A girl and her love of nail polish

Posts tagged ‘Swatches’

Different Dimension Emily

Here’s my first swatch post of 2013, and it will be short and sweet! This is Different Dimension Emily, inspired by the TV show “Pretty Little Liars,” which was on my wish list for awhile. I finally nabbed it during a Black Friday sale.

Different Dimension Emily

Different Dimension Emily has blue, white and light green glitter in a light blue sheer base. I’ve seen other bloggers say they used it on it’s own without undies and built it up, but I actually used something underneath.

Different Dimension Emily

My disclaimer on this is that the application was actually done at a nail salon. It’s one coat of Different Dimension Emily over one coat of … something. The bottle was China Glaze but the name was mislabeled. If I had to guess, I’d say it’s Bahamian Escape, but really that’s just off of swatches online. I don’t own it. If anyone recognizes it, please let me know!

Different Dimension Emily

I love Different Dimension Emily. I think this combo looks perfect for winter, almost like a snowstorm. I think it would look great over a dark blue too, or maybe over silver.

Different Dimension Emily

Different Dimension polish is available on Etsy. As of this posting, Emily is in stock.

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Indies, Swatches

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Rescue Beauty Lounge Piu Mosso

Last week, Rescue Beauty Lounge restocked some of its retired colors in its latest Bring It Back promotion, where it hauls some of the long-gone shades out of the vault to give polish groupies one last chance at nabbing them.

I actually didn’t have any RBL polishes in my collection, but I had recently read through founder Ji Baek’s “Rescue Your Nails,” so I was interested in checking out her nail polish line.

Despite the steep $20 price tag, I picked up Piu Mosso, which is an intriguing polish to say the least.

Rescue Beauty Lounge Piu MossoRescue Beauty Lounge Piu Mosso

In the bottle it looks like it’s a brown polish with lots of shimmer, and on the nail it looks nearly black in most light. But in reality it’s a deep blue with some subtle bronze shimmer. Think really dark pair of blue jeans. RBL actually describes it as as “inky, blue-black.”

Rescue Beauty Lounge Piu Mosso

It’s really amazing. The formula is great; I could have gone with one coat, but this is actually two, plus one coat of Poshe fast-dry top coat. In fact I did stick with one coat on my other hand and it looks fine. The brush is very thin, just FYI, which for me makes it harder to get a nice clean application at the cuticle line.

Rescue Beauty Lounge Piu Mosso

Piu Mosso is very difficult to photograph, so here’s one in my lightbox with the light shining directly on it so you can get a better sense of it.

Rescue Beauty Lounge Piu Mosso

As of this posting it is still available on rescuebeauty.com. And, just in case you were wondering, the name is a musical term meaning faster, with more movement. I like to think it’s because your heart starts beating a little faster when you look down and see this color on your nails. 🙂

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Indies, Swatches

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Zoya Ornate: Aurora

Hope everyone had a good holiday and picked up a lot of good deals over Black Friday weekend. I’ve got a lot of new indie polishes coming my way, so can’t wait to show them to you when they arrive.

I’ve been procrastinating on putting up any polish posts over the past week or so because one of the nails on my swatching hand broke clean off and I wasn’t ready to face the fact that I’d need to even everything out. 😦

Zoya Aurora: Ornate Collection

But here I am with my new short nails to show off Aurora from the Zoya Ornate holiday collection. I would describe this as a purple berry shade, and then off course its got a lot of holographic glitter in it. I really love the formula on this. If you took a heavy holo polish and diluted it a bit with a jelly polish, you would end up with Aurora.

This is three coats with one coat of Poshe fast-dry top coat.

Zoya Aurora: Ornate Collection

The accent nail is one coat of A Piece of Love from Essence’s Breaking Dawn Part 2 collection. Originally I didn’t buy this one but I picked it up after reading on a few other blogs that it’s great for stamping. FYI, the formula on A Piece of Love is about a hundred times better than the others in the collection.

Zoya Aurora: Ornate Collection

I added one coat of Poshe and then taped off half the nail and added two coats of Aurora to the other half of the nail. I finished it off with another coat of Poshe.

Zoya Aurora: Ornate Collection

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Holiday, NOTD, Swatches

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Lynnderella Mercury’s Rainbow

I know there are a lot of people out there that have written off indie polish maker Lynnderella after a lot of controversial stuff went down (weird blog rants, awkward breakup with Llarowe, nepotism), but I hadn’t gotten ahold of one before all of the nonsense, and I really feel like you can’t call yourself a true collector of indie polish without at least one Lynn in your stash.

So I’ve been semi-stalking the Lynnderella Ebay site, where she occasionally lists single bottles with the buy-it-now option. A few weeks ago I saw that Mercury’s Rainbow was available and decided to pull the trigger.

Lynnderella Mercury's Rainbow over Sinful Colors Slate

Lynnderella Mercury's Rainbow over Sinful Colors Slate

Lynnderella Mercury’s Rainbow has holographic hex glitter and holo micro glitter in a shimmery gray base. I’m showing here one coat over two coats of Sinful Colors Slate, which is a medium gray with frosty silver shimmer. It’s topped of with one coat of Poshe fast-dry top coat.

Lynnderella Mercury's Rainbow over Sinful Colors Slate

The application was good for me. It went on smoothly and had tons of glitter, no fishing required.

Lynnderella Mercury's Rainbow over Sinful Colors Slate

It was so fun to wear and was so beautiful and sparkly in different lighting. I must say, I do love it very much. These photos don’t do it justice. I’m not sure it’s worth the $23 price tag, but if this turns out to be the only Lynnderella polish I ever get, I’m ok with it being this one.

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Indies, Swatches

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Enchanted Polish Magic Mirror

Here’s a look at a lovely holographic polish from one of the indie polish makers that put holos on the map, Enchanted Polish.

Enchanted Polish Magic Mirror holographic indie nail polish

This is Enchanted Polish Magic Mirror, a lavender holographic polish with some shy flakies in it. I’ve seen some photos where it does look gray or almost silver, more like a mirror as indicated by its name, but on the nail it is definitely in the purple family.

Enchanted Polish Magic Mirror holographic indie nail polish

These shots are from the summer, in happy, sunny natural light, which really shows the holographic nature of this polish at its best.

Enchanted Polish Magic Mirror holographic indie nail polish

Enchanted Polish Magic Mirror unfortunately is discontinued, but there are a few Enchanted Polish shades available now from Llarowe. Both Llarowe and Harlow and Co. are slated to get Enchanted Polish restocks within the next week or so.

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Indies, NOTD, Swatches

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OPI Nein! Nein! OK Fine! with Berlin There Done That

I’ve got a quick picture-heavy post today to show of a few of the OPI Germany Collection polishes. These are both really great colors for fall.

OPI Nein! Nein! OK Fine! with Berlin There Done That

OPI Nein! Nein! OK Fine! with Berlin There Done That

I started with two coats of OPI Nein! Nein! OK Fine!, which is a dark greenish-gray creme. It looks almost black in some lighting. It went on very smoothly, so pretty. I don’t have anything like it in my collection but The Daily Varnish says it’s a near-dupe of China Glaze Concrete Catwalk.

OPI Nein! Nein! OK Fine! with Berlin There Done That

Then I added two coats of Berlin There Done That, a taupe creme, to my tips. I topped it off with one coat of Poshe fast-dry top coat.

Here’s a look at Nein! Nein! OK Fine! by itself, two coats, no top coat.

OPI Nein! Nein! OK Fine!OPI Nein! Nein! OK Fine!

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NOTD, Swatches

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Amy’s Nail Boutique Woodsie’s Wish

Today I’ve got an indie nail polish for you called Woodsie’s Wish from Amy’s Nail Boutique.

I actually bought this to help satisfy my craving for Pretty & Polished’s Jawbreaker, which I still don’t own. But in the meantime, I’ve got Woodie’s Wish, which is definitely a fun little polish.

Amy's Nail Boutique Woodsie's Wish

Woodsie’s Wish features a white base with bunch of matte hex glitter. The description from Amy’s Nail Boutique lists the colors as turquoise, yellow, blue, pink, orange, hot pink and purple, but I see red in mine too.

In terms of formula, it was a little challenging to apply, in the same way that every other white polish I’ve ever tried is challenging: a little streaky and difficult to get full coverage.

These photos are of three coats. In retrospect I should have started with a few coats of plain old white polish and then just added Woodsie’s Wish from there to save it a little. Although honestly I can’t recall the last time I finished a bottle of nail polish that wasn’t base or top coat, so what am I worried about?

Application aside, this is a very pretty, cute, fun polish to wear. It reminds me of sprinkles on frosted cupcakes.

I’ve seen a lot of white base/multi-color matte polishes crop up on Etsy, so perhaps it’s not the most unique formulation in the world, but I love it. And it’s definitely different enough from Jawbreaker that it hasn’t wiped that lemming off my list.

These photos were taken in August during my vacation in Mystic, Conn. Loved wearing this one in the summer! It’s just taken a while to get them on the blog.

Polishes from Amy’s Nail Boutique are sold on Etsy, and as of press time, Woodsie’s Wish is in stock. There’s also a sale going on now: save 20 percent by using the coupon code “FALL20.”

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Indies, Swatches

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