Anastasia's Illumin8: Eye Shadows from the Queen of Brows that Help Fight Aging

Today I'm writing about something I would never see: an anti-aging eyeshadow. Really.

This makeup was created by Anastasia, Hollywood's reigning queen of brows. I had a chance to meet her briefly a few years ago with a group of beauty bloggers from Total Beauty, and she really seemed very dynamic and just nice. At the time she was in the final stages of creating her color cosmetic line, and she mentioned the products would be released soon. I remember how excited she seemed discussing them, and promised that they would be "more than normal cosmetics." What exactly does that mean?

What Anastasia meant is that she included anti-aging ingredients in many of the products, including the Illumin8 Eye Shadow Palettes. I have to admit that I don't know how well anti-aging ingredients in a powdered product are able to penetrate and act on the skin. I can see how they would do so easily from a lotion, serum or creme, but a powder... I honestly don't know. Anastasia does have some before and after images on her website as well as clinical results. Note that the clinical results were based on clinical grading, a questionnaire and Corneometer measurements were used to look at % hydration.

Regardless, I don't think that including these ingredients will hurt anything, as long as the eye shadow is still great eye shadow. And, if you're going to include the ingredients, we might as well compare the ingredients to my anti-aging checklist:


Remember, these are ingredient categories that I like to have included in my entire routine, not necessarily all in 1 product. However, Illumin8 seems to include 3 major anti-aging ingredient categories that I look for in products. Why do I look for them? Because they work. Their presence definitely bodes well!

How are the shadows at being actual eye shadows? I really like them a lot. The pigmentation is good, they are not too powdery (which can be a pet peeve of mine since I'm great at getting it on to my cheek), blend great and last all day. I have had no issues with creasing or fading.


I have palette #3, which has 5 different shades. My favorite is the one to the far left, a muted taupe. It seems to work very well on my skin, since it is only a few shades darker. I've used all of the other shades frequently, minus the purple which seems to not work well on my skin tone (it makes me look like I've been crying, I think it would be amazing on someone with a darker skin tone).

The black on the far right is actually quite a bit better in person, the silver shimmer is more apparent in person and does translate over to the lid somewhat. I've used it over black eye liner to blend out for an easy smokey eye, and it works perfectly! It is well pigmented, but can easily be blended to tone it down, love that.

I didn't mention yet that the shadows also have "diamond core powder" in them to help diffuse light, great for those of us that want to minimize the appearance of pores or wrinkles.

Overall, I really like this palette. The colors are great, I was impressed with the shadows and the shades. While I don't know if a powder can deliver anti-aging ingredients to the skin, if you're going to have anti-aging makeup then Anastasia has definitely included the ingredient categories you should be looking for in an effective product.

Anastasia's Illumin8 Eye Shadow Palettes