Hello all! Today's post is a comparison between two 'dupe' palettes.
A bit of background first. I saw the Tarte 'Rainforest After Dark' palette reviewed by Grav3yardgirl on Youtube, and immediately fell in love with it. It's only available in the US at the moment, and with a price tag of just over £30, I waited a few weeks until pay day to order it.
In the meantime, I came across a strikingly similar-looking palette from I <3 Makeup. This is a sister brand of Makeup Revolution, who I have a slight obsession with (a full stash post is coming up soon, I have so many of their products! I did start a post but as I've bought so much in the meantime I have to start again). Anyway, this palette is called the Go! palette and costs just £6.49.
Pay day came around and I ordered both palettes (along with loads of other goodies :D). As I <3 Makeup is UK based, their palette arrived first which gave me chance to play around with it. When the Tarte palette arrived, I was finally able to put them side by side and do a full comparison. So, how similar are they? Is there a dupe here? Let's see...
Exterior/packaging
Photos taken with and without flash. Tarte palette on the left, Go! palette on the right:
Tarte - unusual wood-effect top, with brown plastic sides and bottom. The top is also decorated with a gold snake which has a purple jewel on its head. It's just gorgeous, the packaging is what attracted me to this palette. It's by far the heavier out of the two. This palette feels premium and solid. It came in a purple snakeskin-effect box which is also beautiful (forgot to take a pic - sorry!).
I <3 Makeup - the same size and thickness as the Tarte palette, but much lighter. This palette is made from black plastic, except the lid which is transparent. This is handy as there are four palettes in this range, so if you had more than one you'd be able to easily see which is which without having to open them. The edges are rounded and it feels nice in your hand. Doesn't feel as solid or expensive as the Tarte palette, but still looks pretty :)
Interior/layout
This is where the palettes have the most similarities!
Tarte - made up of nine sections - a large circular blush in the centre, a medium-sized highlighter and bronzer at the top and six small eyeshadows along the bottom. There is a large mirror in the lid.
I <3 Makeup - the same amount of sections, and all exactly the same sizes as the Tarte palette. One small difference - the highlighter and blush have swapped places. No mirror in this one due to the transparent lid.
Shades/swatches
Tarte - rose pink matte blush, champagne gold shimmer highlighter, caramel brown matte bronzer.
Three matte eyeshadows (pale pink, tan brown and chocolate brown), two glitter eyeshadows (pinky lilac and plum) and one metallic gold eyeshadow.
Bronzer, blush and highlighter along the top, eyeshadows along the bottom. For some reason, when looking at the palette, I swatched these from right to left. This palette is very highly pigmented. This doesn't show up greatly in this picture, but check out the swatches of the Go! palette below to see the difference. I needed very little product to achieve these swatches.
Random note - I don't like the smell of this palette at all. I can't describe it exactly but, as a lot of Tarte products are made from clay, I have a feeling that's what this smell is. It's not enough to put me off using it, but it's just not an attractive scent to me.
I <3 Makeup - candy pink matte blush, pink shimmer highlighter and slightly warmer brown matte bronzer. Only one matte shade (cream), one glitter shade (darker plum) and four almost metallic shades (taupe, copper, rose gold and pink).
All the shades in this palette, even the bronzer, have much warmer tones. I found no duplicate shades at all.
If you compare both swatch pictures, you can see how much more pigmented the Tarte palette is. I used twice as much product and still got less colour. I have a feeling I'll be able to blend these easier as they are more subtle, but I will also end up using them up faster. This has a standard makeup scent, very subtle but pleasant.
Final verdict - dupe?
At first glance, these two palettes are very similar. However, after seeing them up close and swatching them, they are pretty different - enough to justify having both - and I love them both for different reasons.
I prefer the shades of the Go! palette, and it's much better value at £6.49. The Tarte palette has much more luxurious packaging and stronger pigmentation, but its price reflects that at just over £30 (excluding P&P from the US). I can't pick a favourite.
So... close, but not quite a dupe.
Links for more info (no commission):
What do you think of these palettes?
Which one gets your vote?
I hope you enjoyed this blog post :)
Love, Sarah NailsfromNothing xx
