Since we've had a rare few days of sunshine, and since I now have a car, I took the opportunity to go to some of the National Trust properties nearby. They're basically rural stately homes that are preserved by a charity and they're generally speaking lovely - Packwood House, where we went last week, is a favourite. It's a Tudor manor house, originally erected in 1480, which was much restored in the 1920s and 1930s by a chap called Graham Baron Ash, who was a deeply enthusiastic restorer and spent an enormous amount of money doing up this house and others nearby.
Anyway, I promise I am going somewhere with this tangential history lesson. Aside from the fact that it's an interesting and beautiful place to visit, it also has some lovely interiors and a stunning garden. The colours gave me lots of ideas for manicures I wanted to try (nail varnish being my artistic medium, and all...). This is the first 'NT-inspired' manicure - I wanted to take the colours from the French tiling in the bathroom:
I decided my best bet for a match would probably be Illamasqua Force, a dusky mid blue, with white crackle layered over the top. However, I forgot that Force is an...idiosyncratic polish. Basically, it doesn't behave itself. The Swatchaholic has already commented on how it changes colour with Seche Vite. In my experiments today it behaved even more weirdly. Here it is on its own, with no top coat. This is a very colour accurate shot, IMHO. It has an unusual grey-violet undertone to it that makes it unique amongst my (large) collection of blues.
Fugly pic time! This shot shows what happens when you layer white crackle over the top. You can see a) the bits I didn't clean up (intentionally, to show you - sorry for the fug) where white crackle is not on top of Force, and is white; b) where it went over Force and turned pale blue; and c) how they've both deepened considerably to a royal blue/lavender combo with the addition of top coat (Lumos, since you ask). What a weeeeeeird polish.
Here's some proper pictures:
So that...uh...totally didn't work. The final effect is nothing like the tiles! Just to show that CG white crackle doesn't normally change over blue, here it is over Orly La Playa. (I know, I know, claw-hands and an iphone picture, I'm spoiling you today). Force is...odd.
