How to Transfer a Single MAC Eyeshadow to a Palette

When I was in high school I became addicted to buying MAC makeup.  Actually, it was their eye shadow to be exact.  I loved going into the store and picking out a new color from their lineup. I would stand there for what seemed like forever testing all of the colors on my hand before deciding which one was going to come home with me.

When I started to dabble in some modeling in college, I noticed that a lot of the makeup artists had palettes of MAC eye shadow.  They seriously looked awesome.  I wished I could put all of the single shadows that I had into one of their palettes, but I was told you have to buy them that way.  

I found out you can buy the eye shadows as refills which don’t have the outside plastic casing and then buy an empty palette that holds 15 refills to put them all in. Each refill has a magnet at the bottom as does the case, so that’s how they stick in there.

The problem was, by that time, I had over 45 single shadows in their big ole plastic cases!

Then one day, I met the greatest makeup artist ever.  She told me she had started with a bunch of singles too and had figured out a way to get them all into palettes. Que the Hallelujahs! I was so excited.

She taught me how to do it and after perfecting it….I thought I would teach you all how to go from this:

To this:

You will need:
MAC Eyeshadow
Lighter
Safety Pin
Magnet Tape
Scissors

(I did this to two different shadows and chose the best pic from each. C helped.....how nice of him)

Step 1: Slide a safety pin in the tiny crack along the front of the top part of the shadow case (once its open). Sometimes it takes a little work, but you should be able to jimmy it in there.

Step 2:  Once you get the safety pin in, you should be able to pop the two pieces apart and separate them.

Step 3: Take a lighter and hold it under the bottom of the shadow plate to warm it up. I do think for a good 15-25 seconds. It slightly singes the bottom of the plastic, but you don't need to worry about that. What you are really doing here is loosening the glue that is keeping the two pieces together.

Step 4: Once it is good and warm, take a safety pin  and gently slide it along the outside of the metal part to loosen it. Gently try to stick the pin under the metal piece and pry it up.  Be careful with this, is you are too harsh, the shadow will crack and you will have a mess!

Step 5:  Pop out the metal piece with shadow in tact!

Step 6: Cut a piece of magnet tape the size of the metal piece and stick it on the bottom. 

Step 7: Place into palette!

Voila! Now you have your very own MAC palette :)

I took the time to label the lids of my palettes so I would know what the names of the shadows were in case I wanted to purchase refills (which clearly I need to do). Now, obviously, when I go into MAC I don’t purchase the single plastic containers, I purchase the refills.  They are actually $5 cheaper.  Can you imagine how much I could have saved had I known this a long time ago?!?

Hope I at least help a few of you out!