(2 coats)
This is one of the best grays ever. The formula is fab too. Applied in 2 very easy coats and it dried like lightning!
Saturday, July 9, 2011
Color Club Wild Orchid
(2 coats)
This is one of the best grays ever. The formula is fab too. Applied in 2 very easy coats and it dried like lightning!
Friday, July 8, 2011
Oodles o' purple: Butter London HRH & Nfu.Oh 51
OK, long pic-heavy post - so I'll try and keep it light on the text.
Butter London HRH. Nice standard royal purple, red-toned base. I did two coats but it could probably have done with three since the base is a little jelly-ish. Me being me and compelled to fiddle with things that ought not be fiddled with, I put Nfu.Oh 51 over the top and the result really wasn't pretty:
Urgh. Sooo, that lasted all of twelve hours before I took it off. But I wanted to try 51 over something else because the real draw is the amazing blurple jelly base colour, which was totally lost over HRH. So I swatched it over (L-R) Orly gogo, illamasqua wink, illamasqua force, and OPI dim sum plum. And the result was much prettier:
Orly Gogo is just a total PITA to apply and not worth the 7 coats of polish (4 orly, 3 of the flakies) but 51 looked lovely over any of the other three. Two coats on force and dim sum plum, three on wink. I will definitely give this a full outing soon, because I really like the duochrome pinky colours in the flakies (just not over HRH...dear God not over HRH). Do click to enlarge this one, it's a doozy.
As Borat would say: 'naaaaaaice. Vairry naice.'
Edit - the UK Nfu Oh retail site has now launched. It's at Nfuoh.co.uk. Enjoy!
Thursday, July 7, 2011
Hints of Marimekko - Essie Silken Cord
Essie Silken Cord is really from Essie's most recent winter collection, but I see it more as a summer colour.
It's a juicy pop of red-pink with a hint of orange that for some reason reminds me of Marimekko fabrics, which are my absolute favourite. (My baby blanket was even made out of Marimekko!) I love anything Marimekko, and I love this polish! I've been really enjoying brights this summer far more than I usually do. They seem perfectly suited for sitting back with a cocktail and watching some tennis...
kittytokaren
Wednesday, July 6, 2011
Essie Smooth Sailing and OPI Navy Shatter
I never thought that eBay would be my preferred outlet for buying any nail polish but gotta say, it does me well for Essie. (The trick is to, um, buy a lot and order from a seller who has a great combined shipping deal.)
Essie Smooth Sailing
Photos just don't do this justice. It's actually a kind of chunky iridescent shimmer that sparkles blue and pink and purple and is so very, very, very pretty. Great application, two coats. This is the third day of wear.
Closeup of Smooth Sailing
You can sort of see the great shimmer in this photo. Just imagine it all over the nail...
Am loving the jelly crackles. Some people might be annoyed that there's such a difference between one and two coats of the polish -- the discrepancy is most obvious on my middle finger -- but I kind of like the variation it gives to the polish. At one coat, it's obviously a blue jelly; at two, it turns more into dark navy (almost black but not quite).
Closeup of Smooth Sailing and Navy Shatter
Tuesday, July 5, 2011
Zoya Tamsen & Ashley
Sadly swatch pictures (almost universally, including mine) are not accurate on this one. You are better off believing the description on the Zoya site: a "Medium warm brick red with strong orange tones" indeed.
(2 coats)
I bought this instead of Sooki because I was fairly sure Sooki would not look good on me and I am forever in search of a great orange based red.
But this is red, orange and a healthy helping of brown. Sure in bright light it's gorgeous. But really, in most other lights it's just a brick red (I tried to capture it in the last photo but even that is still too red in my view).
If you're still interested well then SLAM it into your checkout cart because the formula is love. Smooth, silky, and you can almost do one thick coat and call it done (instead i did 2 medium coats). No drying issues either (for me).
(3 coats)
I went through my stash and counted. I have 2 berry-red cremes. And this is one of them. And I like it! Very much. (Ladies of Color - if you are having a hard time finding a red that you can pull off, inch over to the berry-reds. They're very flattering.)
But as I purge I have to be strict about formula and 3 coats to get an even finish on what is a standard berry-red creme is....well. I can't go for that, noOOooooo (noo); no can do.
So now I have one berry-red creme in a stash of hundreds. Maybe I'll covet it now, instead of ignoring the poor dear.
read more "Zoya Tamsen & Ashley"
(2 coats)
I bought this instead of Sooki because I was fairly sure Sooki would not look good on me and I am forever in search of a great orange based red.
But this is red, orange and a healthy helping of brown. Sure in bright light it's gorgeous. But really, in most other lights it's just a brick red (I tried to capture it in the last photo but even that is still too red in my view).
If you're still interested well then SLAM it into your checkout cart because the formula is love. Smooth, silky, and you can almost do one thick coat and call it done (instead i did 2 medium coats). No drying issues either (for me).
(3 coats)
I went through my stash and counted. I have 2 berry-red cremes. And this is one of them. And I like it! Very much. (Ladies of Color - if you are having a hard time finding a red that you can pull off, inch over to the berry-reds. They're very flattering.)
But as I purge I have to be strict about formula and 3 coats to get an even finish on what is a standard berry-red creme is....well. I can't go for that, noOOooooo (noo); no can do.
So now I have one berry-red creme in a stash of hundreds. Maybe I'll covet it now, instead of ignoring the poor dear.
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