Review: Chanel Les 4 Ombres - Tisse Camelia

So, I wrote here about how one of my best friends came up for a visit recently (read about our night out here), and she brought me the most wonderful birthday present.

I was so excited when she presented me with a little Chanel bag. You know that the contents are going to be amazing. Just the rustle of that luxe white tissue paper embossed with little interlinked C's...

Inside was one of the Les 4 Ombres shadow palettes. How gorgeous is that? Like all the Chanel compacts, it comes in a little black velvet pouch to keep it flawless.

This quad is part of eight new shade combinations released this year and is called 'Tisse Camelia'.

The shades inside are pinkish and purplish in hue, which is one of the nicest colour palettes for brown eyes, so she'd chosen really well. They are all satin or shimmer shades with that wonderful deep pearl-like lustre that the Chanel shadows are so good at.

There's a warm pale mauve shot through with a fine golden shimmer, a light warm white colour, a rich peach-toned pink and an absolutely gorgeous dark purplish brown. The last shade is my favourite and will be so perfect for creating a sultry eye that has impact but is way less harsh than a traditional black.

I only own one Chanel eyeshadow palette that's quite a few years old, so this was a real treat and so kind of her. I love Chanel foundation, powder (although mainly for the compact) and their lipsticks, but I hadn't tried much of their eyeshadow offering - would this be the product to turn my head?

The shadows themselves are just as soft and buttery as you'd expect, and they have a gorgeous luminosity to them that's highly flattering. Of course they are beautifully pigmented and easy to blend, and they really feel luxurious on the skin. Chanel shadows are not made with any talc, which they say guarantees 'colour radiance'.

You really know that you're using a luxury product, everything from the glossy embossed case to the beautiful consistency of the shadows speaks for that.

I used to think eyeshadows were one of those things where you got what you paid for, but recently cheaper brands really seem to have upped their shadow game, and the likes of Sleek, MakeUp Revolution and MUA are really snapping at the heels of other shadows -which would make it hard to justify £40 on four eyeshadow shades.

But as a gift this is beautiful, perfect and wonderfully generous and I'm going to really enjoy using this.