I’ve been having a bit of a play around with the Estée Lauder Christmas Collection and have fallen in love with the Extravagant Gold eyeshadow compact. To be fair, it’s an easy sell because I love gold, copper and brown tones. They are so flattering on every skin tone and can be used the whole year round. I was very impressed with the pigment in the shadows – especially in the dark chocolate brown which is great for creating a bit of depth. The dark brown is matte and so really holds its own against the shimmery metallics.

Although these shades are perfect for creating a gorgeous Christmassy makeup look, they would also look great in the summer months against tanned skin. I can see this palette becoming one of my most-used makeup items – the palest shadow has already got a considerable dent in it from where I’ve been using it to brighten up my eyes!

As usual, it’s easier to show you these shades ‘in real life’ than try to describe them in words, but just a few ‘asides’ that haven’t been included in the video: the dark matte brown could be used wet or dry – wet as a liner using a fine brush, dry to create a ‘smokey’ look. The lightest shade is perfect as a highlighter underneath the browbones and at the inner corner of the eyes to really make them light up. The brown-looking shade to the top right comes out a lot more coppery than you would expect, and the gold shade to the bottom left is quite ‘yellow’. There’s a shade combination to suit everyone here, and so I think that this is a bit of a winner!

I also took rather a liking to the red lipstick and gloss – the lipstick in ‘Extravagant Red’ is slightly more forgiving than a bright, fire-engine red – it’s shot through with a little bit of shimmer, as is the strawberry-coloured gloss in ‘Star Ruby’. If you want to see how these look, I’ve made yet another video, and that’s below the eyeshadow one! Phew – I don’t think I can cope with much more video-making this week!

Extravagant Gold is £34 from Estée Lauder.

Extravagant Red and Star Ruby are £17 and £16 from Estée Lauder.