NOTD: Technic Celebration - Illamasqua Creator Dupe?

I've been lusting after Illamasqua's Creator ever since I saw a swatch of it. It just looked so mystical and it reminded me of  Prometheus (because I'd watched it the night before and I'm impressionable like that.) But like a lot of things that I want, I couldn't justify the price, particularly at £13.50 for a single nail varnish. Imagine my excitement when I came across Technic's Celebration! A possible dupe for £1.25? It immediately found it's way into my Love Thy Make Up Haul.

Celebration consists of 15ml of silver glitter suspended in black polish that is contained in a heavy based glass bottle. The packaging is sleek and functional but nothing special (and heavily borrowed from OPI's design.)

I was immediately disappointed by how sheer the base of this polish is. It came out as a dark milky grey colour and the opaqueness above was achieved with three coats of it. Saying that, application was very easy and the glitter spread evenly across the nail which can be a difficult thing to achieve in polishes like this. It also dried extremely quickly so it didn't bother me too much that I had to layer it up. The glitter is also much larger than in Creator so the galaxy effect is sadly lost; even more so because of the layering required. It's possible that it would be a lot less clunky-looking with a single coat over a black polish but I haven't tried it yet. Regardless, I actually really like this polish. I found myself looking at my nails a lot and even got a few compliments! The only problem is that on the third day of wearing it I experienced some rather vicious chipping. Admittedly, I should have used a base coat but it still surprised me that the lasting power was so poor! The remaining polish was an absolute nightmare to remove too, so if you do try this I recommend using a thick base coat.

Final Verdict: Definitely not a perfect dupe but a great alternative for people looking for something similar at a fraction of the cost. Nice effect but the lasting power and opacity could be better.

What do you think to this polish? Know of any other bargain Illamasqua dupes?

Lauren