Illamasqua Fundamental Pallete.

Yet another Illamasqua review for your viewing pleasure today. This time I've broken with tradition & plan to do some good old fashion praise singing.

Illamasqua Fundamental Palette

The Fundamental Palette is part of the Human Fundamentalism range, that's based on the desire to express your inner self on the outside. The premise of this palette is to experiment with a range of different textures. It contains a matt cream pigment (Bedaub), a liquid mental (yuck!) & two matt powder shadows. (Inception and Hype). I picked this up for £10 on sale from the Illamasqua site, a complete steal as full price this retails for £34.

Fundamental Palette Swatches

I find the powder shadows from Illamasqua are really good in terms of pigmentation & wear time & I love the shade range. I've already had a lot of wear from Inception & had been on the look out for a bold yellow like Hype for a while & neither have disappointed. They blend well & keep their intensity for around 8 hours. Although Inception needed to be applied wet to keep its vibrancy otherwise it blended to a much darker almost dirty grey. 

For me the unexpected star of this palette is Bedaub. A pretty, minty green cream shadow that I've been using as a base for Urban Decay's Aquarius as well as wearing it alone. It's really smooth to apply, doesn't crease & lasts all day. I'm so impressed with this I'm already eyeing up other shades. Unlike some of my long wear cream shadows, this stays blendable for a couple of minutes before it sets. It's also easily built up from a sheer wash of colour to a really striking intensity without caking. I'm think this colour will come into its own when spring has finally sprung & it's pastels a go-go.
I've only used the liquid metal as a highlight for the inner corner of my eye. I'm not usually a fan of these but I noticed the consistency of the one included here is far less greasy than those in the Liquid Metal Palette.

Overall this a great little quad. I'm not sure how many looks you could achieve using solely these colours but individually they are great products. Even at full price this is quite good value when you consider the price of the individual colours.
I've had quite an extensive play & will post some looks once I get some decent photos.

Illamasqua Cream Foundation

Its been a while since I used a cream foundation, I had a little love affair with Max Factors Miracle Touch but I'm a liquid girl at heart. Illamasqua's Cream foundation was in the sale at a bargainous £10 & as I seem to be reaching the ends of my current favourites thought I'd give it a whirl. 

Illamasqua Cream Foundation C150

Likes

• Blend/build ability
• Consistency
• Didn't exaggerate large pores
• Shade. Much less orange than appears in pan.
• Styling of packing, good size mirror for touch ups

Dislikes

• Sponge applicator included makes it really hard work to apply & there's nowhere to store it within the casing so it's a fairly pointless addition
• Styling. Although I really love the way Illamasqua products look its a bit of a faff when riffling through your make up bag to distinguish between them
• Shininess

Illamasqua Cream Foundation C150 swatch

I was initially fairly impressed. The shade was a good match, the colour appears much less yellow once blended. This product has had mixed reviews but like all foundations one man's trash is anothers treasure. It's probably best described as medium coverage, much lighter than the Max Factor equivalent but it is buildable. It doesn't feel as greasy as I expected from the quick swatch on my hand & has plenty of slip to allow for easy blending. I found I didn't need a concealer with this foundation as I added a little dab more under eyes & on blemishes & it did the job well enough. 

I blended it out using a Real Techniques Buffing Brush after applying a thin layer using a MAC 190. I only powdered the areas I'd concealed & fixed with Urban Decay De-Slick. I found it lasted really well. Even a 2 hour power nap (woops!) failed to make too much of a dent in its lightly luminous finish. It did crease slightly under my eyes by the 14hr mark but I think that was more to do with the powder I used (Max Factor, trying to make a dent before I ditch it). Its perfect for a causal Saturday or a lunch with the girls but I'm not sure it'll be making onto my week day list as it takes a little more care to apply than a liquid. It's not transfer or climate resistant either which is an essential to me for work. 

I gave this foundation another outing before posting this review & I'm not sure my original opinion still holds. It was still comfortable to wear & lasted a good 6 hours but I looked so shiny all day. It didn't feel particularly greasy but appeared to me to be a step too far past luminous. It also transferred really badly when I blew my nose or used a napkin. Perhaps I should have powdered with a heavier hand, perhaps I used too much product but either way I wasn't overly impressed. I've not experienced foundation transferring onto things before & as I'd used my faithfully De-Slick, before & after, was amazed & alarmed. 


This product is far more natural looking than many cream foundations & the satin like finish I achieved the first time I applied it was really pretty. I think the jury is still out on this one. Perhaps it's best suited to good skin days where a feather like touch is all that is needed to even out skin tone.

Illamasqua Liquid Metals

At first sight it's easy to fall in love with this quad of highly metallic creams. The pigmentation & shiny is beautiful & the super soft texture is not at all irritating. The shades are wonderfully wintery & scream NYE party. With names like Enrapture, Surge, Electrum and Phenomena (from top left) its hard not to harbour some lust. This is sadly where my love affair ends.

Oh my word! This palette is awful. A friend gave it to me & said "make it work, I really want to love it but everything I try fails". Never one to shy away from a make up related challenge I snatched it from her with gusto, resolute that I'd report back with some stunning results.

Now, I usually like Illamasqua, the colour & shade ranges are exceptional & the goth in me loves the styling but in my opinion the palette (£34) is an epic fail.

I should confess I'm quite picky about cream shadows due to the creasing issues I've experienced but from a fairly high end product with such a good reputation I had higher hopes.

Firstly I tried Surge as a shadow smudged with fingers over eyes prepped with foundation. Creases appeared within 10 minutes but were easily corrected with fingertips. After about a hour it looked horrific with the only colour remaining being crease lines. Then I tried Phenomena over Mac's Soft Ochre paint pot. This faired no better.

Determined to find a use for this seemingly gorgeous palette, I tried applying a thin layer over Urban Decay Primer Potion then patting a Mac Pigment in Old Gold over the top to set it. I fixed this with Urban Decay De-Slick spray. Loved the super dense shine & thought I may have cracked it. However, after a hour of sitting & doing very little, the creases were not only very evident but impossible to correct.

Following some research (& a little sale purchase, whoops!) on the Illamasqua website I tried using the Liquid Metals in different ways. They failed as eyeliner, as disappeared quickly & applying them over a powder shadow was tricky as they either caked or rubbed the shadow off. As a highlight on the cheekbones they looked amazing but faded fast (2hours of sitting in a cool room!). On the collarbone they faired a little better but I was scared of transfer onto not only my clothes but the clothes of anybody I dared to hug.

 Finally I tried them as lip glosses. For photographs this would be fab but after about 3 mouthfuls of wine you're left with a sticky glass and naked lips.

I really do want to like this palette. The colours are stunning & very metallic but sadly I cannot find a use for it that lasts & doesn't require mega efforts to achieve.

I'd love to know how others use it, if only so I can admit defeat & go back to playing with products that work!