Today’s post is dedicated to Julija of Infinitely Awkward, and pays homage to fivezero’s megaposts. In one of the comments, Julija asked me how many Illamasqua polishes I owned – I did a quick count from my inventory spreadsheet, and the answer was: 47. 😮 (Correction, the number of unique shades is actually 44, I purchased back-ups of certain shades which I will indicate with an asterisks) Arguably, Illamasqua are one of my all time favourites in terms of formula and colour selection. Up until last year, I had easy access to the brand but unfortunately, Illamasqua decided to exit from the North American market. Many of the ones I own were purchased during the clearance sales. Here is my Illamasqua collection, grouped by colour:
I also recently purchased these nail swatching spoons – I’ve been looking for ones with short handles (on the right) rather than the long ones that are meant for display purposes (left):
I’m pleased with these shorter ones, now I can see swatches of all my polishes easily and store them on a ring. I’ll probably do series of nail polish megaposts with other brands in my stash. Here we go – every single shade of Illamasqua nail polish I own swatched. These are listed alphabetically and shown with 2 coats (no base / top coat) – shade descriptions are from Illamasqua’s site where possible.
(Mild NSFW warning: some of Illamasqua’s shade names are of a raunchy, sexual nature. They make Nar’s Orgasm and Deep Throat seem tame!)
Alarm – bright flame red, glossy finish
Bacterium – pearlescent ash ochre
Baptiste – deep royal purple, shimmer finish
Blizzard – snow glitter, glitter finish
Boosh – pure black, glossy finish
Charisma – deep raspberry pink
Collide – bright neon pink, satin finish
Creator – magical black (shimmer finish)
DWS – cement grey
Facet* – grey crystal
Faithful – coppered metal, metallic finish
Faux Pas – blue violet, rubber finish
Fire Rose – shattered pink (shattered star)
Gothiqua – deep plum polish with bright green microshimmer
Grab – grape magenta, glossy finish
Harem – bright mauve pink
Hemlock – pale opal green iridescent
Jo’mina* – electric lilac
Lament – bright coral pink, glossy finish
Load – creamy white
Loella – bright candy pink, glossy finish
Milf – bright mint gloss
Monogamous – creamy flesh pink, matte finish
Muse – deep teal blue, glossy finish
Nomad – bright jade, glossy finish
Obsess – bright fuchsia pink, glossy finish
Phallic – deep midnight blue, shimmer finish
Pink Raindrops – sheer cool pink (silver glitter)
Poke – bright violet purple, shimmer finish (review here)
Purity – peach (review here)
Raindrops* – sheer light grey, jelly finish (silver glitter)
Rampage – dark green jelly, glossy finish
Ruthless – bright scarlet red, glossy finish
Scarab – deep ruby red, metallic finish
Stagnant – grey mauve
Stance – fuchsia violet, glossy finish
Swinger – glistening platinum gold metallic finish
Taint – stone brown, rubber finish
Throb – blood red
Trilliant – shattered champagne (shattered star)
Unnatural – rich burgundy wine, glossy finish
Untold – red glitter, glossy finish
Venous – bold blue green
Viridian – peacock green, metallic finish
My favourite colours are of course, the 3 back-ups I purchased: Facet, Raindrops, and Jo’mina – as well, I love Bacterium, Ruthless, Scarab and Viridian. I hope you enjoyed! 😀 I will continue to post swatches on my hands of the Untrieds since technically many of these (50%) I have never actually worn on my nails. 😛 As you can imagine, this took a while to swatch, photograph and edit everything but I’m really glad I finally started to swatch all my nail polishes. Do you own any Illamasqua nail polishes? Which ones are your favourites?
stash matters 
My first thought when I saw this post was holy dedication! But it’s so helpful to see all these shades swatched. I love DWS, Purity and Stagnant….they are all so pretty though!
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It did take a while but I’m so pleased with them! I love being able to have a library of swatches to refer to if I’m in the mood for a certain shade, I can just pick it out from the ring. 😀 I really like DWS too, it’s a great grey that doesn’t lean too blue or green.
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That is exactly what I am looking for in a grey nail polish! It’s so great to have them all in one place, so much more convenient!
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I’ll see if I can find a dupe of it for you from a brand that’s more readily accessible!
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That would be amazing 🙂 thank you!
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So I read online that Zoya Dove is similar to Illamasqua DWS:
http://www.zoya.com/content/item/Zoya/Zoya-Nail-Polish-Dove.html
Another option is Essie Master Plan, although it may have a touch of taupe in it:
http://www.essie.com/colors/grays/master-plan.aspx
HTH!
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Thank you so much for looking into it! I love them both so much and Essie’s is gorgeous!
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No problem at all! 😊
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Gah! So many awesome polishes! I especially love all of the deep dark vampy shades! ❤
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Yeah I’m not normally one to gravitate toward the dark vampy shades but these are just so unique / complex! I will have to wear one of these for Halloween!
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I think I just died and went to nail polish heaven! LOVE the shades Bacterium, Charisma, Facet, Hemlock, Phallic, Raindrops, Scarab, and Viridian. I never bought any when they were still available…so sad we can’t buy them anymore!
Thanks for doing all the swatches 🙂
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Your favourites are mine too! They’re so unique – I’ve honestly never come across a shade like Facet before. I’m so glad I bought a back up. Some of the shades – like Face and Raindrops – were initially limited edition ones but they proved so popular that Illamasqua made them permanent.
Illamasqua DOES ship internationally but the conversion KILLS us… the nail polishes cost $17 at the Bay… now they’re $30 excluding shipping – OUCH. There are a few shades I’m lusting after but I just cannot justify the cost.
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Hehe I also noticed that we both liked the jewel-toned ones or the unique ones like Raindrops and Facet, both of which I’ve heard tons about!
Had no idea they were leaving the North American market…I was wondering why I stopped seeing the brand in stores lol. Now I’m kicking myself for not picking any up during clearances at the Bay! But agreed, $30 is rather steep to be paying for a nail polish.
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Holy crap! I loooove these. I think my jaw dropped when I saw the first pic with all the bottles lined up! ❤ I only wish I'd gotten into these a bit sooner – most of mine are from the clearance at Hudson's Bay. I only paid FP for Alarm and Boosh – those got me hooked.
I love Alarm, Bacterium, Baptiste, Gothiqua, Lament and Poke the best of all. (I actually looked at Alarm, gasped, and then felt relieved when I remembered I have that one.)
MORE megaposts, please!!! Your stash deserves to be seen.
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I’ll work my way through my collection. Which is SMALL in comparison to YOURS, missy! Have you thought about swatching your stash onto nail spoons like this? I am so pleased about how compact these are – all of the shades there for me to choose from.
Gothiqua was a Hudson’s Bay exclusive – did you know that? I was like GIMME GIMME NOW. I haven’t actually worn Alarm on my nails – it’s SUCH a bright shade of red, I think I’ll save that for summer.
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my three favorite colors are boosh, creator and trilliant. i never thought of illamasqua as a brand but i think I might . Do you have any other illamasqua products.
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Trilliant is an amazing colour! A little outside my comfort zone since it’s quite a textured glitter.
And yes, I have quite a few Illamasqua products: foundation, blushes, eye shadows, brushes. I had quite a love affair with the brand when they were here. I enjoyed going to their counter because the makeup artists weren’t trying to push every product onto me. I can do swatches of my other products if you want. 🙂
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Please.🙏
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Wow that’s quite a collection. I don’t own any Illamasqua nail polishes though I’ve definitely been tempted at one time or another. I really like the look of Facet especially…
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Facet is my all time favourite Illamasqua polish! 😬 I was so pleased they made it permanent!
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Baterium looks so pretty. I wish I could pull off Viridian, but it looks awful on me. Awesome collection!
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Bacterium was actually my very first Illamasqua nail polish! And it grew into a full fledged obsession. Hey are you back on WP now? Your blog says it’s protected…
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Nope. My blog is still offline.
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Wow! Such a great post- thanks for sharing and for taking the time! I have yet to try Illamasqua’s polishes, but I hope I will get to grab some in the future, they look gorgeous!
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Yes, they’re definitely worth a try! 🙂
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Milf and stagnant are my favorites! What a good idea to put these on individual swatches to be able to see its true color! This post came out great!
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You only like Milf because of the name! 😛 😉
Thanks – it was a lot of work but I am rather pleased with the outcome. I’ll do more of these for sure.
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LOL MAYBE.
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DANG GIRL! You’ve got your swatch on! I feel somewhat bittersweet about these, not as many ‘unique’ colours as I expected, but definitely some more bright colours than I expected, especially from you! Do you actually wear those bright colours? 😛 Is Blizzard matte white glitter, or reflective (non-matte) white glitter? I like Charisma, but I’d like it more in a creme finish I think. I really like Gothiqua, Raindrops and Viridian!
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True, the colours aren’t as unique as one might imagine coming from a brand like Illamasqua (and that was the fallacy of the brand – people all thought it was SO edgy and perhaps TOO edgy, but in reality, a lot of their product & colours were quite tame – just the promotional imagery and branding made it seem that way). But what makes the polishes special to me is how well they apply and last on the nails. The pigmentation on these is insane. And as I showed in the Purity post, even their pastel cream shade was nearly a 1 coater.
Blizzard is a matte glitter – the pieces look kind of like vellum. I haven’t worn this on my nails yet but I think it’ll be perfect for a wintery look!
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Amen to the first part! One would think they’d have all these glamorous, unique colours that aren’t so widely common among other brands! That’s good though, the quality is good for the value then! Sometimes these kind of brands are complete misses when it comes to quality, the price is just in the name and that’s it. Oohh that would definitely be nice for a wintery manicure, it’d look like falling snow!
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First off, props to you for taking the time to swatch every color and create this extensive (and informative) post! I don’t own any Illamasqua nail polishes, but after reading this post, I really need to find a way to order some! I can tell why you got backups of Facet and Raindrops- they’re beautifully unique colors! I’m not a huge fan of pink, but Pink Raindrops would definitely be something I’d seek out. Great post! 😊
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I was soooo excited for Pink Raindrops but unfortunately I have to say it’s not nearly as beautiful as the original Raindrops. There jelly translucent quality that made Raindrops so memorizing is missing from the Pink Raindrops – it’s still a pretty shade but I suppose I have really high expectations for it!
I do hope you get a chance to try Illamasqua polishes – they’re really high quality.
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Now that’s impressive! Very useful post, thanks for swatching them all. Throb is my all time favourite Red. Phallic the most beautiful deep blue and Stagnate just a perfect taupe. ❤
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Throb is a really pretty shade of red – I just love the pigmentation on that one. I love how Phallic looks in the bottle and under certain lights but mostly it registers as a dark shade on my nails. I do love it though. Do you have some Illamasqua polishes that aren’t shown here? I’ve love to see!
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Nope, I have only few all covered here! xx
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Wow – what an amazing and impressive collection you have! So many beautiful shades!
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wow awesome collection!! never tried (or seen) these. Love those textured ones..amazing!
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Really enjoyed this post thanks for linking me, given you a follow on here and on Bloglovin 🙂 Think the ones that look the nicest are Pink Raindrops, Baptiste, Phallic and Gothiqua 🙂 Sadly I don’t own those, I did have Vice but wasn’t keen on the rubberised finish, now I have Viridian (which I love but chips quickly on me) and Noble 🙂
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I’m glad you enjoyed this post! I can’t wait to do more of these. 🙂
I haven’t had issues with Illamasqua chipping on me, luckily. Which base and top coat do you use? I use Orly Bonder and Poshe top coat and they seem to work well with most polishes (although Zoya polishes just never seem to stay on me, sadly!).
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I don’t use a topcoat typically because I test them for chipping 🙂 my base coat is Sally Hansen Miracle Growth 🙂 xx
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In case you’re wondering… I’m catching up with your favourite posts from before we “met”. 🙂
I remember when I found your blog. It was in early 2016, I believe. I think you had wrist issues at the time…
Back then I thought OMG ther’s another girl who really hoards beauty stuff, skin care and toiletries (not just one of those imposters who pretend to be overwhelmed by their 20 nail polishes, 10 fragrances and 5 blushes!
I will email you as soon as possible. Here’s what happened: I have a pinched nerve. The first week I couldn’t do anything. I felt like a stroke victim because I couldn’t move. It’s getting better, but my arms and shoulders are still killing me when I type a lot. I haven’t checked my emails in almost 2 weeks now (I’m scared!) but I hope to be able to get on top of things asap.
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Oh man, pinched nerve is no fun! I hope you’re resting it as needed and / or exercising it appropriately (I have no clue if you’re suppose to let it heal or help it along somehow…) Don’t worry about those unread emails – they can wait!
Funny how you deemed me worthy of “hoarder” status! 😆 Thank goodness I’m no imposter… 😛 I still wrestle with the knowledge that I have over 150 blushes but the last time I pulled out my baggie of blushes that I hardly ever use, I couldn’t bring myself to get rid of any of them – not one!
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My only illamasqua nail varnish i have is Radium, its such a dimensional lime greenish color i love it.
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