It's pointless to deny it: Love her or hate her, Kylie Jenner is a makeup powerhouse. Her wildly popular beauty brand, Kylie Cosmetics, has launches so massive it consistently breaks the internet.
But that kind of success hasn't come without some major issues. Fans constantly complain about the high price point to low quality ratio β and that's not all. Kylie's kustomers have reported an awful lot of products arriving broken or damaged. Lip glosses arrive with bent and broken bristles. Highlighters are shattered. Fans have even complained that one of her palettes smelled like chemicals.
Not a great track record.
Despite all that, Kylie's beached-themed Vacation collection sold out in record time.
It was her most hyped ever β everyone was freaking out over the bold shadow colors in the eye palette, as well as the unique formulas of the Wet Set highlighters.
I ordered the collection the literal minute that it dropped.
And guys, if you've ever ordered from Kylie Cosmetics and your products arrived fucked up, you're not alone. I'm a beauty editor, and my stuff arrived fucked up, too.
But first, let's rewind: I pride myself on being really fucking good at shopping Kardashian-adjacent launches, but even *I* was still too late for those crazy gelatinous highlighters. I managed to get the Take Me On Vacation Kyshadow palette ($52, Kylie Cosmetics) and the Send Me More Nudes matte lipstick collection ($45, Kylie Cosmetics).
My order was placed on June 20, but didn't arrive until June 28. And as soon as I opened the Kylie-branded shipping box, I noticed something was off.
I slid open the matte packaging of the Nudes lipstick collection, and I will be totally real: These four shades are nearly *identical* to the KKW Collection.
Each suggestively-named shade ("Naked," "Birthday Suit," "Commando," and "Bare") is a LITTLE more golden than the colors in Kim's kollection β hers definitely skew more pink, so these warmer tones will likely be more wearable.
But the difference is *so* slight, it's almost negligible. So if you missed out on the matte Vacation Collection set but already have the KKW set, in my opinion, you're not missing much.
But I hadn't even taken the lipsticks out of the (very tight) cardboard packaging when I noticed something ELSE. The lipstick shade called Naked, third from the left in the picture above, seemed to be broken or incorrectly packaged β the cap was much further away from the tube than any of the other shades.
And then I picked it up, and saw what the issue was. It was even more gross than Iβd thought.
The lipstick wasn't incorrectly packaged. IT HAD BEEN OPENED.
The cap had been twisted a full turn, opening the lipstick up to air and even bacteria.
SCREAMING.
SHRIEKING.
DYING.
WHY.
HOW DARE YOU.
Has this OPENED lipstick been used? Is it filled with bacteria? There's literally no way to know!
As far as I know, none of Kylieβs liquid lipsticks or glosses come with transparent safety seals so you can see whether or not the products have been opened. This lipstick collection FOR SURE does not, nor was the outer packaging sealed in plastic.
So this OPEN lipstick could just be merely unsanitary, or it could be actively dangerous. Kylie's fans β and me β have no way of knowing.
Next, I opened the Vacation Kyshadow palette β and was even MORE horrified.
First, the outer packaging β a vaguely camo-print cardboard box β wasn't closed in my order. Then it got more repulsive.
Neither the mirror or the shadows themselves were covered with protective plastic film. The mirror was covered in eye shadow residue β and even worse, FINGERPRINTS.
The fingerprints β clearly visible β were absolutely not mine.
I bought this palette in order to review it for you guys, and part of that is checking how items arrive. (Are they packaged well? Badly? Is everything here in one piece?) It's important to me that YOU, as discerning beauty-lovers, know what you're getting when you order from a brand.
Opening an expensive palette and finding a smudged-up mirror, which is evidence that someone had their dirty hands all over a product going near your eyes? Not OK.
The bronze shimmer shade, called Sail Away, looked like it had already been finger-swatched.
Alternately, it looked like the shadow had been broken and hastily re-assembled with rubbing alcohol β but not well. That pan looks MESSY.
The matte pale pink, First Class, had two gouges near the top of the pan.
It seemed like a lot of the powder on the mirror was from this shade.
The shimmery turquoise "star" shade, Island Girl, was flaking away and getting EVERYWHERE.
And this is without me even *using* it yet. I have literally only opened the palette at this point.
And then there's the matter of the palette's overwhelming chemical smell.
You may remember that Kylie's Peach palette was dragged to hell and back for having a horrible smell, later attributed to glue (oh my God, still horrifying). I am sorry to report that the SMELL OF POISONOUS NIGHTMARES is back in this eye shadow palette.
But don't just take my word for it. I had all of my Revelist colleagues smell Kylizzle's Vacation palette, and tell me what they thought it smelled like. IT WAS NOT GOOD.
"It smells like when the back door of a warehouse opens, and it's chemicals and mustiness."
"It smells like something I would not put on my body."
"It smells like… is that paint thinner?"
"You know what that is? It's the inside of an envelope. The part you lick to seal."
"Burning plastic."
"Like something middle-schoolers sneak into bathrooms to huff."
"That's a Sharpie. That's straight-up permanent marker."
"Expired rubbing alcohol."
I reached out to Kylie Cosmetics reps to see if they could comment on the quality issues I'd experienced.
I was instructed to send Kylie's Kustomer Kare (sorry) photos of the issue, which I did. I was unable to photograph the smell. The brand has yet to provide comment, but I'll update you if / when it does.
All in all, Kylie Jenner's Vacation Collection left a terrible taste in my mouth. It is NOT Revelist-approved.
I'm aware that Kylie Cosmetics is a nominally indie brand; that it's a young label headed up by a teenager, and so some mistakes are bound to happen. Jenner stans will undoubtedly try to tell me that the people who buy this palette are really just buying it for the brand name and the cache of Kylizzle, not for quality.
All that may be true, to some degree. But these major product fuck-ups happen all too often, and Kylie's makeup line is NOT CHEAP. If Jenner wants to change $52 for an eye shadow palette β putting her brand on par with luxury brands like NARS and MAC β she'd better deliver when it comes to quality.
$100 for some lipsticks and an eye shadow palette might not be much to Kylie, but it's a lot for her fans. They deserve much better quality than what this brand has been putting out. And at the very least, they don't deserve used makeup.
That's just gross.