It’s only March yet some summer beauty collections have started to arrive in stores. Estée Lauder’s Bronze Goddess collection has a mix of beautiful bright and bronzey shades. Being a huge fan of the gelée powders, quickly picked up the new limited-edition Heat Wave Illuminating Powder Gelée ($40 for 0.21 oz/6 g, also online at Nordstrom, Neiman Marcus and Estee Lauder). Heat Wave has a beautiful embossed pattern like sun rays. It’s a luminous pale gold champagne in the compact. It swatches true to the color in the pan. I expected to fall in love with it completely, especially after swatching on my hand in store – it was like wearing sunshine on my hand. However, on the face I found it a bit too sharp and frosty (I tested with the sponge applicator, soft fluffy brushes and skunk brushes). It does layer beautifully over a cream bronzer, but I think I’m at the right amount of tan to be too dark for this to look natural. I’m all for visible shimmers, however this one emphasized my pores and looked slightly too metallic on my skin. I do think it will suit fairer skins better. Money wasn’t wasted though, this has just the right amount of glitz and sparkle to wear on the eyes. The frost factor is similar to that of the paler Armani Eyes to Kill Shadows (Heat Wave is just sheerer and not quite as frosty). Your mileage will vary with this one depending on your skintone.
Comparisons to some other gold/champagne gelee highlighters. All the ones shown below were limited-edition, I’m not sure that they will be easy to find these days, but if you already own some – you may want to shop your stash before caving on Heat Wave. MAC’s Whisper of Gilt is almost identical to Estee Lauder’s Heat Wave. I prefer the MAC even though it’s still quite frosty. The Estee Lauder Heat Wave has some tiny gold micro sparkles (these are really tiny) that emphasize my pores. The MAC is more metallic all the way through.
Here’s a simple look that I’ve did last week. It includes a few favorites:
- Eyes: Apply Estee Lauder Heat Wave, then NARS Fez and MAC Spare Change (discontinued, but NARS Via Appia is similar)
- Cheeks: Layer Edward Bess Daydream Bronzer (new version here) and Tom Ford Love Lust blush
- Lips: Swipe a pink gloss, Tom Ford Sugar Pink (swatched here)
I’m overall pleased with Estée Lauder’s Heat Wave. Even though it doesn’t work out for my face (for everyday at least), it’s a lovely eye highlighter/shadow with excellent lasting power.
Did you pick up anything from Estée Lauder’s Bronze Goddess collection? Did you like Heat Wave or did you find it too similar to what you already own? Note it is a limited-edition product. I recommend you try soon before it sells out. You can find it in store now at most Estee Lauder counters. Right now it’s online as well at Nordstrom, Neiman Marcus and Estee Lauder.
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Hi Sabrina, Heat wave is simply beautiful, both in the pan and in the swatches — truly sunshine against skin!
Aaah, this is the perfect highlighter for summer! I really love the pattern, they always do such amazing powder gelées! I'm totally loving the look, you can never go wrong with pniks and corals! ^^
I'm not too found of metallic-shimmery highlighters. P.S. You have a lovely highlighter collection 😉
Thanks for posting this so quickly! Great swatches as usual, you just helped me save some mo-nay! I'm going to skip since I already have Whisper of Gilt 🙂
Glad this helped 🙂 Always good to avoid dupes 🙂
I love it anyways :]
Heat Wave looks a little too shimmery for my NW45/Perfection Lumiere #94 skin so I'm going to skip it. But I'm totally ok with that since I'm still totally in love with, and use almost daily, the Shimmering Sands. I regret not having picked up the Topaz Chameleon. Great swatches.
I tried this on in the store recently and thought it was so pretty. Very helpful to see it side by side with Whisper of Gilt. Your look of the day sounds lovely!
Ugh, your highlighter collection is so beautiful. I'm having an incredibly hard time resisting Heat Wave.
Wow this is so gorgeous in the pan and the color seems like it would be insanely beautiful on the inner tear duct but I agree with you–it seems just a bit too frosty for my taste (and very large pores!). This is the reason I have yet to purchase any of these powder/cream hybrids–because they all seem SO metallic/frosty!
That Topaz Chameleon looks REALLY nice! But I already own Whisper of Gilt and you're right about them being very similar. The eye shadow palette (from the Bronze Goddess collection) looks nice too!
Did you check out the fun rollerball glosses from this collection? I am loving the succulent shade, goes on sheer and shine shine shine!
I think it looked so great on you ! Its versatility really makes it worth checking out. I just got myself the Tease from previous collection and absolutely love its effects.. hmm I have a feeling that I'm gonna pick this one up !
Beautiful:)….Be You
I am obsessed with hilighters. I need heat wave in my life!
I love highlighters so much.