In February Illamasqua launched a special type of polish for their spring 2013 collection
With nail art still going strong companies are trying hard to capitalize on the DIY factor. Everyone wants that DIY look without the three hour turn around time. This speckle polish has done just that.
Gives you a mega cute DIY look in minutes with a chip free award winning formula. Needles to say I fell in love with this polish. So much so that I got every single color. About $19 each at Sephora with San Francisco tax.
These took a surprisingly long time to release in my store. Something about a delay in the signage and the product not being able to be put out without it. Because of this I had to have an awesome friend of mine purchase some of the colors near him.
Colors;
Scarce, Fragile, Freckle, Speckle, Motie
two coats
Mottie (green) put up a huge fight! It was very thin compared to the others and I had to pick at the glitter flicks to even get any on my nail. Fragile(blue) was easier to work with but gave me a few streaks, it shaped up after the second coat. Speckled, scarce, and freckled all applied smoothly, the flecks dispersed beautifully on their own and I love the texture. It is creamy and just lightly sheer so you can still see the specks underneath ever so slightly.
I got about a week's worth of wear from this polish with no top coat and minor tip wear. Some chipping on my thumb and index but I use my hands at work for 8 hours so all nail polish has a hard time with that. For reference I get about 4 days from OPI with no top coat before my hands start to look hideous.
To the packaging
The uniqueness of the Illamasqua polish always attracts me. I adore the bottle shape, it's so easy to store and no awkward rolling if they fall over in your drawer.
I don't know what happened, but with this collection I got a lot of this
The caps over turn, it made me sad. So of course I tried to fix it or it was going to bug me for the rest of my life
yes this happened
Thankfully it popped right back on, so I just placed it on in the proper direction and now she's perfect again. I screwed and unscrewed it a couple times and it's good as new, I even tried popping it back off and it refused to budge
My only other packaging complaint is that the bottom of the bottle doesn't have the name on it.
It is written under "Nail Varnish" I cant see it without glasses on and it was very hard to photograph.
THE DUPE!!
Then a few months later (earlier this week) I discovered this guy!! He is available at Urban Outfitters and only comes in Bohemian Summer (blue) so far. (sadly my least favorite of the colors)
$5 or 2 for $8
okay let's nit pick!
I'll start by saying that if I had paid $19 for the UO I would have returned it upon first swatch. However for 5 dollars it's great for on a budget beauties. Or a good chance to try the look for a lower cost in case you're on the fence about it.
Just from the bootle you can tell the dupe has more flecks in it, but is otherwise identical. Yes and no. I would say the amount of flecks is very similar but the Illamasqua one has 3 different fleck sizes where the urban one only has 2.
The urban polish is missing the "medium" fleck and has an over abundance of the large one.
The polish its self is substantially more liquidy and sheer. I had to do 3 coats to achieve the opacity of the Illamasqua one. Because of the larger flecks your nail gets more black in it, since the polish is thin it makes the flecks on the under coats more apparent. I like the scarcity of the Illamasqua flecks because it makes it look more egg like. The UO looks like a unique glitter top coat on your nail. This could be a pro for you if you like that sort of thing :)
one coat UO(left) one coat Illamasqua (right)
you can see the Illamasqua all ready looks creamy
pinky two coats middle three coats (see how black the flecks look?)
This is after 1 day at work all ready some minor tip wear and pieces where the flecks have ripped off.
Overall I'd say this is a good polish. Because of the consistency it feels a little grainy from the flecks and they tend to snag, something that could be fixed with top coat, even better with a gell coat. If I hadn't bought all of the Illamasqua ones all ready I would probably have skipped the blue and gotten this one(since blue is my least favorite of the colors any way). I feel like a light hand and some top coat make this one just as good.
TL;DR
All of the colors with the exception of green (it was much thiner and the flecks were hard to grab) , applied smoothly and with tiny to no streaking. One coat was enough because although it is on the sheer side it is closer to cream. I applied two coats anyway for brightness and to add extra flecks.
9/10 for this one.
7/10 for the packaging because of turn cap issues.
PS: Since I all ready have the blue I'll probably be giving away the UO one so stay tuned.
<3 Alice
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