Guerlain Mysterious Butterfly: Pretty and Pretty Useless

I have been lemming Guerlain's Mysterious Butterfly palette since it came out during the holiday seasons last year. However, I did not have a full time job then, so I definitely could not afford it. Finally, last week I gave in to the lemming and ordered the palette online when I saw that this limited edition palette was still available on Sephora.com. I guess it's not really surprising that the palette hasn't sold out since I read several slightly negative reviews on Sephora. I still decided to get it despite the warning of the low pigmentation level, though, because I was blinded by its outer beauty =P


Just looking at the case makes me happy! I love the color and the butterfly imprint. I was considering getting a regular Guerlain quad instead, but I don't like the gold color of the case for the regular collection. That is a very shallow reason, but a reason nonetheless =P Like Dior's eyeshadow palettes, Guerlain's also come with protective velvet pouches, as befits such a high end brand.


Inside the palette are two applicators and four eyeshadows with a beautiful buttefly-motif overlay of silver shimmer. I haven't touched the silver shimmer since I don't want to destroy the butterfly motif, but I've read that it's very shimmery and it makes the eyeshadow colors too shimmery if you actually mix them up. I don't like the applicators since I don't think they pick up color very well (in comparison to using fingers), but they're not horrible, per se. Plus, the design of the applicators is quite cute, so I'll forgive Guerlain for giving me poor applicators =P


The colors of the eyeshadows are an off-white, a very pale cool lilac, a medium warm pink, and a medium cool purple. With the exception of the off-white shade, all the shades are only very slightly shimmery if you don't touch the silver shimmers; the off-white is a bit more shimmery, but still nothing really loud. I feel like the off-white is also the most pigmented of the bunch, the rest take quite a few layers to show up properly on my rather pale skin. This low pigmentation level is the main reason for the negative reviews on Sephora, and also the reason why I didn't do a swatch for this product. In addition, because I'm obsessed with not touching the butterfly, I only have a very tiny area to work with, which makes the palette even harder to swatch. So for anyone who is looking to see a swatch, please refer to this post on KarlaSugar's site.


Following is the official Guerlain instructions for where to apply which color in case anyone is interested.


All pictures in this post were taken under white light.

In short: Amazingly beautiful packaging, but more of a collector's item than something you would use everyday. I'm definitely going to keep this palette so I can take it out every once in a while to admire it, but I don't foresee myself actually using this palette, ever.