Long overdue, but today I'm looking at the Quickie Chronicle palettes by Too-Faced. According to Sephora, company founder Jerrod Blandino was inspired by a documentary on 1950's "pin-up" magazines. Each of these limited-edition palettes (only 7,000 of each are made), has a different story written by Blandino on the back to express the personality of the woman on the front, and by extension, the makeup look the palette colors will provide. But every palette has the same text at the top: "She had always been a good girl. She played by the rules, never kissed
on the first date, and agreed Daddy always new best. But then the
innocent girl picked up the Quickie Chronicles, and honey, she was
never the same."
Almost of the images are from PC Designs, while some, like the Miss Sixty palette (which was done in conjunction with the women's fashion line), seem to be original artwork. To the best of my knowledge I am missing only one of these – the "Rent" palette, which does not feature a pin-up girl but images of the actors in the play/movie Rent. Seeing as how I'm not into musicals I never bothered to buy it, but maybe I should to make the collection complete.
The feminist in me doesn't think a series of 50's-style pin-up girls is the best representation of women, and the copy for some centers on women using their looks to snag a man and his money. For example, take this text from the Bathing Beauty palette:
"The Bathing Beauty knew she needed a man to bankroll her leisurely,
luxurious lifestyle, but she couldn't decide what sort. He, of course,
had to be willing to buy her diamonds for absolutely no reason at all,
and she positively had to have beach houses in Malibu, Maui, St.
Barths, The Rivera, and Monaco so she could work on her beautifully
bronzed glow year round – and this kit was always at her side to help
her lure in the bait."
Yikes. That aside, I do think the creator meant all of the copy to be tongue-in-cheek and not serious, and I love that he actually writes for each one to make them unique and represent the feel of each palette. As a consumer I think it's great to be able to pick up one of these and know that the makeup inside directly relates to the image on the outside. Looks like you can judge a book by its cover!