Giorgio Armani Eyes To Kill Eyeshadow #4 Pulp Fiction

I liked the Eyes To Kill Eyeshadow #2 Lust Red I posted about here so much I went to Selfridges to buy another shade straight away. Regular readers of this blog will most likely be unsurprised that I chose #4 Pulp Fiction, a silver taupe.

It's lightly speckled with a rosy/red accent shade, but this isn't individually detectable when the eyeshadow is swatched or applied; instead it gives an overall mauve/silver taupe with strong shimmer. There are silver micro-sparkle particles scattered throughout, although the creamy texture helps to prevent the sparkle dropping on to the skin (it's not actually cream, it's more of a cream/powder hybrid). The lighter shades are definitely more shimmery/sparkly than the darker shades, giving an almost wet-look metallic finish.

Applied, using a fingertip. If I use the MAC 239 brush, it does tone down the sparkle a bit, although it's still very shimmery.

This is the closest duplicate I've seen for the discontinued Shu Uemura ME Silver 945 eyeshadow. ME 945 was replaced by ME 950 in the new Shu Uemura formula, but the colour of the ME 950 lacks the mauve undertone and the new formula is less creamy and less metallic than the old formula. 

I did have a look at the L'Oreal Colour Infallible eyeshadow in Flashback Silver today in Boots, and honestly, if you don't want to spend £25 on the Armani Eyes To Kill, the Colour Infallible is a good substitute (and Boots has these on sale for £5.50 at the moment - £1.50 off the regular price). I think that the L'Oreal Flashback Silver was a bit lighter and not quite as 'complex' looking as the Armani Pulp Fiction (the L'Oreal don't have the speckling that the Armani do in the pot, and are one uniform colour). I'm considering buying the L'Oreal to do a proper comparison of both of them at home.