Tarte Off The Cuff blush and bronzer palette review & swatches

Tarte Off The Cuff blush and bronzer palette

I'd been musing over getting some Tarte Amazonian Clay blush, but the fact that Tarte has no distribution in Europe and the only way to get it was to order one on E-bay for twice the retail price plus p&p successfully put me off the idea.

However, when I saw the Off the Cuff Holiday palette, I treated it as a now or never oppotrunity to get my hands on not one but four blushes and a bronzer.

The five products come in a gorgeous palette, which looks like a clutch bag I'd love to take with me for carnival parties. It's shimmery silver with a small logo in the corner and comes tied with a black band with a gold bow, which actually turns out to be a cute bracelet.

The palette has a magnetic closure, which works surprisingly well, and a large mirror in the lid.

The blushes themselves are all embossed with Tarte signature print, symbolising a jungle and there's 4.5g of product in each pan.

CRAVE is a vivid coral pink, matte. I feel this shade will be my spring favourite.

DAZZLED is a dark mauve with with golden sparkle, which somehow fails to fransfer onto the skin. It might also be just an overspray since the deeper I dig, the less pronounced the shimmer becomes. If used with moderation this shade makes a lovely cheek colour for the autumn. 

DARLING is a dark peach shade, matte. This is the second favourite of mine for autumn.

DOLLFACE is a very bright, cool-toned dollish pink, matte. I can see myself using this quite often on cold, frosty days yet to come.

And PARK AVE PRINCESS is a medium-dark bronzer which is a perfect neutral brown colour, which leans neither too orange nor too muddy gray. I use it both for contouring and adding warmth all over my face.

Tarte Off The Cuff blush and bronzer palette

I was suprised by how dark and how cool-toned the shades selected for the palette are. Only Dollface is on the lighter side, while others are definitely dark, and no shade, even the peach and coral ones, displays warm, orangey tones. I'm more than happy to get such a selection of shades as they match my complexion better.

This came as no surpprise to me that these blushes are insanely pigmented. I would actually like them to be less so. I usually take small amount of ptoduct on my blush brush, then dab it on the back of my hand, and only then I start applying the blush onto my cheeks. If I don't do that I inevitably end up looking like a clown and spend hours trying to blend the red patches away from my cheeks. 

Apart from the overpigmentation issue, the blushes are of excellent quality. They blend well and wear pretty much all day. They are soft and the brush picks the desired amount of product without kicking off clouds of dust. 

My purchase was definitely not on the cheap side, but considering the fact that I got five products instead of one and paid for the shipping only once makes it good value for money. Now that my curiosity is satisfied, I won't order any more Tarte products, unless they open their distribution here, even though I'm completely satisfied with the quality of the blushes. Just can't afford them.

Disclaimer: I bought the product myself for my personal use and I am not affiliated with any company. I am not paid to do this review and everything I said here is my genuine opinion.