Pacifica Love3 Eye Shadow Trio {Review}

Overview

Rating: 3.5/5 stars ★★★☆☆
Price Tag: $9.99 USD
Weight: 0.1 oz
Where to Buy: In Target stores; online at target.com

The exclusive Pacifica Love3 Eyeshadow Trio is another entry in the Made to Matter initiative to expand the availability of eco-friendly products at Target stores. The other Pacifica eyeshadow palette in the collection is the Power of Love Eyeshadow palette. You can compare the two eyeshadow palettes by reading my review for that palette here.

All Pacifica products are certified cruelty-free and vegan.

Target Made to Matter Pacifica Collection

Packaging

The eyeshadow trio is packaged in a small compact: a white plastic base and a clear plastic lid printed with little white hearts around the edge. All of the Made to Matter Pacifica products sport little hearts somewhere on the packaging. I’m not into heart motifs so it’s kind of meh to me. The base of the compact has a #6 recycling symbol, indicating that you can place it with your weekly recycling once it’s empty. The eyeshadows themselves are housed in three triangular shaped pans.

Reverse of the Pacifica Love3 Eye Shadow Trio

Overall the compact is sturdy and you can easily fit in a small purse or clutch for on-the-go touch ups. I don’t foresee too much damage if you accidentally dropped the eyeshadow on the ground.

Pacifica Love3 Eye Shadow Trio

Formulation

I was very impressed with the pigmentation of the Power of Love Eyeshadow palette. Not so much here. While the texture of the eyeshadows are silky smooth, they don’t have a lot of pigmentation. You get a soft —or worse, muddy —look when applying two or three shades at once. Even with an eyeshadow primer, and you need one, you won’t get a defined look.

Close up of the Pacifica Love3 Eye Shadow Trio

Since the shadows are soft, they do produce a fair amount of fallout during application.

Shades

The trio shades are listed as Ethereal, Lovely, and Dreamy, though it’s not clear which name goes to what shade. This is also the case with the other Made to Matter exclusive Power of Love Eyeshadow Palette that lists names on the reverse of the packaging, but are not in order with the shades.

Swatches of the Pacifica Love3 Eye Shadow Trio over the e.l.f. Essential Glitter Primer.

The eyeshadow trio sports shades that are cool-leaning neutrals, so it should work for a variety of skin tones. One of the problems with this product is that it contains one highlighting shade and two mid-tone shades, instead of the usual one highlighter, one mid-tone, and a dark shade. I think if the taupe was darker, it would help rid the muddiness in the trio.

One thing I’ve noticed is that the shades don’t show up very well in natural light sources, but become more noticeable and pronounced under incandescent lighting.

I had a heck of a time photographing the Love3 shadows. The coral shade refused to be photographed accurately even though I tried different white balances, time of day, and even cameras. I tried my best, but understand that the shades are slightly more cool than pictured.

Champagne [Pearl/Shimmer]

I always assign the name Ethereal to this shade, even though I have no evidence to support my theory. It is a light champagne that is useful as an eye brightening lid color or inner corner highlighter. If the eyeshadow was more pigmented, it would have a more pronounced shimmer finish, but once applied looks like more of a pearl.

This shade reminded me of the highlighting shade Skinny Dip in the Pacifica Enlighten palette (my review here). A comparison shows that Skinny Dip is slightly brighter with yellow undertones, as opposed to the this champagne that has cooler, pinker undertones.

Swatch comparison of the Pacifica Love3 Eye Shadow Trio and Enlighten Eyeshadow Palette,
swatched over the e.l.f. Essential Glitter Primer

Neutral Coral [Shimmer]

It’s kind of like a coral color, but also oddly neutral with some pink. Pacifica seems to have a difficult time producing corals with decent payoff and once again that is true. The shadow itself doesn’t stick well to the eye and feels like it is absorbed into the skin, no matter how much color is applied. On the other hand, if I’m not careful, it can look like I have an eye infection. I’m aware that the issues I have with the coral could be attributed to my skin tone. There aren’t many reviews online, so I can’t compare experiences.

The shade has a fairly noticeable shimmer finish.

The worst, but most color accurate photo of the Pacifica Love3 Eyeshadow Trio,
swatched over the e.l.f. Essential Glitter Primer

As I mentioned earlier, all of the photos I took emphasized the coral undertones, even though it’s not anywhere that orange. In person it has more pronounced pink undertones. The photo above is a more accurate depiction of the color.

This coral shade reminded me of Coral Sand in the Pacifica Enlighten palette, but that color is much lighter and more peach than the one in the Love3 trio.

Swatch comparison of the Pacifica Love3 Eye Shadow Trio and Enlighten Eyeshadow Palette,
swatched over the e.l.f. Essential Glitter Primer

Taupe [Demi-Matte]

A light, all-purpose taupe for contouring the crease or darkening up the outer corner. Or also a lid color since it’s not that dark. It’s more of a mid-tone taupe, instead of a darker shade you’d normally find in an eyeshadow palette.

To borrow a term from Silk Naturals, the taupe has a finish that is not quite a pearl, yet not matte. If used as a crease color, it will come off as more of a matte, but on the lid it will have a slight lustre finish.

Images

Final Thoughts

Pros: Widely available, neutral shades, silky texture
Cons: Muddy colors, only one version available, poor pigmentation, pricy, only available at Target

The Love3 Eyeshadow Trio is a great idea, but ultimately ends up another adequate offering from Pacifica. While it’s convenient that there are more options for vegan eyeshadows available at local stores—one product that’s more difficult to locate—the all too common problem of color payoff once again plagues this product. Due to its problems I cautiously recommend the Love3 Eye Shadow Trio. Even with the payoff issues, I occasionally find myself reaching for it when I want a more natural, soft look.

The trio is more than I would normally pay, but I suppose it’s not too bad compared to other brands. I just expect better color payoff for a ten dollar product.

Since there is currently only one version of the eyeshadow trio, I would love to see Pacifica expand the product with at least one more color option. And maybe replace the mid-tone taupe with a darker shade. And also be more specific with the shade names, like the Enlighten and Mystical Supernatural palettes.

You can find more Pacifica reviews on {makeupfu} here.