My Illasmasqua Nail Polish Collection (so far...)

Hello!

So some of you may know about the fact that I recently fell in love with Illamasqua as a brand and went on a little bit of a shopping spree (helped in part by the sale they had on recently....) I thought I'd show you my little stash of their nail polishes as they are something that really stood out to me in terms of amazing consistency and quality (not that I think their make-up is bad quality or anything like that, but as a nail polish nerd, I can tell the quality of a brand/polish very quickly!)

First up is a stash shot (not as rude as it may sound...or is that just me??) Quick note: not all of these were brought at the same time. I brought some on a trip to London where I popped into the flagship store on Beak Street and had lovely customer service and then the rest were brought online via the Illamasqua website, the Debenhams Kiosk at work, eBay and Asos. It's not the most extensive collection ever but I have 15 Illamasqua nail polishes, most of which I bought over the last month....for reference the brand I own the most of is Rimmel, closely followed by Barry M and I've been buying those for years...so this collection has grown very quickly!!

Nail wheel shot without flash (all with two coats on, although most would have been fine with just one I think)

Nail wheel with flash.

From left to right: (all pictures without flash)

• Serenity - Rubber Finish - Rubber Brights Collection - Beautiful consistency/colour/staying power. I literally can't explain how in love with this nail polish I am! The feel of the rubber finish polishes is something I absolutely adore. To start with they just looked a bit like matte finish polishes but once they dry and you can feel the texture, it literally feels like rubber on your nails! Love it!
• Optimist - Rubber Finish - Not as bright yellow as I expected, which was a little disappointing to be honest. But having accepted it for the orangey-yellow that it is, I do like it more now. Does stain nails though so two layers of base coat are needed for this one.
• Devotee - Rubber Finish - I love pink nail polish and this is just the perfect pink for me I think! It's bright but not super neon so it's not in your face. 
• Nurture - Rubber Finish - Probably my favourite green ever! Again bright without being neon and it didn't stain my nails!
• Prosperity - Rubber Finish - I don't have a lot of block colour purples, most have a shimmer to them, so this one is really nice. It's a lot like a Beauty UK one that I have except the finish is different.

• Baptiste - Shimmer Finish - The shimmer in this is subtle but full on at the same time. I can't wait to try this one out when it's more towards Autumn.
• Jan - Glossy Finish - I got this in the Mystery Box I got at work for £14.00 (I got 2 powder eye shadows, 1 liquid metal, 1 eyeliner and 2 nail polishes!) and I must admit, not a polish I would have chosen. I wore this for one day before taking it off because it's too 'nude' for me. I'm a bold polish colour fan but it's god to know I have a more nude colour if I ever need it (and for nail art it's great!)
• Gamma - Glossy Finish - Such a neon orange!! I love neon colours for nail art so this will definitely be used for that at some point but I'm not sure about it being a full manicure colour...
• Kink - Rubber Finish - So I went a little mental buying up lots of rubber finish polishes as you can tell! I LOVE this colour for Christmas as I'm missing a dark green in my collection (or I was anyway!) I will be using this in my Christmas nail art for sure!
• Taint - Rubber Finish - Again, another Christmas nail art colour. Plus I kind of like it for a nice Autumn colour without being too muddy brown.

• Glitterarti - Glitter Finish? (I'm not sure what it's official finish is!) - This is the first polish I ever fell in love with at the flagship store. When the assistant told me it only came in a duo set, I literally couldn't have cared less what colour it came with because I knew I had to have it! It's such a god damn pretty colour! And the glitter in it is sort of holographic so it really makes an impact on your nails.
• Viridian - Shimmer Finish - This is the colour that came in the set with Glitterati. I have quite a few teal colours but this one is just got that something about it that made me feel better about buying this duo. The shimmer isn't over the top and just makes my nails look sort of...grown up (if that makes any sense at all?!)
• Fragile - Speckled Finish - This was also brought from the flagship store as, when I was making my way to the till, I spotted the display for the new speckled range. I probably could have brought all of them to be honest, but settled on this one as a) blue is my favourite colour and b) it looked the most like eggshell to me (Robin's eggs look like this a bit I think so naturally I had to get it...even if my name is with a y not an i....) I love this polish as it really does look like eggshell on my nails (in a good way!) and with a matte top coat over the top it's even more amazing I think!
• Raindrops - Jelly Finish - This is a blogger cult product by Illamasqua and I admit that I brought it purely because I wanted to see what all the hype was about! It is truly worth the hype and is just about the prettiest grey nail polish I think I'll ever see. The finish is neither glitter nor shimmer but somewhere in between and I love how unique it is!
• Pink Raindrops - Jelly Finish - I got this because Raindrops was so pretty that I thought "Screw it. You're having a bad week...treat yo'self!" (If anyone gets that reference, I'll love you forever!) however, this is a little bit too much like Jan for my liking. It's not bright enough for me and is a bit...blah in colour for me. The finish is just as pretty as Raindrops but I just don't love the colour personally. 

I've found that all the Illamasqua nail polish dry very quickly without my quick dry topcoat and are piratically chip free too! I was quite sceptical about the rubber finish ones because you can't put a topcoat on them, but even at work (I open a lot of boxes/bash my hands on drawers a lot/catch my nails on my clipboard frequently...) they lasted at least 5 days before chipping. The tip wear on these are practically non-existent for me too. I find a lot of polishes show tip wear within a day for me, or shrink back when the quick dry top coat has done it's magic, but Illamasqua polishes seem to be great all round!

Other than a few colour misses for me personally (which is me and not the polish at all) I think Illamasqua are my favourite brand of nail polish purely for the quality and colour/finish range. So what do you guys think? Have you tried Illamasqua nail polishes? Let me know if you have any recommendations!

Until next time,

xoxo