By Jessica Ye (Jessica Yap)
We thought we had seen just about every possible variation of setting powder, until Huda Beauty decided that perhaps what our faces really needed was a little more pink. And lilac. And Cardi B.
The result is Ultra Snatched, the latest addition to Huda Beauty’s Easy Bake family, and it comes in a colour palette that looks like someone tipped a box of pastel sweets straight onto the makeup counter. There are soft pinks, electric lilacs and rosy mauves, all designed to brighten and lift the complexion whilst keeping that famously smooth Easy Bake finish.
Naturally, Huda Kattan needed someone who could match the energy of it all. Enter Cardi B.
The rapper stars alongside Huda in the new “Snatched Baddies” campaign, and the two are not exactly playing it safe. The campaign revolves around the pair trading lives, allowing Huda and Cardi to step into each other’s worlds whilst putting Ultra Snatched through its paces. There is plenty of glam, a healthy dose of humour and, judging from the campaign imagery, absolutely no interest in looking understated.
That feels rather appropriate for Cardi, who has never been particularly precious about makeup. Her beauty looks have always been part of the performance, whether that means an enormous lash, a sculpted complexion or enough hair to require its own postcode. Putting her face alongside Huda Beauty’s full-glam aesthetic was therefore less of a strange pairing and more of a meeting that was probably overdue.
The collection itself gives Easy Bake a noticeably different look.
The Loose Setting Powder Duos come with two shades rather than one, allowing the powders to be worn separately or mixed together. Cherry Lilac combines Cherry Blossom Cake, a sheer soft pink, with the new Lilac Muffin, a cool lilac for fair to light skin tones. The two can also be blended into a pinky-lilac shade.
Then there is Pink Ube for medium to tan skin tones, where Pink Velvet Cookie, a deeper rosy pink, meets Ube Birthday Cake, an electric lilac. Mixed together, the colours become a rosy mauve.
And honestly, the colour combinations are probably the first thing you will notice. We are so accustomed to seeing setting powders in variations of beige, banana and translucent white that a bright pink or lilac powder immediately looks like it belongs in a completely different part of the makeup bag.
There is some logic behind the madness, though. Pink can give the complexion a brighter, fresher appearance, whilst lilac tones are commonly used to counter dull or yellow-looking areas. Huda Beauty has simply pushed those familiar colour-correcting ideas much further, and packaged them into shades that are meant to be seen.
The loose powders promise up to 18 hours of wear with a flashback-free finish, whilst the duo format means you can decide how much of each colour you actually want. More pink? More lilac? A little bit of both? It is essentially makeup with a mixing menu.
For those who prefer their powder in a compact rather than loose and flying everywhere the moment you open your handbag, Easy Bake Pressed gets the same Ultra Snatched treatment. Ube Birthday Cake comes in a medium shade with cool lilac undertones, whilst Pink Velvet Cookie is designed for tan skin with warmer pink undertones. The pressed formula offers up to 12 hours of shine control with a matte finish that is intended to stay smooth rather than turn into the dreaded cakey situation.
Huda Beauty’s Snatch Map technique completes the routine, using the loose powder around areas that need a little extra brightness and lift before layering the pressed powder over the top. It is the sort of technique that makes sense when you are going for a properly sculpted, polished complexion rather than the “I just woke up like this” school of beauty.
At $43 USD (~$58 SGD) for the Easy Bake Loose Setting Powder Duos and $40 USD (~$54 SGD) for the pressed powders, Ultra Snatched is clearly aimed at the makeup lover who enjoys a little theatre in the routine. There is something quite refreshing about that. Not every product launch needs to pretend that we are all after effortless, barely-there beauty.
Sometimes we want the pink powder.
Sometimes we want the lilac powder.
And sometimes, apparently, we want Cardi B and Huda Kattan to swap lives whilst doing a full face.
We can live with that.
