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Makeup by Mario has landed in the UK: We tried the beauty brand from Kim Kardashian’s favourite MUA
Packed with creamy formulas and high-shine shades, the coveted collection did not disappoint
![<p>The collection includes eyeliner, eyeshadow palettes and highlighting products for brightening your look </p>](https://webcf.waybackmachine.org/web/20221024211523im_/https://static.independent.co.uk/2021/07/22/16/mario%20indybest.jpg?quality=75&width=982&height=726&auto=webp)
The collection includes eyeliner, eyeshadow palettes and highlighting products for brightening your look
Mario Dedivanovic is one of the most well known make-up artists in the world, having made his name as Kim Kardashian’s head MUA, travelling around the world for photoshoots, Instagram snaps and red carpets.
The man behind the Kardashian’s most glamorous, well recognisable looks is a bonafide star in his own right too, having built a loyal following on Instagram and racking up millions of views on YouTube with his tutorials. He also boasts Salma Hayek, Kate Bosworth and Gabrielle Union as A-list clients.
In 2020, Dedivanovic launched his own make-up range, Makeup by Mario, pouring his nearly two decades of experience into his products. Despite launching during a pandemic, it quickly became a coveted collection of make-up must-haves. And now, for the first time, UK customers will be able to get their hands on the nine-piece line up as it launches on Cult Beauty on 23 July.
While there’s been an overwhelming amount of launches from beauty brands worldwide this year, with a history of creativity and flawless make-up execution on some of the biggest Hollywood stars, we couldn’t wait to dip our toes into the Makeup by Mario collection.
Ahead of its grand entrance onto the UK beauty scene, we’ve tried the entire range of eye and complexion products to find out what’s worth a spot in your make-up bag.
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Makeup by Mario master mattes eyeshadow palette
This warm-toned matte eyeshadow palette is made for more than just your eyes, as shades “matte 6” and “matte 11” can also be used to fill in your brows. Suiting all skin tones, there’s 12 shades that can be used for highlighting, brightening, shaping and contouring over the lid. We found that each shade blended beautifully together. We love how versatile this palette is – it’s a great all rounder for both everyday and more dramatic looks. It’s one that will get plenty of use in our routine, whether it’s for an all over wash of colour or a smokey eye. Each shade is buttery soft, with very little fallout and a range of colours to play with. If you like to keep it simple with your eyeshadow, this would be a great investment palette.
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Makeup by Mario master metallics eyeshadow palette
The second 12-shade palette boasts creamy metallics that are rich in pigment and super soft. This jewel-toned collection of colours, ranging from gold to pink to teal, is much more versatile than you would initially imagine. Depending on which brush you use and how you blend them, you can have a vibrant pop of colour, a statement eye look or a sheer touch of shimmer that will catch the light beautifully. You could forgo the brush altogether also and just use your finger to swipe a colour directly onto the lid. For an all over shimmer, we used “metallics 10”, a glowy copper colour with a densely packed brush, and then added “metallics 1”, a classic gold sparkle on the inner corner to brighten our eye. Like with the palette above, each shade was effortless to blend out.
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Makeup by Mario master metals eyeshadow palette
The third eye palette from the collection is full of Dedivanovic’s “master metals”, which deliver a high-metal shine and liquid-foil effects. The five-shade compact also includes a mixing palette to help you create a liquid foil texture from the shadows. Simply add the “master metal manipulator” – a mixing solution that changes the consistency of the shadows – to the shades for a truly dramatic formula.
On their own, the shadows contain super-fine iridescent pearls that are extremely pigmented with just one swipe, giving full coverage luminosity. The innovative formula is a gel-to-powder texture that glides onto lids seamlessly. The sloped tray in the compact allows you to mix colours is an ingenious way, it inspired us to get creative with our eye looks. While this might not be the palette for those that tend to shy away from shimmer, for us, this is the star of the show. The shades encourage experimentation when doing your make-up and offer brilliant colour payoff and a long-lasting finish.
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Makeup by Mario master metal manipulator
This is a mixing liquid designed for the eyeshadows in the master metals palette. When you mix one drop together using the spatula that comes included, they create a foil effect that lasts for hours. We used it to press the shade “bronze” over the centre of our lid, which amplified it instantly. You can also use the master metal manipulator on top of lip and brow products to make them transfer-resistant. It’s a lot of fun to get to grips with and adds a creative look to regular shimmery eyeshadow.
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Makeup by Mario master mattes liquid eyeliner
If you love a cat-eye flick, then this liquid eyeliner is a must have. It’s in the form of a flexible, fine-nibbed pen that delivers an intense jet black, matte colour. The formula is waterproof too and simple to use. The fine point allows you to create a precise line across your lash line with ease and create a feline flick as thick or thin as you like. It delivers a continuous fluid colour too, with no patchiness or fading. Just minutes after applying it, we went over it with a cotton bud and it didn’t budge a bit.
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Makeup by Mario master pigment pro pencil
We tried this dual-ended liner in “super black”, one of the five shades available. On one end is a creamy, soft gel-like pencil and the other is a small paintbrush to smudge and blend. It delivers instant pigment, we used on our waterline and to gently create a soft flick on our lash line. We loved that it comes with a sharpener included as there’s nothing more annoying than a blunt eyeliner pencil and nothing to sharpen it with. While we love the pencil, we didn’t find the brush much use, as we prefer to use an angled or densely packed brush to smudge out a line more effectively.
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Makeup by Mario master secret glow
Unlike any product we’ve ever seen before, you could almost mistake this for an empty single-pan palette when you first open it. Instead it’s a translucent balm that can be tapped onto eyelids, highpoints of the cheekbones and under the brow bone. It gives a unique, glass-like glow without adding colour and is easy to dab onto skin with your finger. It’s perfect for adding a dewy, plump-looking glow that will compliment your statement look, or keep you looking dewy when you’re bare-faced.
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Makeup by Mario master crystal reflector
This sheer, crystal effect sparkle has plenty of uses, whether you want to add a light layer over your lid or add a beaming highlighter to cheekbones. We used the shade “quartz” which is a silvery tone that adds a light shimmer without being overly intense, so if you lean towards a more natural look but want to play with luminosity, it’s a great choice. We brushed it onto the highpoints of our cheekbones with our ring finger and found that it’s super soft to the touch and easy to brush over skin without disrupting the rest of your make-up.
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Makeup by Mario master mattes brightening pencil – launching in August
Another multitasking product is this brightening pencil, designed to be applied on the waterline to give you a wide-awake look, highlighting under the brow bone and adding light to the inner corner of the eye. It’s very soft and creamy, making easy to blend out with just your fingers. We applied is under the brow bone and our eye area was instantly lifted. This one comes with a handy sharpener too. It’s a simple, easy to use pencil that gives a subtle brightening effect on and around the eye. This product launches in August.
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The verdict: Makeup by Mario
With products like the master secret glow and master metal manipulator, there’s a real sense of Dedivanovic’s artistry and creativity in this collection. He encourages colour, shimmer and high-shine finishes without feeling gimmicky, and the colour payoff in the eyeshadows is brilliant and truly lasts.
Our favourite piece of the collection is the master metals eyeshadow palette, with intensely pigmented shimmers that can be mixed with the master manipulator to add a foil effect to the five shades. Across the Atlantic, Dedivanovic has recently launched a soft sculpt collection of cream contouring, bronzer and blush products that we hope make an appearance in the UK soon. We can’t wait to see what’s next from the brand.
Voucher codes
For the latest discounts on make up and other beauty offers, try the links below:
For more must-have palettes, check out our review of Pat McGrath’s first ever blush collection
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