Urban Decay Naked 2 Palette Review & Swatches

Wowee, what a busy week this has been! There's just been too much to post I hope you guys have been as excited about all the fantastic new products that have been coming out as I am!



One of the most hyped products right now is the Urban Decay Naked 2 Palette which was just released on urbandecay.com earlier today for $50. It won't reach other retailers like Sephora and Ulta until mid-January 2012 so if you want to be the first to get this, you'll have to fight the masses on Urban Decay's website each day. So is this palette worth the hype? Let's take a look.











The palette comes nicely housed in a tin-style container, reminiscent of Asian pencil cases, with a mini Lip Junkie lipgloss in the shade "Naked", of course.









The lipgloss is a cute miniature size with a pretty filigree cap. The color is quite wearable and pretty, and it also has a cooling minty sensation. I also show in the video that the angled squeeze applicator is a bit rubbery to give more "drag" in application. This will be an easy addition to throw in my purse since it's so tiny but it also probably doesn't hold a ton of product.









Here you can see the palette contains 12 shadows, 3 of which are mattes (foxy, tease, blackout) and I think it's a good call that they added a matte highlight shade and matte black this time around. I was actually hoping for more mattes since I dearly love Buck from the last palette but they have quite a lot of metallics and satin-finish shades instead, and of course a signature metallic-with-glitter Chopper.





Tease - matte mushroom taupe with purple undertones

Pistol - satin warm steel grey

slightly pinky grey (I really love this shade from the Verve - pale metallicpinky grey (I really love this shade from the Rollergirl palette)

micro

Here are swatches of all the shades on my arm:

foxy / half baked / bootycall / chopper / tease / snakebite / suspect / pistol / verve / ydk / busted / blackout







Comparing this to my



Here's a dupes list:

Foxy - Used to be available in individual pot form, but not anymore so it's not "new" but new to me.

Half Baked - The only shade that is included in both Naked palettes.

Bootycall - Palette exclusive shade. Very similar to Virgin (Naked) and I think it was a little unnecessary since you have Foxy for highlight and Verve for inner corner brightening.

Chopper - You can buy this individually. It's much rosier and more glittery than Sidecar (Naked 1).

Tease - Palette exclusive shade. I wanted this matte to be silkier than it is.

Snakebite - Palette exclusive shade. Slightly darker version of Smog (Naked 1).

Suspect - This shade was in the Rollergirl Palette.

Pistol - Palette exclusive shade.

Verve - This shade was in the Rollergirl Palette.

YDK - You can buy this individually. Similar to Sidecar (Naked 1) but a touch warmer and without glitter.

Busted - Palette exclusive shade.

Blackout - This matte black has been in several palettes including the 15th Anniversary palette.



Technically there are 5 new shades, but since Foxy was formerly discontinued, there are 6 in this palette that are new to UD's current lineup. Did I mention I LOVE my Rollergirl palette? I'm happy they included 2 of those shades in here as well.



One thing that does slightly bug me about this palette is the layout of shades. Naked original had a logical progression from lights to darks with a few coordinating lighter-darker shades being placed next to each other. Naked 2 on the other hand seems to skip about more instead. I want the coordinating lighter shades to the left of darker ones! (Original Naked Palette below)





Do you need both Naked and Naked 2? Honestly probably not. Most of the shades are close enough to being duplicated from the first palette that it wouldn't warrant another expensive purchase. If you don't own either palette though, I think the Naked 2 is a really wonderful and well-rounded palette with a good range of light to dark colors in a variety of finishes. The glitter shades from Naked (Sidecar, I'm looking at you) went less used than the rest of the shadows but the glitter in Naked 2 (gorgeous rose-gold Chopper) is such a beauty and the glitters seem less dense that I think it might be one of my most-used shades in the very near future.



It just comes down to what shades you prefer on yourself. If you want traditional warm browns, I recommend the original Naked. If you prefer medium, taupier colors then try Naked 2.



As for me, my perfect palette would be:

Naked original except replacing Sidecar (metallic taupe with glitter) with Chopper (rose gold)

Toasted and Hustle (purples) with Verve and Pistol (greys)

and Creep (almost black with glitters) for Blackout (matte black)



In other words, you can't make me decide! Too bad we can't have it all unless we own both.... ;)



So what do you think? Will you be picking up the new Naked 2? Which palette do you prefer?



Disclaimer: Thank you to Urban Decay for generously gifting this palette! This post is not sponsored. Comparing this to my original Naked palette , the Naked 2 contains more light metallic shades as well as more medium greigey-taupey colors. The original leaned very warm and I would not say this one is cooler, per se, but it does include more of those medium, I'm-not-sure-how-to-describe-this-color, greyish purplish taupish tannish shades.Here's a dupes list:Foxy - Used to be available in individual pot form, but not anymore so it's not "new" but new to me.Half Baked - The only shade that is included in both Naked palettes.Bootycall -similar to Virgin (Naked) and I think it was a little unnecessary since you have Foxy for highlight and Verve for inner corner brightening.Chopper - You can buy this individually. It's much rosier and more glittery than Sidecar (Naked 1).Tease -I wanted this matte to be silkier than it is.Snakebite -Slightly darker version of Smog (Naked 1).Suspect - This shade was in the Rollergirl Palette.Pistol -Verve - This shade was in the Rollergirl Palette.YDK - You can buy this individually. Similar to Sidecar (Naked 1) but a touch warmer and without glitter.Busted -Blackout - This matte black has been in several palettes including the 15th Anniversary palette.Technically there are 5 new shades, but since Foxy was formerly discontinued, there are 6 in this palette that are new to UD's current lineup. Did I mention I LOVE my Rollergirl palette? I'm happy they included 2 of those shades in here as well.One thing that does slightly bug me about this palette is the layout of shades. Naked original had a logical progression from lights to darks with a few coordinating lighter-darker shades being placed next to each other. Naked 2 on the other hand seems to skip about more instead. I want the coordinating lighter shades to the left of darker ones! (Original Naked Palette below)Do you need both Naked and Naked 2? Honestly probably not. Most of the shades are close enough to being duplicated from the first palette that it wouldn't warrant another expensive purchase. If you don't own either palette though, I think the Naked 2 is a really wonderful and well-rounded palette with a good range of light to dark colors in a variety of finishes. The glitter shades from Naked (Sidecar, I'm looking at you) went less used than the rest of the shadows but the glitter in Naked 2 (gorgeous rose-gold Chopper) is such a beauty and the glitters seem less dense that I think it might be one of my most-used shades in the very near future.It just comes down to what shades you prefer on yourself. If you want traditional warm browns, I recommend the original Naked. If you prefer medium, taupier colors then try Naked 2.As for me, my perfect palette would be:Naked original except replacing Sidecar (metallic taupe with glitter) with Chopper (rose gold)Toasted and Hustle (purples) with Verve and Pistol (greys)and Creep (almost black with glitters) for Blackout (matte black)In other words, you can't make me decide! Too bad we can't have it all unless we own both.... ;)So what do you think? Will you be picking up the new Naked 2? Which palette do you prefer?

Opened up, the layout is quite similar to the former Naked Palette with 12 full-sized eyeshadows and a full-length mirror going across the top. Value-wise, this is great for neutral lovers since 1 eyeshadow for Urban Decay retails for $17 so you are getting $204 worth of eyeshadow for $50 and that's not even taking into account the brush and lipgloss included.This mirror is actually much larger than the old palette, embedded in cardboard. I didn't use the mirror on the last one since it was so small but this one is a more adequate size for actually putting eyeshadow on. The synthetic brush is dual-ended with a rounded blending brush end and a flat brush end.Here's a close-up of each section:- matte cream- metallic neutral gold- satin champagne (very similar to Virgin from the original Naked palette)- metallic rose gold with silver micro glitters- matte mushroom taupe with purple undertones- satin deep bronze (gooooorgeous)- satin light taupe- satin warm steel grey- pale metallicpinky grey (I really love this shade from the Rollergirl palette)- metallic toasty taupe with coppery microglitters- satin plummy dark brown- matte black