Posts Tagged ‘nature’
When I first read the promotional copy for Illamasqua’s Toxic Nature collection I had visions of a futuristic time, a time when society had a veritable breakdown devastated by chaos – dark, dingy, dirty, dystopic – something reminiscent of Mad Max with the smell of brutality in the air and survival the goal of the day.
But since this is, after all, a makeup collection the promotional imagery was colorful and rich. I can always count on Illamasqua to make the unnatural and distorted look stunning.
I couldn’t wait to get my hands on this collection and went straight to the source on launch day. When my package arrived from the UK I opened it with trembling hands and out tumbled one of my favorite color collections, to date, of 2011.
The collection consists of six cream pigments (the star of this show!), two lipsticks, two glosses, five polishes, a precision ink eyeliner and a handmade toxic claw. Nope. That wasn’t a typo.
Let me begin with my personal pick of the collection…the cream pigments.
All six were consistent in texture, that is to say they were all creamy without going on sticky or wet. They dry down to a matte finish in no time. And the wear is amazing! All day (8+ hours) with no creasing, fading or movement of any kind. And did I say I did not use a base?
What makes these cream pigments so especially cool is they are a multipurpose product. Don’t you just love it when a product really goes to work for you? I tried the cream pigments as eye shadows (my favorite way to wear them), as eyeshadow bases, as a cheek color, lip color and color corrector. Yup. You read right a color corrector. These nifty little pots are excellent to color correct dark circles, redness, and hyperpigmentation.
Now to be fair, if your discoloration is severe, these babies may need some extra muscle to fully neutralize what you’re concealing but if what ails you is slight to light, give ether the peach (*Emerge) or the green (Bedaub) a try.
If you’ve never tried an Illamasqua lipstick what you should know is they are…slammin’! Really, the color pay off is top notch and toxic nature’s Atomic (a vibrant fuschia) and Flare (a bright orange) are no exception. The wear time on me is average at about 6 hours and because of the intensity of the matte formulation there is a slight stain left on lips – which I rather like.
Although I’m not a big collector of nail polish, I couldn’t pass up on the shade Bacterium. While the name conjures images of sludge and slime splattered with bug bits, the color is exquisite. Illamasqua describes it as a pearlized ash/ochre and I have to agree. It’s not only a lovely shade for the summer but will work just as beautifully come fall. Oh, and I can’t forget to mention that after six days there was no chipping. Gotta ‘ love that.
And last but not least, the precision ink eyeliner. The beauty grapevine touted this as the most unique item of the collection but quite honestly, it’s a waterproof pen eyeliner folks. The color is called Glister, an opalescent nude. I’d love to jump up and down over this item (it does glide on easily and wears well on lids but not on the waterline) but lets just say my socks weren’t knocked off BUT they did roll down a bit ☺
My alter ego, Maxine, had a field day with this collection. She donned her black patent leather pants, swept Atomic on her lips, Delirium on eyes, and cheeks affixed a pair of handcuffs to her belt loop (hey, it’s my alter egos accessory of the day and we are talking about toxic nature), gave herself a wink in the mirror before she straddled her steel horse and rode off to face the unpredictable, uncharted and unnatural world that is toxic nature…
What did you (or your alter ego – I know you have one) pick up from the collection? Let me know below!
xo♡Liz
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