Beauty: Urban Decay Naked 2 palette review and 4 looks

A few weeks ago, my sister gave me the very best birthday gift ever: this Naked 2 palette by Urban Decay. I had been lusting over the Naked palettes since forever, but for some reason I never took the plunge to spend the 45-50€ it took to actually call the luxury palette my own. My birthday was the perfect occasion to add it to my collection. I have used it literally every morning since I got it, proving the incredible quality and versatility of the Naked palette. Of course, the internet is already filled with amazing reviews of the Naked palettes, but I figured you might be interested in my perspective regardless. Read on for a review of the palette, and four different looks I created!

The Naked palettes at the moment come in three varieties: the warm-neutral toned Naked 1 (or original), the neutral/cool toned Naked 2 palette, and the rosey, softer Naked 3 palette. I was going back and forth a bit between 3 and 2 when my sister asked me which one I wanted, but in the end I picked the 2 because it had a few darker shades, and more variety than the 3. I'm pretty fair skinned, but my high contrast colouring (dark hair and eyes, fair skin) looks better with medium shade make up, as light coloured make up tends to wash me out or make me look like a Barbie doll. I have no regrets about picking the Naked 2 palette, I have found that it contains a nice variety of shades to create warm, cool and neutral looks. Check out the shades!

 And swatches!

Love all of these shades except Foxy. Totally crappy, barely any colour pay off and I don't understand why they chose such a pale yellow shade.

The first three are all faves of mine for all over the lid, and verve is so pretty as a highlight or for a lighter all over lid colour.

Blackout is one of my all time favourite eyeshadows. So intensely pigmented it's almost like charcoal.

The palette is really well balanced between warm, neutral and cool shades:

Cool toned: Tease, Pistol, Verve, Busted

Neutral toned: Bootycall, Suspect, YDK, Blackout

Warm toned: Foxy, Half Baked, Chopper, Snakebite

Additionally, I feel like the textures are also sufficiently varied, although I wish it had like one other, darker-but-not-black matte eyeshadow:

Matte: Foxy, Tease, Blackout

Satin: Bootycall, Snakebite, Suspect, Pistol, Verve, Busted

Glittery: Half Baked, Chopper, YDK

To illustrate, here are some of the diverse looks I've created over the past week. Clockwise from top left: a soft, silver smokey eye (my fave of the bunch), a bronze, darker smokey eye, a bright gold look and a more intense mix of warm copper and dirty grey to offset a cat eye.

And let's look at the total picture of how these work with my face and the rest of my make up.

I love all of these looks, but the one I go back to over and over again is the top left: the silvery, soft smokey eye, built on Verve, Pistol and Blackout: works equally well with a barely there pink lipstick, as with a bright orange one. Very versatile and flattering. The bright gold was also a lovely surprise, since it's not a look I'd automatically go for because it's so warm toned. However, by pairing Half Baked with the more neutral Bootycall (used as a highlight in the inner eye corner), the warmth of the gold is toned down and more wearable. Love it!

End verdict: this palette is BOMB ASS and it makes me excited to do my make up every single day. And yes, now I desperately want the Naked 3 palette as well. Make up like this totally reignites my passion for make up.

AND! Urban Decay has recently launched in the Netherlands and Belgium, so you don't have to pay crazy shipping/import fees anymore to get your hands on these babies. Get the Naked 2 palette here, and get creative! If you're from the UK, you can find it here, and US buyers can shop here.