Mac 2024 gift of gold advent calendar
- Price: £137.76 (on sale)
- Worth: £445
- Number of days: 24
- Number of full-sized products: 18
- Advent calendar highlights: Squirt plumping gloss stick, Macstack mascara and Fix+ original setting spray
- Available: Now
- Why we love it
- Plenty of full sizes
- A good chunk of trending beauty - lip plumpers, clear brow gel etc.
- Take note
- Perhaps a few too many lip products
- A couple of stingily-sized mini
As the brand behind my favourite lip liner (’subculture’, for anyone asking: was £20, now £15 Maccosmetics.co.uk), pressed powder and mascara, I had high hopes for Mac’s advent calendar offering this year. Upon unboxing, I was thrilled to see the viral Macstack mascara among the goodies, as well as not one, but two, lip liners in the supremely wearable shades of ‘spice’ (a cult fave) and ‘whirl’.
Other highlights included the clear lip glass – a must in a world obsessed with no make-up make-up – and the colour excess gel pencil, which I’ll be adopting in a Charli XCX-esque manner, smudged all round.
Some elements I was perhaps disappointed with was the inclusion of sample sizes, something most brands have moved past in 2024, as well as an eye mask that felt a tad flimsy. Given the calendar’s premium price, which exceeds that of LOOKFANTASTIC and Harvey Nichols (wherein there are no giveaway-like sample sizes), I’d have hoped to see these minute tubes thrown in as extras.
Of course, there’s still more than £300 of savings to be had here and this is certainly apparent in the four full-size lipsticks. My favourite? It has to be Macximal in ‘taupe’ – it’s the ultimate autumn-winter shade with a warm, neutral tone.
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I was pleased with the number of individual eyeshadows here, too – four in total – and, if you’ve still got your empty Mac pro palette (circa 2012), they’re the perfect festive shades to slot in for an effortless sweep of shine on the lids. The tinted lip glass in ‘oh baby’ is a little bold for frequent wear, though I can certainly see it’d be a perfect pick for darker skin tones.
Speaking of skin tones, there is a lack of foundations, concealers and powders, as mentioned previously, though I would have liked to see some blusher or bronzer. This is something that multiple competitors have done as an approach to including face base products and Mac’s mineralise blush is an ever-popular pick. Here’s hoping for 2025...
The packaging, I must say, is impressive, with day 24’s gift (I won’t spoil it for you) revealing itself on a raised platform as you open its lid. The ornate gold wrap is luxurious and the addition of this calendar to your side table or console will be a flourish of festivity to admire in the build-up to Christmas.