Real Deal Review: Melt Cosmetics Blueprint Eyeshadow Stack

Update: Melt now sells Blueprint and other stacks as a traditional palette! You can purchase it here.

I have honestly become a bit disillusioned about the makeup world. Don’t get me wrong, I still love makeup, but there are very few things I see that just say “buy me” when I pass them. I felt it for real on my last trip to New York. Shopping for makeup is one of my must-do things when I visit. I love to hit up the stand-alone stores for my favorite brands and the flagship department store playgrounds of Macy’s, Bloomingdale’s, and Sak’s Fifth Avenue.

The last two trips have been during Sephora’s VIB discount sale. Across the five boroughs, there are a whopping 25+ Sephora locations. My hotel happened to be in close proximity to at least three. Sure, we have several locations in the Nashville area, but other cities tend to offer a different array of brands. Online shopping is an option, but I appreciate the opportunity to actually see and touch what I’m considering buying.

In retrospect, I didn’t buy as much product this time as my receipts suggested. The only purchase I didn’t think twice about was the Melt Cosmetics Blueprint Stack.

Melt Cosmetics is kind of a sleeper in the makeup industry. The company was founded in 2012 but made its retail debut in Sephora this year. The trendsetting founding mothers of Melt set out to fill a void in the industry for highly-pigmented matte lipsticks. I heard about Melt when YouTuber Jackie Aina reviewed another of their innovations – the eyeshadow stack.

Melt’s eyeshadows come in traditional palettes, but the stacks are game-changers. Melt sells its individual eyeshadows in round magnetic pans. When sold together as a “palette”, the disks cling together, and come with a mirror that serves as a “lid.” This allows for compact storage, and the ability to quickly curate your own combination. You also purchase a magnetic tin to carry them, if you prefer more traditional storage.

My first Melt purchase was the Dark Matter stack. I chose this stack because I was having trouble finding a highly pigmented burgundy and a strong matte black. I was not disappointed. The quality and combination of the eyeshadows and the packaging made it a go-to, especially or traveling. This made purchasing the Blueprint stack a no-brainer.

The BluePrint Stack

The Blueprint stack is a beautiful mixture of blues:

Skylight (baby blue shimmer)/Deadbolt (sapphire metallic)

Dim-out (midnight blue matte)/King Stud (deep pearlized blue)

In addition, there are four warm metallics to balance the palette:

Hotwire (orange copper shimmer)/Beaming (gold/pink duo shimmer)

and Hammered (matte mahogany)/Nailed (bronzed gold shimmer).

I loved this stack at first sight/swatch, but Dim-out and Hammered stole the show for me. I have found it very hard to find dark blues that show up true-to-pan, and equally difficult finding warm dark browns without gray undertones. This palette has both! The stack is great on its own, but if I add the shades from my Dark Matter stack, I could easily create a variety of neutral and bold looks from one palette.

The Wear Test

At first swatch, all of the eyeshadows are beautifully pigmented. Let’s just say you don’t want to touch one and accidentally wipe your hands on anything else. LOL. They are also true to swatch on the eyes. I found both the mattes and the metallics to be soft and easily blendable, but I had fallout issues with Skylight. Thankfully, it is the color I will reach for least often. Beaming was a pleasant surprise in the stack. I kept wondering how a pink shimmer fit into a blue/gold/brown colorway, but on the skin, the pink is almost unnoticeably subtle. It’s a beautiful bright gold that has the pink undertone but can work with pretty much anything like any other gold. We’ve got options!

Value

Despite the price tag, I found this palette to be a great value, as with the other Melt palette I own. Melt’s stack eyeshadows are traditionally larger than the singles that most other brands carry. Check out this comparison:

Brand	Size	Weight
Sephora	1.25 inches	0.07 oz
Smashbox	1 inch	0.06 oz
Morphe Jaclyn Hill Palette	1 inch	*0.056 oz
Melt Single	1.5 inch	0.125 oz
Melt Double	.75 inch	0.04 oz

*Based on 10 eyeshadows with a total net weight of 0.56 oz.

In this case, each disk comes two eyeshadows to the standard size, pan, which is still fairly large. Melt stacks normally contain four eyeshadows for $48 or five eyeshadows for $58. The Blueprint stack is comprised of eight eyeshadows for $48, or about $6 per eyeshadow. That’s comparable or less than many drugstore single offerings. Furthermore, stack eyeshadows purchased individually at Melt cost $17. Purchasing a stack is an immediate bargain.

The Packaging

The only thing I’m disappointed with is the packaging. Now, to be clear, the stack concept, in general, is my second favorite thing about the brand. My first stack is untouchable in that regard. My issue is that the magnets in the Blueprint stack didn’t seem to be as steadfast.

I traveled to Ohio with this stack as I have done before with Dark Matter. When I unpacked my bag, I found traces of [dark blue] in my bag. The stack had shifted open during the flight. My favorite eyeshadow was chipped. Thinking it was a fluke, I flew back with it the same way. When I finally unpacked my makeup bag this weekend, I found more wasted eyeshadow and a bigger chip. My heart was broken, yall. Most eyeshadows that come in Melt stacks are sold separately (yay for refills!). The Blueprint stack appears to be an exception.

The Verdict

Rating – Mighty Fine. The only thing that stops this palette from earning Mack’s coveted “High and Migh-T” rating is the packaging. Still, I highly recommend this palette, and if Melt launches this same concept in another color scheme (like green – hint, hint), it’s as good as bought.

Have you tried the Blueprint stack or any other Melt stack? Do you have a favorite go-to blue in your arsenal? Let me know your thoughts below!