Slightly Depressing Illamasqua Post

This is my third attempt at writing this post, not because I messed up the last two but because I find this post difficult to write as it requires me to draw upon the worst time in my life.

Yesterday Illamasqua announced their "Final Act of Self-Expression" collaboration with a London Funeral directors to provide makeup artistry services for the recently deceased's funerals. The intention I'm sure is to offer a service which would allow those for whom makeup played an important in their identity to be made up in a way which they would have had done whilst alive. However, I am not convinced that this is coming across in a way in which they intended, it does seem in poor taste, namely because many of the people who would want this service are young or at least much younger than the average life expectancy. It is not 'natural' in Western society for young people to die, it is not common place to expect to lose a loved one so early on in life, so such deaths will ordinarily be extremely traumatic, if it had been a service offered through funeral directors, it would be fine or if this scenario were really commonplace it wouldn't seem as bad.

My primary objection comes from the fact that this could create an unrealistic expectation as to how the dead person will look. The model in the images advertising this is obviously alive and looks fantastic, much more like a sleeping character out of a fairytale than a corpse. Despite the common misconception, it is difficult to make the dead look alive, when my Mum died I was present and the change was instantaneous, the body she had once lived in looked like that of a stranger and no amount of make up would have been able to change that. As a result we decided that the coffin lid should be shut and no viewing allowed, although viewings are fairly common where we come from in Scotland (there were viewings at my Grans funeral, at my great-Grans twenty years ago and at all but one (out of necessity, rather than disapproval) of my families funerals in Scotland). Opinions varied as to the success of this but my Mother had said that my great Gran "looked like a vampire-it was horrific", she had said that it wasn't down to the make up or and lack of skill on the part of the funeral parlour. I think this could be selling an unrealistic expectation to someone who is dying and to relatives who have just been bereaved. 

Swatches: Illamasqua Atomic and Flare Lipsticks

Brand: Illamasqua

Atomic (Pink)

Flare (Orange)

Collection: Toxic Nature S/S 2011

Price: £15.50 each

Swatches: Orange and Purple Lipstcks

L-R: Barry M 117, MAC Meltdown, Morange And Neon Orange
L-R: Barry M 129, 143, MAC Purple Rite, Up the Amp, Illamasqua Fetish, MAC Violetta and Style Curve.

Violetta (Perm, PRO) and Style Curve (LE) are both very similar, SC is slightly more red toned and is a cremesheen rather than an Amplified Creme.

Morange (Perm) and Neon Orange (LE and Perm PRO) are also similar both are AC but NO is slightly more red toned.

If you have Violetta, you probably won't need to get SC. If you have Morange or NO you won't really need the other.

Haul: October

EOTD: Funky Rocket

UDPP

MAC Bare Study p/p

MUFE 92

UD Ransom

MAC Stars n Rockets

MAC White Frost

MAC Gesso

MAC Crystal Avalanche

MAC Black Funk e/l

MAC Blacktrack f/l

Benefit Bad gal mascara

Illamasqua intense lipgloss Fierce

Update

Another update, since I have not done or bought much recently but it will be the start of term in the next few weeks and hopefully I will be able to buy some of the amazing stuff I've had my eye on recently.

Seen a lot of posts about the new Illamasqua collection (Dystopia). I'd like almost all of  the products in the collection, which is in contrast to Sirens where I was fairly indifferent to much of it. Urban Decay has also got quite a few things that caught my attention, the new primers look good and I would kill for the new Book of Shadows, which I missed out on last year due to the delay in my funding. From looking at the official US website there are a number of great products due out but, sadly, it does not always follow that what is released in the USA will be released in the UK but fingers crossed. The same goes for the Too Faced site, they are advertising the Teddy Bear hair bristles on a variety of brushes aside from the kabuki and flatbuki both of which I have and love. I wish that even if these products weren't sold in UK stores or on a UK based site, you could buy them off the US site and pay for the shipping to the UK.

I have also noticed that Lime Crime are bringing out a range of lipsticks on the 1st October.  I have fallen in love. I have wanted to try the eye dusts but felt that $12 + shipping was a bit steep for 0.07 oz of product but for a gorgeous bright lipstick ($16)  I think it would be worth it and I could buy a dust to try it and not feel as bad about it. The range of bright and bold colours is quite impressive, it has pinks, purples, oranges and red, as well as a black and a blue lipstick,which for a collection of 10 colours is quite good, as not even MAC carries black or blue as permanent colours and Illamasqua doesn't carry a blue (I wouldn't be surprised if this changed one day).   The other thing that stands out is the packaging:  a bright pink tube with a holographic unicorn, what isn't to love about that?  I only hope that it is as good as it seems otherwise I am going to be very disappointed...

I am keen to try the OCC lip tars especially Anime, Pageant and Katricia.  I recently did the makeup for one of my friends and her two sisters for her wedding, which got me thinking about freelancing.  I do have a lot of good makeup and brushes and as lipstick and eyeshadow etc go, I could do some nice looks  for people of different races and skin tones but when it comes down foundation and powders etc,  I only have NC and NW 15 and 20's. Clearly, that is not very helpful, in the town I grew up I suspect it would have been perfectly possible to work with such a limited range but where I live now, it would be difficult to do much with just those. Foundation costs a lot when you have to buy several different colours, so when I was on OCC's site I noticed that they have small sizes but that was for the airbrush system. I have been wondering if it is possible to use these without an airbrush machine and just apply with brushes. But don't want to waste money to find out if it looks okay or not.

I am overjoyed that it is almost time for the Boots Christmas catalogue to be released. Every year I race down to my nearest Boots to grab one and look at all of the stuff they have got in.  It has been like this for years, the only decent places to buy anything in my hometown and the neighbouring towns was Boots and Superdrug (and even then the range was quite restricted), so when the catalogue came out I would give my parents a long list with just about everything from the 17 and Natural Collection ranges on it and hope that on Christmas morning I would have lots of bright and smelly goodies under the Christmas tree. They would sometimes buy a couple of the things on the list as well as "proper" presents, i.e. things I would be able to keep and wouldn't be used up by New Year.  It is much better now that I can buy my own things and don't have to wait until 25th December. Especially now that I'm a bit too old for lists and they would have no idea what to buy, what I've already got and my Dad would have a heart attack at the tills at the price of a singular lipstick, so best done myself.

I love autumn and winter more than summer and spring. You can really go for drama in your makeup and wear lovely deep spicy perfumes and wear gorgeous deep purples and other jewel colours.  It is also easier to wear foundation without it being too hot or humid and ruining the look.  Autumn and winter tend to (or at least they seem to) last quite a long time in the UK, so I suspect I'm in the right place in that respect.

Review: Illamasqua Fetish Lipstick

Illamasqua Lipstick 'Fetish' £14

Haven't been out much so I have not been wearing much makeup recently, so it has taken a while for me to roadtest it and then life turned a bit hectic, meaning I didn't have time to write it up.

Anyway, when the product  was applied the colour was gorgeous and vivid- exactly as I had hoped it would be. I found that it had quite a dry, matte texture (as I think most illamasqua lipsticks have) which coupled with the colour, meant that it really was not very forgiving on dry lips.  I think to get it to look decent you really need to exfoliate  and moisturise your lips better than with MAC (generally speaking).  It would probably be a good idea to use a good lip primer to help with this.

Otherwise there is not too much else to say except that this colour is amazing under the "Fierce" lipgloss. 

Review: Illamasqua Intense Lipgloss

Illamasqua Intense Lipgloss in "Fierce" (£12.50)

This just arrived in the post this morning and I immediately fell

 in love with the colour. It is a gorgeous opaque purple both in the tube and once it has been applied. This was something that I had hoped for but did not fully expect to happen, as quite often lipgloss'es apply thinly and do not offer the coverage I had hoped for and as a result I do not often buy them as I am less inclined to wear them alone rendering them a waste of money.  

The other (main) reason I rarely buy lipgloss is the texture.  They have this tendency to be very sticky and gunky and end up gluing hair  to your lips or dragging lots of sticky product across your face and glasses and it drives me insane. The illamasqua lipgloss was different it was a lot less sticky than any other glosses I have tried and despite having been outside I did not have a purple mess all over my face.  The texture is not like a lipstick or a gloss,  it is hard to accurately describe what it felt like but, it was sort of like a half way between a gloss and a lipstick.

The scent was also quite nice something which my Mum agreed on (she hated the colour). There is only really one thing that I think some people would dislike about this product and that is the applicator and the tube.  The tube is quite stiff when conside

ring that it is a squeeze out product, which I think  for some may be a bit of an issue and the top of the applicator is fairly small and I don't imagine that too many people who like to apply straight from the tube would find it very convenient, however, Personally this isn't a problem as I use a brush and appreciate that the tube tends to draw the excess back into the tube, meaning that less is spoiled on the applicators tip or in the lid.

I will most definitely  be buying this again.

 

Swatches

Just received my stuff from Illamasqua this morning and decided to put up the swatches. Will probably put up the review later.2 coats of the nail varnish in 'Baptiste'

top: Lipstick in 'Fetish' 

Bottom: Intense Lipgloss in 'Fierce'

Update

Not updated for a while,but haven't done very much to write about.

My hair has settled down, I think it could have been made worse by the fact that she used hair straighteners, which I tended only to use before I had my hair cut thinner at the bottom and it used to look bushy, with it both cut thinner and straightened the effect was too much (I still prefer the way my usual hairdresser does it)  and whilst I'm not overly keen on my fringe it looks better than it did. All it need was to be washed and  for some of the Kerastase Volumaktiv (not sure how it's spelled) to be sprayed and blow dried. Although I should never be happier with what I can do with my hair than what a hairdresser can do, same goes with makeup, brows and nails (hence why I tend to do my own makeup and brows- I usually only get a polish on my nails and can do it well on my left hand but then other can be a bit messy, I wonder if they'd charge half price for one hand?).

Went on a massive depotting rampage last night and depotted everything but my style warriors stuff, I managed to do it without breaking any shadows and without ruining my straighteners or setting anything on fire so I call it a success.  That said I didn't have any magnets and need another 2 or 3 pallets to accommodate them (about 30 of them now live in  in CD cases so until I get the pallets and magnets I will be anxious for them, so a trip up to B&Q tomorrow for magnets and a rush order at mac.co.uk).  I also hope that they still do B2M and that my local counter will accept panless e/s pots and that they allow you to buy from limited edition stuff (Trimming Talk and Most Popular are crying out to me).

Considering putting an order in for some Illamasqua stuff, my main problem is that I can't see the stuff first (killing my plan for Rich Liquid Foundation- I have been told that anything from RF120 to RF145 is comparable to NW15 I don't want to spend £20 on foundation that is too dark or far too light nor can I afford or want one in each shade). The other problem is, it all looks so good to me, I am trying to constrain myself over the summer but would end up with 7 lipsticks, a dozen eyeshadows, most of the intense Lipglosses and medium pencils and a load of other stuff. I have been tempted to buy the lip pallet but sadly they don't seem to have Fetish or Perilous and those are the two I really want with Box and Ignite. So I'm trying to keep to a £50 limit for the time being (the day my student loan comes in I'm going to go crazy- roll on October. I will justify it as helping the economy by buying British- I may end up walking to Uni everyday- 6 miles and having no books except the crap out of date ones in the library, but I will have amazing makeup). I'm quite keen to see how pigmented they are and the range of colours, I think I may be 'forced' to buy Daemon and Vulgar as I don't really have any red or orange eyeshadows and obviously that is just plain wrong and upsets the karma of my collection (I hope that that works on my Mum if she gets to the post before me- I really doubt it will though).