Review: Illamasqua Liquid Metal Palette in Art of Darkness

I picked this little beauty up for just £10 when I went on my recent rampage through the amazing Illamasqua Sale (it's still on, go go go!) and it's probably the item that I was most excited for. It's a palette of four multi-use metallic cream pigments housed in sleek black plastic with a nice sized mirror. I don't usually include so many photos of a single product but I really want to show this off completely:

Top Left Clockwise: Stoic, Solstice, Superior, Resolute

I absolutely love Illamasqua's packaging. I love the signature shape and clean black plastic. It does get dirty easily because the plastic is just so smooth. I've already left a myriad of fingers prints and smudges all over mine but it's so easy to clean that it's not really an issue. The creams themselves are beautiful colours and I love the effort that Illamasqua have gone into with the pretty names. Stoic was the stand out for me and I was almost tempted to buy it on it's so I could have plenty in my stash. In the end I'm glad I didn't as Stoic is actually the least pigmented and the hardest to work with of all the colours.

I was so amazed and excited when I swatched these! Ahh, look at them! Beautiful, luminous metal. Solstice is definitely the most pigmented and being gold I feel that it's something that I'm going to get a lot of use out of. Resolute and Superior were about the same (very smooth and pigmented) and sadly, as I said, Stoic was a little more patchy and awkward. Still nice and well pigmented though. One of the things that I'd noticed when I was looking for other reviews of these products is that no one had really tried to push the limits of these products. When I was playing with them the first thing I wanted to do is start mixing and painting and see what they could do! Which led me here:

The pigments are very easy to blend and mix which means that despite there only being four colours in the palette, the colour possibilities are a lot higher! Superior and Resolute created a rich violet, Solstice and Resolute created a coppery/orange and Solstice and Superior created a pretty olive tone. Obviously these are just three options and there are a lot more (I'll let you know if I find anything else really special) but how exciting! There's such a wonderful capacity for experimentation and creativity with Illamasqua products which the company actively encourages. I am a happy bunny.

But of course, regardless of how good they look on my arm, it's how they stand up on my lids that matters. And this is where it all falls apart.

This is the first look I tried using Solstice and Resolute. I always try out any eye products without primer to begin with just to get a feel for the lasting power and quality. I'm very sad to say that this lasted even less than a single hour. The second I started blinking the pigments settled into my crease and started disappearing from the rest of my lid. The photo you see above is immediately after applying and you can already see the look dissolving. Not to be beaten though, I decided to try again.

I know this look using Superior and Stoic isn't amazing, it was simply thrown together to check lasting power. I applied e.l.f eyelid primer and used a little powder to ensure a completely matte base. And for a moment I thought it might work! It didn't immediately settle into my crease and it was still very easy to apply. However an hour later it was just the same. The look is fading away quickly and just looks an absolute mess. I look like I've been clubbing for twelve hours straight and suffer from extremely oily lids. As someone with dry skin I very rarely experience creasing like this. I knew that there would be some creasing due to the texture but this is ridiculous! I'm not sure what I'm going to do. I'll ask Illamasqua for advice and see if there's anything that will salvage my beautiful pigments. I'd be heartbroken if they sat in the back of my drawer for the next two years. Sigh.

What do you think to this palette? Have you got any secrets to stop creasing? I'd love to know!

Lauren