The Team Tests: Tom Ford Eye Color Quads reviewed on three different lid types
Doing group reviews on PV are honestly quite a challenge as we all work remotely, but it’s definitely more insightful as we get more varied feedback from different types of users. We also had a lot of fun doing it for the Tom Ford Lips and Boys Lipsticks so we just had to do the same for these three Tom Ford Eye Color Quads!
These 4-eyeshadow palettes look absolutely gorgeous in a warm mahogany compact with gold accents. The reflective material is similar to the lipstick cases, and has a similarly luxurious heft. I love how the mirror swings carefully, neither too quick nor too loose, as is the case with most budget makeup palettes. And while I rarely care about free eyeshadow applicators, I appreciate that these come in three tips, with one of them being an actual brush.
To test these palettes and get a good idea of how well the shadows perform, I created three different eye looks that incorporated the colors of each palette. Afterwards, Gett, Den, and I monitored our faces for the next 8 hours to see how well they fared!
Tom Ford Eye Color Quad in Pretty Baby, worn by Den
Skin tone: light warm
Lid type: dry, hooded
Color Story: I was honestly intimidated by the shades in this palette. Violets are my fave color spectrum but I've no idea how to apply them without looking like I got two black eyes. I also feel that shimmery shades can look pretty monotonous but this quad was cleverly designed to have different grades/sizes of shimmer, which allows for a more dimensional look!
The top shades are rose gold (left) and amethyst (right). They are both sheer but buildable, with very fine and subtle champagne shimmer. Both have warm notes that flatter my skin tone. The chocolate shade (bottom right) seems to have much less shimmer but it also does not apply quite as smoothly as the other three. It was the burnt coral shade that stole all our hearts though. The dense blue glitter gave it an iridescent quality that led us to call this the Mermaid Palette! It's such a unique shade, and it catches the light in every angle to flattering effect. All shadows felt buttery and blended beautifully with a brush.
Mini Review: Perhaps because of the different shimmer qualities, there was quite a bit of eyeshadow fallout during application. Once they're on, though, these shadows stay put! My worries about my hooded lids causing premature creasing were put to rest when I reached hour 7 of wear with the pigments still smooth and intact. There was also zero shimmer on the rest of my face. I only noticed shimmer transfer and fading after 12 hours, but it was only on one eye! I checked my glitter-covered hand and figured that these shadows would have stayed on even longer if I had: 1) used eye primer beforehand, and 2) avoided my bad habit of eye-scratching. My theory is that as my face lightly oiled up during the day, my natural face oils actually helped the shimmer adhere better to my skin, hence the almost non-existence of fallout even as the day progressed.
I was pretty impressed by the longevity of these shadows, even with minimal eye prep and no primer. Surprisingly, I feel like this palette is best for doing day eyeshadow looks because of the somewhat sheer shades. Besides, that holo glitter would look most stunning in the sunlight!
Tom Ford Eye Color Quad in Leopard Sun, worn by Tellie
Skin tone: light warm
Lid type: normal, hooded
Color Story: This palette spoke to me! I love how there was a pop of yellow along with the reds, as I have been getting sick of my wine and auburn eyeshadow palettes. I was a little sad to see some measure of glitter on all of them, though. I really love working with mattes, and I find an all-shimmer eye tends to look monotonous, but these colors have great glitter profile with reflective particles ranging from shimmer to chunky glitter!
My favorite shade has to be the top left chunky gold shade. Chunky glitter is difficult to get without looking cheap, but this looks amazing and definitely interesting! My second fave has to be the maroon shimmer (bottom left.) It’s warm yet pulls together all the rest of the colors. The orangey gold on the top left was a good base to make the chunky glitter pop, and the metallic brown was a good way to break up and deepen the bright colors. All these varying refractive particles give interest to the palette, despite not having any mattes. That said, I still do feel a bit limited by this quad and would rather use it over some mattes that I already have.
Mini Review: I honestly had zero expectations for this shimmery palette, as shimmers are particles suspended in a powder base, and those two don’t easily bind. With my Korean shimmers and glitters, the reflectives start falling off and spreading to my cheeks anywhere between 1-6 hours. However, I was pretty pleased to find this quad, including the chunky glitter, to be much better behaved! My normal lids take eyeshadow pretty well, but I was astonished to find no fallout within 8 hours, and minimal fallout by hour 12. This is considering that we all agreed not to do any special kind of prep like glitter primer or eyeshadow primer! I just feel like it reacts very well to lid oil, as instead of fading, cracking, or falling off, it just seems to…. hold its vibrancy? Keep the glitter?
I often look bruised or ashy once eyeshadow color starts to fade. The Clover Chips vibrancy of this eye look was pretty consistent throughout my wear test! I’d love to use this for colorful, but not too editorial eye looks. I’d say it’s a classier, refined, everyday version of a more artistic look. While the lack of mattes make me uneasy, the shimmer profiles of these shades are just too good to ignore!
Tom Ford Eye Color Quad in Honeymoon, worn by Gett
Skin tone: medium warm
Lid type: very oily, hooded
Color Story: Honeymoon has a golden bronze, a bright copper, a burgundy red, and a dark plum. The dark plum seems shimmery but it looks quite matte once blended out. It's great if you want to darken your eye look! The copper and burgundy red are pretty lid shades and I appreciate how it you can use either to end up with a neutral look or a dramatic look. The golden bronze shadow, while very pretty with its fine glitters on swatch, disappointed me a bit upon application because I couldn't see the glitters anymore on my lids.
Performance: Eyeshadows tend to crease on my lids by hour 4 if I don't apply any eyeshadow primer. I wear contact lenses so I tend to clear out debris from my eyes every so often. As a result, any eyeshadow placed on the inner corners don’t last with my constant picking.
After two hours of commute, my eyeshadow still looked good from afar but had actually already creased (only obvious if you look closely). I had been wearing the look for more than four hours at that point. I then wore these to watch Avengers: Endgame to really test how well they would stay on. I expected to exit the theater with zero eyeshadow left (because I cried A LOT) but lo and behold, they held up pretty well!
As the colors wore through the day, it seemed as though the eyeshadow powders blended with the oiliness of my lids to make them stay on better and look smoother. The golden bronze shadow looked especially pretty and made my lids look naturally glossy!
Overall I find Honeymoon to be a very versatile palette that can take you from day to night. The shadows were so buttery with minimal fallout. I find fingers work really well for application, but brushes also work just fine.
And that’s how Tom Ford’s new quads performed on three different PV girls! I think all across different eyelid types, everyone was pleasantly surprised at how well the shadows wore throughout the day. For shimmers, no less! We love the varying textures of shimmers in these palettes, and with the exception of Pretty Baby, pigmentation was pretty on point. We think you definitely need to fully check out the Tom Ford Eye Color Quads - there are seven (!) in total - to find what tickles your fancy. Each palette is a unique surprise!
