Strawberry Milk

So I rarely come across a color that I dislike, so when I do it comes as a surprise. The color in question is Essie Pop Art Pink, and what prompted me to buy it was Scrangie's swatch which made it look like milky pink perfection.

Where to begin...first of all this looked much cooler-toned than I anticipated, which I'm not fond of. Pop Art Pink is a light milky pink jelly. My skin is very warm and cool toned reds and pinks always seem to clash horribly. It's also a very "Barbie-ish" pink, which while pretty is just not my style. I lean more toward the blush and antique-pink hues.

The formula is very sheer and rather streaky. Shown here is 4 thin coats, because it was patchy and uneven at 3 despite my best application skills. I do love the milkiness and slight translucency of it, though. If I don't swap this away I'm considering tinkering with the color a bit to more suit my taste.

Funnily enough, since this bottle is the "retail" version sold at drugstores rather than the "salon" version, the sticker on top of the cap reads "Poppy Art Pink". I've noticed these changes between the retail and salon versions--i.e. "Lapiz of Luxury" rather than "Lapis of Luxury". Why the unnecessary name changes, Essie? Is it supposed to make the names more personable to the barbaric masses who don't know what Pop Art is and sub Z's for their S's? Hahaha.

Jelly Apples

This week my nails have been painted red, red, red, with a classic--Essie Jelly Apple. I'm always tempted to throw some glitter over any mani that crosses my path, but for once I resisted with this one, and I love it. There is just something so glam about a simple red mani, and I'm definitely going to be wearing it a lot more often whenever I feel like letting my inner pinup loose. Jelly Apple in particular is super shiny and juicy looking with a lot of depth, and it looks like candy on my nails.

At first coat, Jelly Apple pulls very blue-toned; in fact I was incredibly disappointed because I was sure it would be too cool for my skin, which is very warm and looks awful with blue-toned reds. But at second coat all my fears were assuaged because as it builds in opacity the overtly cool tint evens itself out to a lovely glassy red that doesn't pull blue at all.

Jelly Apple has a very nice formula that practically applies itself. Here I'm wearing 4 thin coats. You could probably be okay at 3 coats if you don't mind the tiniest bit of visible nail line.

My Milkshake

It's time for another palette cleanser! I happened to see a swatch of Wet 'n Wild Megalast 2% Milk and liked it immediately--plus I don't have many pale-colored jellies in my collection, so it was a good fit. It was certainly nice by itself, but I couldn't leave it well enough alone so I sandwiched a coat of OPI Lights of Emerald City inbetween two layers each of 2% Milk. Have I mentioned I'm a sucker for food-themed names? I don't even like 2% milk (I'm much more partial to whole milk, or hemp milk if I can get it), but it's still a fun and cute name for polish.

2% Milk has a good formula for such a light color, and it flowed on the nail easily without being watery or streaky. It's a very nice, clean color that isn't as stark as a plain white; I'd call it an off-white or ivory.

Lights of Emerald City is a unique bird--I haven't seen another polish quite like it, even though the glitter combination of small iridescent squares and large matte white squares is a pretty simple mix. It is glitter-packed, so you don't have to fish for the big pieces of glitter (although giving the brush a swirl in the bottle helps get more of the larger white glitters on the brush).

Overall I really like this combination and I can definitely see myself wearing it again when I'm in the mood for something simple and refreshing.

Return to the Dark Side

Okay I must confess, despite all the pastels and brights I've been wearing lately...I've always been kinda a vampy girl. I rocked the black polish (way back when it was still just "goth", not "chic"). I love color, but there's never anything quite like a deep, rich, saturated dark...with a little added sparkle, of course.

Urban Outfitters Mystic is just that: a lovely, serene deep blue jelly with specks of fiery orange-shifting flakies. Mmmm.

This was opaque at 3 thin coats, and I think I'm in love. Sparkly toppers with a clear base are nice and all, but there's nothing quite like the depth of a jelly-and-sprinkles combo polish. I hear this is a possible dupe to Deborah Lippmann Ray of Light...if it's true, the price difference will make it a steal.

If vampies in spring are your thing, pick up Mystic at Urban Outfitters for $5 a pop!

Pastels...for Spring. Groundbreaking.

I'd apologize for the inconsistent posting, but let's be honest...this is going to be a regular thing. So, onward! Today's mani is Lynnderella Ghost of a Chance over Essie Marshmallow. I know, layering white matte and pastel glitters over a white is SO obvious, SO done...anyone care to guess exactly how many fucks I give about that? As far as I'm concerned, pastels over white go together like butter and raspberry jam (and if you guessed 0 fucks, you were correct).

I mean, look at this:

Ghost of a Chance is composed of multi-sized pastel matte glitter containing white and pink satin hearts and holographic microglitter. The formula was workable; most of the smaller glitters brush on with no problem. I did have to "place" the larger heart glitters, but it wasn't too difficult. My mani here was done with 2 normal coats of Ghost, with placed heart glitter. Marshmallow was streaktastic as usual, requiring 3 coats until it even began to resemble evenness, but until I find a better white jelly, it's here to stay as a staple base color.

Lynnderella Ghost of a Chance is available for purchase through her Ebay store for $23!

Valentine's Day

So V-day is a commercialized holiday. Still doesn't mean it's not fun to dress up! I'll be wearing my heart backseam tights and red cardigan at work today, with Revlon Candy Apple Lip Butter...and on my nails, OPI Guy Meets Gal-veston topped with Happy Hands Cadance.

Cadance is filled with pale pink and hot pink glitters of various shapes and sizes, blue/purple iridescent glitter, and pale pink heart glitter! It's a perfect pairing for Guy Meets Gal-veston. Cadance has a nice, easy formula and was very easy to work with. It was a limited edition polish created by by my pal Kristi of Happy Hands, with proceeds being donated to Covenant Pet Trust, a local non-profit organization!

This is 3 coats of Guy Meets Gal-veston with two coats of Cadance. You can get your own bottle of candylike goodness for $10 from Kristi's Etsy shop!

Welcome to the Dark Parade

I have another awesome indie on my fingers today: Pahlish Dark Parades, a deep indigo jelly with green glassfleck and confetti glitter.Shown here is 3 thin coats of Dark Parades by itself, plus 3 more coats of topcoat to smooth everything out.

This one is really glitter packed, so naturally the formula is very thick. It was manageable for me, but if you don't have much experience applying glitterbombs you might want to add some thinner!

The colors of the glitter are a perfect compliment for the indigo jelly. Also, may I say that adding the green glassfleck to the indigo base was a stroke of genius? It makes me think of creepy carnival.

You can purchase Dark Parades for $9 from the creator Shannon on her Etsy store, Pahlish!

HARE Cast in Bronze

In the aftermath of Sandy messing up the ENTIRE METRO SYSTEM (eff you Sandy, please go get a yeast infection), I decided I needed some cheering, and nothing does the job like my first-ever indie! HARE is one of the first indie polish makers to catch the nail community's attention, and she remains one of my favorites. I have a lemming for Bisbee that began practically the day of my indoctrination into polish hoarding, but I opted to pick up one of her new creations this time, the very amazing Cast in Bronze from her Fall 2012 Finder's Keepers collection.

Gorgeous. This was two coats of Cast in Bronze by itself, a beautiful lilac jelly packed with tons of shimmer and bronze colored hex and square glitters. If you look hard in real life you could probably see visible nail line, but to me the sheer, squishy jelly-ness of this is part of the charm so I opted to wear it alone.

Formula-wise, I had no problems at all. The base is thicker than most polishes to better suspend the glittery goodness, which is normal and expected and can be fixed by a few drops of thinner, but even without thinning I didn't have much trouble getting this on my nails. There was a brief moment after applying the first coat during which I feared the sheerness might also result in streakiness, since the distribution of color seemed a bit uneven, but the second coat erased all those doubts (and frankly it was probably my own fault anyway because I was using Revlon's 2-in-1 TC/BC, which is a terrible basecoat--so slippery, doesn't help with even polish distribution at all).

All in all, I had a great experience with HARE and can't wait to get more!

Dear Sandy

You don't scare me!

I have another franken today; this one is named "Sting-Me-Not".

“I made him a poultice of firepod and sting-me-not and bound it in a lambskin...There is great healing magic in fire, even your hairless men know that.” -Game of Thrones

3 coats of Sting-Me-Not by itself.

 

Closeup swatch--Sting-Me-Not is a teal jelly with multi-sized gold hex glitter, iridescent square glitter, and clear flakies.

Glamorous Vampire for fall

Three coats of Revlon Facets of Fuchsia over one coat of Milani Black Magic, topped off with two coats of New York Color Grand Central Station. I love talking up Grand Central Station--it's a great clear topcoat, thicker than your average drugstore topcoats and perfect for smoothing out those lumpy glitters. And the best part, it only costs $2!

Revlon Facets of Fuchsia is Revlon's attempt at Deborah Lippmann's Bad Romance, purple large and small hex glitter in a black jelly base. It cost me $6.99 at my local Duane Reade, but I believe it is $5.99 or even $4.99 at retailers outside of NYC...curse you markup!

At first, using AllLaqueredUp's swatch as comparison, I thought Revlon had gotten the color of the glitter wrong...Bad Romance seemed to be more purple and less...well, fuchsia. But after looking at multiple photos of both Bad Romance and Facets of Fuchsia, I've decided they are perfect dupes after all--there are photos of Bad Romance which look more fuchsia, and there are photos of Facets of Fuchsia looking more purple, so I guess it's just a lighting difference! Either way, is it not gorgeous? I love this "new" style of different-sized glitters, it adds great interest to single-color glitters.