyn Hill has been in her audience’s hearts for a while, and when she announced her collab with Morphe, everyone went crazy. Her first release went really well, but after getting some iffy reviews, she re-released her palette making sure every shadow had the perfect formula. Her palette is the perfect mix of natural shadows with a pop of color, yet all of the colors are totally wearable for everyday. In the past year, she released four new smaller eyeshadow palettes with Morphe because she had so many unused shadows that she felt she needed to release. Hill even made her own brushes with Morphe! She has definitely continued to shine in the YouTube world and doesn’t show any sign of slowing down. You can purchase her collection on the Morphe website, any Morphe store, or in Ulta.
Morphe has continued thriving, especially after collabing with James Charles. Charles has definitely made a name for himself over the last year. He’s just a 19 year old making YouTube videos at his new LA home, yet he has over 15 million subscribers on his channel. There was once a meme surfing the internet called “Flashback Mary,” where Charles mistakenly wore face powder that made his face look white in pictures. Because of this meme going viral, Charles gained more followers, yet he still stuck to his normal makeup tutorials and reviews and he has definitely learned from his past mistakes. In 2018 the internet exploded with news that Charles would be teaming up with Morphe to make his own eyeshadow palette. He always makes sure to mention in every video to use his code “James for 10% off,” with the brand, and this time, buyers can use it to purchase his own palette. Usual Morphe palettes come with 35 shades, but Charles decided to make a 39 shadow palette, highlighting his top seven colors for a natural smokey eye. The rest of the palette has a variety of hues and colors making it almost impossible to figure out a definitive number of looks you can make. Some shadows are regular shadows, some are glitters and others are pressed pigments which make it a little harder to work with, yet with a lot of practice, the looks will be worth the effort. You can find his palette, if it’s ever back in stock, on the Morphe website, Morphe stores, or in Ulta for $40.
There are hundreds of other collabs out there, but these are some of the best of the best! All products mentioned are definitely recommended for anyone to try.
Honorable mention (because it’s not sold anywhere anymore): BH Cosmetics Carli Bybel Palette. This palette was the perfect “first” palette because it had very basic shades that were easy to use, AND there was even a couple highlighting shades that were perfect to use as an eyeshadow as well. To top it all off, it had a wonderful price tag. I still use this palette today and when I hit pan on the colors, I’ll be very sad knowing I can’t buy it anymore.