First up we have my Hunger Games mani! While I was in Vegas, I tried to layer my manis so I wouldn't have to change them as often. So one day I had on CQ Rustic Dream, which I love to death! This is a Rite Aid only polish brand, usually right next to the Chameleons and Petites. Rustic Dream is a gorgeous multichrome that goes from pink to copper to gold. Love it! We planned to see the midnight showing of Hunger Games in Vegas, so I added some flames to my existing mani with Orly Glitz and Glamour. I love that Orly because it's pretty opaque so really great for nail art, I LOVE the formula. Here's the mani that was on fire!
And a flakie extravaganza! Forever 21 has some of the coolest polishes. I found this neat Love & Beauty polish there, uniquely named "Pink".... It's the sheerest reddest pink jelly with the most amaaazing micro-flakie-shimmer. Gorgeousness! It has specks of blue, pink, gold, orange, it's amazing! I wanted to layer it so I put it over Color Club Electronica, a blue tinged purple with subtle pink sparkle. And for extra crazy, I added two coats of Finger Paints Asylum, muahahahahaha!
Here's a shot where you can see all the different flakes!
And more swatches of yesterday's Wet n Wild Speak When Spoken To over black:
Alright my friends, I have returned! I had the best time EVER. I had time to paint my nails a few times, but didn't have a lot of time to take pictures. So while I was in Vegas, I got to go to the ABC store (not a booze store), which was full of Hawaiian things and Island Girl nail polish! I'll have swatches of those for you soon enough.
For now, I have the Wet n Bejeweled collection to talk to you about! They are $2.99 and have started popping up at CVS. As far as I can tell, they are near dupes to the China Glaze Prismatic collection that will be coming out next month. These are hard to describe, but they are ridiculously sparkly, with duochrome particles being the base of the polish, very teeny scattered almost imperceptible holo bits, and different small round glitters in a rainbow of different colors. Very fascinating and very twinkly. And the duochrome to these is pretty strong. I layered my first swatch over black to make the colors pop more.
Finger Paints Black Expressionism with Wet n Wild Speak When Spoken To. The duochrome in this goes from aqua to blue to purple to pinkish on the edges.
I know that's a lot of pictures, but I want you all to see how faceted and gorgeous this is. Sooo sparkly. Yum!
I'm leaving for Las Vegas tomorrow! I've never been and I'm sooo excited! The only thing that's stressing me about it is the airplane flight. I haaate flying. I get barfy. I'm not afraid of flying, that part is cool, I just get nauseous really easily. I'll bet you can guess what I'll be keeping an eye out for while I'm there.... nail polish! Specifically the Hawaiian Girl nail polishes... waaaant. So I wanted to do a manicure to commemorate the occasion, and figured I'd do some stamping because I'll probably leave this mani on for more than a day (unusual for me).
The base color I used was Orly Glitz and Glamour, my favorite gold. This polish has an amazingly opaque formula, and wasn't runny at all. I barely had to do any cleanup with it. However, the cleanup I did have to do was a pain because the little gold flecks are almost like glitter in that you have to really work to get them off your skin. Anyways, I did two coats of G&G and then I layered one coat of OPI DS Shimmer on top for some rainbowy goodness. For the stamping I used American Apparel Hassid and plates BM 19, C01, and m22.
I was so excited to see Shatter Me Claire was doing a franken contest! If you've read my blog at all, you'd see that I love to franken and customize my own nail polish. LOVE IT. So when I saw she was doing this competition, I had to enter! I couldn't enter any of the frankens I'd already shown online, like my Sailor Moon collection, so I decided to alter one of my untried nail polishes by Funky Fingers.
Here's my franken Dante's Inferno. I wanted something similar to the indie polish by Nerd Lacquer that references the black night in Monty Python and the Holy Grail, but a little more warm toned. So here's my franken for your viewing pleasure. It consists of: Funky Fingers Voodoo, Love & Beauty Rust orange glitter, Wet n Wild Prancer, and Sally Girl gold glitter mini. You can vote for my franken here:
Well, I was organizing my stash, and found my bottle of OPI Diva of Geneva. This color is the most beautiful red-tinged purple with a little bit of a gold shift. So so pretty. I used it as a base for Clarins 230 a year or so ago, and liked it, but didn't love it. Today I threw DoG on again, and as per usual, I wanted to layer on top of it.
I haven't given my CND effects polishes enough love lately, so I added a layer of CND Crimson Sparkle over my two coats of Diva of Geneva. Now, this obviously isn't a dupe for 230, or Max Factor Fantasy Fire, but it DOES give you a little bit of that reddish/pink to gold shift, and has a lovely sparkle that reminds me a little of 230 or even OPI's La Boheme. You could get a closer version of 230 by layering the color morphing pigment topcoat in red to green on top, but for people who a) don't franken, and b) don't want to invest in Indie polish, and c) happen to have Crimson Sparkle, it makes a pretty mani!
Mmmmm.
And here's a belated St Patrick's Day mani, a greenish franken and Milani HiTech alternating:
And from pinkie to thumb, A-England Dragon, Nubar Reclaim, Catherie Arley 803, Milani Hitech and Nfu Oh 66.
Mmmm. Dippin Dots. *cough* Anyways. I've got a couple spotted manis for you today. First up is a combination that reminded me of mint chocolate chip icecream. Man I love icecream. I used OPI Wooden Shoe Like to Know? as the base. Beeeautiful formula. Smooth like buttah. This swatch is two coats, then a coat of Seche Vite on top. I used China Glaze Refresh-mint for the dots. Apparently I didn't give the dots enough time to dry, so you can see there was a little streaking. Still liked it though. Try to ignore all the bubbles and imperfections please :).
After all this dot poppin', I thought I'd do a bit of a palette cleanser. I've had Revlon Starry Pink as an untried forever and a day. I love that Revlon is stepping it up with their colors and glitters the last year. Yes... I suppose a lot of them are dupes of more expensive brands like Deborah Lippmann and Chane, but I'm fine with that so long as I have access to these fun shades! Starry Pink has been relabeled since it came out last year, it's now called "Popular". Weird rename, but whatever.
I wanted to give the polish a little more color, since Starry Pink is a little too washed out for me, so I did two coats of Starry Pink over two coats of Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Lacey Lilac. And for funsies I added a layer of Orly Love Each Other, which was a total disappointment. I can't really see it, but maybe you can see it in the macro?
This layering bubbled like crazy, but it didn't really hurt the aesthetic too much. My favorite part of Starry Pink is the way it makes the silver glitter and hex glitter look almost more dull and white, which makes it such a pretty, soft, dainty look! Love :)
This. may. be. the. HOLOIEST. HOLO. EVERRRRR!!!! I've seen a lot of holographic polishes in my day, but these Laylas are INSANE. More holo than my Nfu Ohs, my OPIs, my China Glazes... it's like they bottled rainbows, added some awesomeness, and BAM.
Yes, the formulas are kind of a pain in the butt. The polish is a little thick, a little clumpy, definitely needs a lot of shaking. I recommend using a basecoat specifically for holos, also known as Aquabase. Nfu-oh makes a great Aquabase, Makeup Store sells one as well. The base really does help with application. Before I had my Nfu-oh Aquabase, I tried to apply my China Glaze holos and I'd get patchiness, baldspots, and allover ridiculousness. Using the base helps adhere the polish better so you only need one or two coats instead of two to three. Which means you'll keep more of your holo goodness over time! Less baldspots and less chipping.
Speaking of chipping, these types of holos are gonna chip pretty much no matter what you do. Since topcoats will dull the amazing rainbow goodness, it's very hard to extend the wear of your pretty holo. One thing to do is to do your aquabase, then holo, then topcoat, then another layer of holo. This helps extend the wear a bit, but since I only wear my polishes a day or so, I can't testify to how long. Without topcoat, the layers of holo tend to rub off, and your polish will dull over the course of a day. I still don't care! Totally worth it!
Anyways, enough chatter, here are the two Layla Hologram Effects that I've tried so far!
Flash Black, two coats over one coat of Aquabase.
Retro Pink, sorry about the lack of cleanup... was supposed to be a base for nail art but it didn't work out. Loved the color though! It's like springtime and Easter and fairies all put together!
For some reason it's taken me awhile to try some of these OPI Holland collection polishes. Today I finally put on I Have a Herring Problem, and I'm so glad I did! Formula was lovely, two coater, but I did three. Gorgeous gold, silver and darker flecks in a greyed out dusty blue green base. But since I can't leave anything alone, I added dots in Milani Hi Tech. The dots look 3D because of the holo-y ness. Yum.
Who doesn't love holographic nail polish? It's shimmery, happy, and FULL OF RAINBOWS. I am possessed by a desire to obtain ALL OF THE HOLOS. There are a lot of caps in this post because I just love holographic polish THAT MUCH. I love mythical creatures, and it's a hard love to flaunt. As much as I'd love to cover myself in unicorn memorabilia, it's just not that easy to do. But every time I wear a holo nail polish, it gives me that magical little feeling of bliss inside.
A draw back: most holos are either very hard to find, or very expensive. There are a few easy to find exceptions, like the Milani holographic nail polishes. Today I have for you Color Club Fashion Addict, a light silvery lilac scattered holographic polish. Color Clubs can be bought online or at Bed Bath and Beyond for as little as $2.99, a fraction of the cost of $12.50 Nfu Ohs or $18 Ozotics. Unfortunately, the holographic version of this polish, as well as the other holos in this collection, have become harder to find. When Color Club ran out of holo pigment they just replaced their holos with creme formulas which led to a lot of disappointment in the nail world. Some duds are still hanging around online and in stores. I find the best way to tell if you have a dud in your hand is by walking to the front of the store and finding a ray of sunlight to check for rainbows (this is what I did to determine the Fashion Addict I had in my hand was good, but the Revvvolution they had was a dud).
The formula on my Fashion Addict is opaque and heavenly. I did two coats of Fashion Addict over one coat of Nfu Oh's Aquabase.I really do recommend Aquabase if you use holos often. It makes your holographic polishes way easier to apply, which means less coats, which means you save your polish! Some even say it makes the polishes brighter, more holo-y. I don't have proof of this, but I can't disprove it either!
Not the MOST holo polish, but still dainty and lovely.
