Stars and Stripes! (Well... Dots and Stripes, anyway)

Happy 4th of July!

I used Urban Outfitters Silver Holo (dupe for Color Club Harp on It) with Jade Vermelho Surreal on top for the stripes and Rescue Beauty Lounge Dead Calm with OPI DS Glamour on top for the blue base with Silver Holo dots.

Color Club Harp on It is still readily available right now, and Jade Vermelho Surreal goes in and out of stock on Llarowe and Ninja Polish. RBL Dead Calm and OPI DS Glamour are both discontinued and most likely going to be hard to find, but Glamour has some "dupes" being made more recently (one is Glamorous by Ninja Polish). Dead Calm is a dark blue creme, so there are probably some similar polishes out there.

butter LONDON - Lillibet's Jubilee for the Queen's Diamond Jubilee

From what I understand, this past weekend celebrated Queen Elizabeth's Diamond Jubilee, which marked 60 years since her ascension to the throne in 1952. In honor, butter LONDON has created a nail polish shade named Lillibet's Jubilee.

butter LONDON - Lillibet's Jubilee

Lillibet's Jubilee is a beautiful, bright silvery lilac foil. At first I was disappointed because I thought it was going to contain holo particles, but now that I've tried it I think it's stunning just how it is. What it does, it does very well! The finish is incredibly reflective and eye-catching, and the lilac tint sets it apart from all the other silver foils out there. It also has excellent formula, gliding on perfectly in two easy coats. I don't have anything like this in my collection; all the purple foils I have are darker and not as shiny. Elegant, yet striking.

Lillibet's Jubilee and all the other butter LONDON polishes are available on the butter LONDON website, as well as in Ulta stores and at Ulta.com. They retail for $14 each. Lillibet's Jubilee is labeled as a limited edition on Ulta, but I'm not sure since Butter London's site makes no indication.


(Products were provided for review.)

A Starry, Starry... dupe? CM - Midnight Imposter

I'm not one for buying expensive nail polishes unless they are extremely unique. I'm always on the lookout for cheaper dupes or a way to franken-dupe my own for less. This is a polish I saw on a couple blogs and I thought it looked a lot like Essie's very-hard-to-find Starry, Starry Night.

CM - Midnight Imposter

Midnight Imposter is a rich royal navy blue jelly with lots of small silver hex and square glitters. The formula is wonderful. It is opaque at two coats, but for a little extra depth I used three coats for the pictures and one coat of Cult Nails Wicket Fast on top and it came out glassy smooth. In short, it is beautiful and everything I would hope Starry, Starry Night would be if I ever decided to pay the high prices for it (which I won't... the only time I've spent $30+ on a nail polish was when the money was going to charitable causes).

Now after I've looked up Starry, Starry Night again, I see that it appears to have smaller micro glitter instead of the slightly bigger pieces in Midnight Imposter, but honestly I like the look of Midnight Imposter more. Because the glitter is a little bit bigger and more sparse, it actually looks like individual little stars, and I love how some of the pieces get buried underneath jelly layers to appear to be different shades of blue along with the silver. It's classy and chic indoors and sparkly out in the sun!

I got Midnight Imposter from East Bay Beauty Supply, and the cost and shipping was very reasonable in my opinion. I feel like I've seen CM polishes in store as well, but I can't remember where.

Love & Beauty - Silver: The Blingy-est Polish I Own

I can't believe I haven't worn this until today. I remember thinking how amazing it was when I swatched it on a nail wheel, but somehow I never got around to actually wearing it until just now. It's really too bad Love & Beauty doesn't give their polishes actual names. This one just says "Silver" on the price sticker.

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Love & Beauty - Silver

Silver is a clear base that's packed with small holo hex glitters. It's not micro glitter, but it lays pretty flat and gives excellent coverage. What struck me about this polish is how much the rainbows show even in the dim light. I'm pretty sure it's the strongest holo glitter I've seen in a polish. I've worn the Layla holos and glitter bombs like OPI Crown Me Already, but this one takes the cake for the single most "blingy" polish that I own. Even better is that this glitter doesn't even dry very gritty so it's nearly perfect with one coat of Wicked Fast.

In the right light, the colors are almost blinding:

These were all taken under a particular lamp that really amplifies the rainbows in holo polishes (as a side note, one of my favorite things to do is sit under this lamp with my holo polish swatches and just stare at the beauty... *sigh*). The pictures do not even come close to portraying the amount of color and sparkle.

I LOVE when I find a new favorite polish and it happens to be incredibly inexpensive! I got this on Forever 21's website a while ago, so I'm not sure if it's still available (it could be this one or this one), but they have a lot of amazing colors (especially glitters!) and they're less than $3 each!

Tony Moly Galaxy: Swatches and Review

I finally caved in and bought the Tony Moly Galaxy collection. We all know how much I love glitter, so it was only a matter of time... At first I was only planning on picking up the two or three that were my favorite, but I'm glad I got all of them because most of the others won me over completely!

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Tony Moly - Mercury

Mercury is made up of lots of small silver glitter with some sky blue and red mixed in. The base is slightly tinted grey, but it doesn't make much of a difference because the glitter is so dense. This is the most shiny of the set, and ended up being one of my favorites.

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Tony Moly - Earth

Earth is a translucent navy blue base with steel colored micro glitter and small fuchsia holo glitter. It's not as sparkly as Mercury, but still incredibly interesting!

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Tony Moly - Mars

Mars is a mix of small copper and micro orange glitter with a sprinkling of royal blue micro glitter that's not always apparent. In fact, I couldn't really see it in the bottle until I held it in the sun. I kind of wish the blue glitter was a tad bit more prominent but it's still a really awesome accent! I love brown and copper glitter so I figured this would be one of my favorites.

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Tony Moly - Neptune

Neptune is a crazy blend of green glitters in a sheer green base. From what I can tell, it has olive/gold and forest micro glitter as well as medium grass green hexes. I love green polish and glitter, but didn't expect to like this one as much. I wish it had another accent color like the rest of them to add a little bit of pizzazz.

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Tony Moly - Jupiter

Jupiter is comprised of small lavender and indigo glitter and medium cerulean blue holo glitters, but to spice things up it also has a sprinkling of copper micro glitter! I wouldn't be nearly as captivated if it didn't have the copper, but this ended up being one of my favorites as well!
*Aside note:  This one kind of reminds me of The Hungry Asian's Sea Creature because of Sea Creature's purple micro glitter accent amongst the teal and blue.  LOVE.


I was surprisingly impressed with this collection! All of them had wonderful formulas that were opaque in two coats (however, they all required at least a coat of Gelous and Seche Vite to make them glassy smooth) and they weren't too thick like some glitters can be. I was so enamored with the "accent" colors in all of them, especially Jupiter.  The odd thing about them was that none of the bottle actually have the planet names on them (in English, anyway). They are labeled GT01-GT05.  Also, Neptune is 04 and Jupiter is 05... weird.

My only complaint is that they didn't do one for ALL of the planets! MOAR GLITTER!

I bought my set of these off ebay and they range from about $32-35 for the set or $7-9 each.

OPI NY Ballet Collection: Swatches and Review

This was an unexpected love for me. I'm not usually the sheer/pink/nude type, but something drew me in: these are beautiful, elegant JELLIES! I've been crazy about the glitter/jelly sandwiches lately, and I have a feeling these would be perfect for them!

OPI - My Pointe Exactly

This is my favorite. My Pointe Exactly is a light grey jelly that is semi-opaque at three coats (shown). Even with a bit of VNL, I still loved the look of this. Elegant and edgy at the same time!

OPI - Don't Touch My Tutu!

Don't Touch My Tutu is a nice clean white jelly. Along the same lines as Essie Marshmallow but a little bit more sheer, I think it would work even better for the glitter sandwiches. I love the way white jellies make glitter look like sprinkles on a cupcake.

OPI - Care to Danse

Care to Danse is a light purple jelly. The bottle looks more purple than it appears on the nail.  I'm not sure, but this may be my second favorite.

OPI - Barre My Soul

Barre My Soul is a very nice peachy beige jelly.  This would be a lovely base for a French manicure!

OPI - You Callin' Me a Lyre?

You Callin' Me a Lyre is a a peachy pink jelly that's more saturated than the others in this collection. Again, it'd be a great base for a French manicure base.  I think of the collection this was the most opaque at three coats.

OPI - Pirouette my Whistle (over each of the colors above)

Pirouette My Whistle is a clear base with silver micro glitter and large white/silvery pearl hex glitters. Most pictures of this at one coat didn't have too many white hexes, but my bottle seemed to be packed with them. I had to actually TRY not to get too many because I wanted a sparse look. Either way, it's quite elegant for a glitter. I think I like this even better than Nubar White Polka Dot.

All of these applied very nicely and easily in three coats, although it seems easiest to avoid streaks by using medium-thick coats. I suggest waiting a few minutes between each coat to prevent bubbling as well. They do kind of self-level though, which is a plus.

OPI is available at Ulta stores as well as in JC Penney Salons. I prefer JC Penney because if you buy two or more, they're only $6 each instead of $8.50 at Ulta.

Layla - Flash Black: Swatches and Review

LOOK AT THIS POLISH!

LOOK AT IT!

Layla Holo Effect - Flash Black

Holy rainbows, Batman! Isn't it incredible?! I can't get over it.  It's too perfect.  I've worn it three times in the last two weeks, which is a record for me!

Flash Black is an amazing charcoal linear holo.  It applies like butter in two easy coats over an aqua base coat such as Nfu-Oh Aqua Base or the Jessica Hologram Chic base (although I've heard it's a pain to apply without the aqua base).  It also doesn't dull with a topcoat!   In short, it's perfect, and I need a backup bottle.

*swoon*

And here's a shade (indirect sunlight) pic to show that it still has a holo effect even in lower lighting:

Layla Holo Effects can be purchased at Harlow & Co, as well as on Aveyou.  They run about $15-16, and there have been rumors that Ulta may carry them soon as well.

Nerd Lacquer - Holy Grail: Swatch and Review

Sorry for the absence!  I was snowed in at my parents house and couldn't get to my camera or computer.

Yet another one where I'm not sure WHY I got it, but it sort of just jumped into my Nerd Lacquer order (I think I was in the "BUY ALL THE NERD LACQUER!" mentality... haha).

Anyway, I actually ended up wearing it for a few days because I loved it so much!

Nerd Lacquer - Holy Grail

Holy Grail is a whole bunch of different shapes/sizes of silver holo glitter in a dusty light teal holo AND glow-in-the-dark base! At first I thought the base color was a little bland, but after wearing it I realized that it toned down all of the crazy holo in this just enough to make a really pretty, classy polish. Not everyone may like it (and it actually took me a couple hours of wearing it for me to fully appreciate it), but I'm very happy I picked this one up.  I actually ended up being very pleased with EVERY Nerd Lacquer polish I got!  This only took two coats to be fully opaque (like all of the Nerd Lacquers I currently have), and the glitter lays nice and flat although it does need a couple coats of topcoat (Gelous and SV) to be smooth.

Again, Nerd Lacquers can be found in the NerdLacquer store on Etsy, on NinjaPolish, and Harlowe & Co, but are kinda of hard to catch in stock. All of these sites offer some way of being notified when it IS in stock, so sign up for the emails if you're really itching for some Nerdiness!

OPI - Crown Me Already! Swatch and Review

Just like I have polishes where I wonder WHY I bought it in the first place, I also have ones where I can't figure out why I DIDN'T buy it immediately.

This is one of them. I passed it up in the store many times only to buy it on ebay about a week ago because I couldn't stand it any longer.

OPI - Crown Me Already

Crown Me Already is a mix of super shiny silver micro glitter and all different sizes of hex glitter. The biggest hexes are probably about 2mm wide and they look like tiny little mirrors or coins amongst the micro glitter. It is truly eye-catching and bling-tastic, and I love it. I have a coat of Gelous and Seche Vite over it and it's not completely smooth, but you can't really tell because of how extremely reflective the silver is. I'm so glad I got this one, and now I wish so badly that OPI would make a nice, rich gold version of this! The formula was great as well; it's opaque at two coats and not lumpy or thick at all. It's also not one of those where you have to "place" the glitter to make it look nice.

This one made me realize just how much I appreciate almost every brand of nail polish because each one has it's own "gems" that are particularly wonderful. I'm not at all an OPI fan girl (I can't stand all of the "Suzi" names... and I actually don't like the name of this one much, haha), but every once in a while they bring out a beautiful doozy of a polish that really wows me.

I was only able to find this one on ebay (at a reasonable, typical OPI price - $8 with free shipping), but it may be available at other online retailers as well.


Another quick question. Which do you prefer: pics with the bottle or without? I've automatically done them with the bottle because that's what a lot of bloggers do, but think I like how I can "pose" my hand a little better without it. Thoughts?

Mirror Nails: Day 4 Review

Well, I'm back from Disneyland and I wanted to let you know how my mirror nails are holding up!  (Good news - not one single nail came even close to popping off!)

Here is a picture on day 4:

Nail Bliss Silver nails w/ Elegant Touch Super Adhesive Tabs (Day 4)

If you remember, I applied them Friday mid-day and wore them throughout my Disneyland vacation. I must say, they still look nearly as perfect as when I first applied them. You can see a tiny bit of wear in the gel top coat on my middle finger near the cuticle, but I have a feeling I could touch that up with another layer of clear gel easily. Also, the gel has become a TINY bit scuffed on most of my fingers, but it's not noticeable unless you're looking at them up very close. Scrangie shows the chrome finish wearing off and being very scratched after five days of wear, so I think the gel top coat helped IMMENSELY. I would recommend ALWAYS putting some sort of protective top coat over chrome or mirror nails to protect the finish. It seemed to work wonders in my case!

The second half of my review is actually of the Super Adhesive Tabs that I bought at Ulta. They claim to be water resistant and can last up to 7 days. In this case, I've only had them on for 3-4 days, but I really don't see any deterioration at all yet. These nails are stuck on good! Granted, the fake nails I'm wearing are filed down to nearly my natural nails' lengths on most fingers, so there's not much of a "free edge." If they were longer they might have more of a tendency to pop off, I don't know. I also like that there is not much "give" in the adhesive. They pretty much don't budge, so you don't get that weird feeling of the nail getting pushed into your cuticle when you press on something (if you've ever worn fake nails, you probably know what I'm talking about). Right now as I'm typing, they feel like my natural nails to me.

So here is my overall review of this mirror nails effect:

Pros:

• Awesome quick fix for when one of my nails broke WAY down right before my vacation
• Mirror finish is super eye-catching and fun.  Very Star Wars or Tron -esque
• Super Adhesive Tabs by Elegant Touch are nice and strong and make the nails comfortable to wear
• Wore for at least three days easily - would probably be good for up to a week with no problems (perfect for a vacation!)
• Nails are long but can be very easily clipped and filed to your ideal length without any damage to the nails
• No glue needed!

Cons:

• Fake nails are still a bit "bulky" and don't look completely natural
• The adhesive tabs create a tiny bit of a gap around the edges (between your natural nail and the fake nail) where lint can get stuck.

I guess my only wish is that they could make both the adhesive tabs and the nails themselves a bit thinner to give a more natural look.  Other than that I loved these SO much and have ordered more because they were so fun!  I was surprised the adhesive lasted so well, even through showers and dishes and Splash Mountain!

Here are some tips for a longer lasting manicure that I picked up from trying these out:

• Adhesive that claims to be easily removed with "warm water" will NOT last and won't hold the nails in their proper place very long (they seem to "slide" around on the nail quite a bit).  Be sure to get ones that can handle multiple days worth of wear and are water resistant. An alternative is to use nail glue, but it can be more difficult to remove, especially if you'd like to keep the fake nails for future use.
• Mirror/chrome finishes are VERY susceptible to scratches and wear and it's very important to put a clear top coat over the nails to protect the perfect shiny finish!
• The adhesive tabs are somewhat long and can be trimmed with clippers to the length of the natural nail before sticking on the fake nail. This makes it so there's not too much exposed adhesive to gather dirt and lint, etc.

For more info on the products reviewed in this post, see my original Mirror Nails post.

Mirror Nails

No, this isn't a polish. Yes, they are fake nails.

If you remember, I tried one of these fake "mirror nails" on the other day and compared them to other mirror-like finishes. These are actually a different brand than the one featured in that post.

Nail Bliss - Silver Chrome Nails

These are the same nails that Scrangie reviewed in her post here (although hers were the "Platinum" color, and these are the "Silver"). They are a bit thick, and don't look too incredibly natural (they're a little too wide), but I love them all the same. I also had the same problem I have with most fake nails which is that most of the sizes are too large, so I have to use the smallest sizes available and hope they look ok.  Because Scrangie remarked that the chrome finish was easily scratched, I decided to put a layer of my SensatioNail UV gel top coat over them to protect the finish and keep it nicer longer.

I attached these with Elegant Touch Super Adhesive Tabs because I didn't want to fuss with nail glue but still wanted them to stay on for a few days while I'm on vacation. I'll comment on the wear after I have them on for at least a couple days.

The nails featured in this post are here on this site, though not available for purchase. I found mine at Sally's, though I looked for them recently in the local store and didn't find them.

At Ulta I was able to find a similar brand (that actually fit my nails even better) called Elegant Touch. The metallic ones I found can be ordered from their site here. They are a little closer to the "Platinum" color of the Nail Bliss nails (the color in Scrangie's post).

Chrome Nail Comparison

I was looking for the perfect design to do on my nails for my Disneyland trip this weekend when I broke my middle fingernail... dang! The break was so far down is was barely even on the free edge, so I decided to try out some chrome false nails I got from Dashing Diva a while back. So while I'm doing the wear test on the falsie to see whether it will last for my vacation, I figured I'd do a little comparison of various "chrome" nail looks.

Chrome Nail Comparison

Obviously, the fake nail has the smoothest, brightest shine and the most "true" mirror-like finish, but it also has some drawbacks: it's thicker and less natural than the others, and the wear time on it is next to nothing since it just has the adhesive tab on the back. There's an another brand at Sally's that comes with adhesive tabs but you can also use glue (that may last a bit longer).

The silver foil (ring finger) actually looks more like the Dashing Diva chrome from a short distance. The wrinkles are not as prominent if you're not viewing it as an extreme close up. If my nail hadn't broken, I'd probably be opting for this method this weekend. It provides an ALMOST mirror finish and the foils are relatively inexpensive while enough to do MANY manicures.  A lot of the "flaws" that appear here are my own fault for not waiting for the foil glue to dry enough before sticking it on, btw.  The part towards the cuticle is more of an accurate representation of the shine.  I think this is my favorite of the four pictured.

It amazes me how dull the two polishes (China Glaze Millennium and Zoya Trixie) look compared to both the foil and the fake nail. Neither actually has a "mirror" appearance at all, but they both have the ease of regular nail polish.


The false nails are from Dashing Diva, but I don't see the silver chrome on their site right now. Like I said, there's an alternative available at Sally's by a brand called Nail Bliss (though it doesn't appear to be on their site).

The silver foil I bought at Dollar Nail Art. They have a $25 minimum purchase online (or you can order by mail with a check), but they have so many awesome foils, beads, glitter, etc. it was easy for me to find plenty that I wanted!

Zoya Trixie can be ordered from their website, and I'm not sure if China Glaze Millennium can be found easily anymore (it was from their Khrome collection a couple years ago).

butter LONDON - Knackered

I don't really know why I NEEDED Knackered, but nevertheless I bought it when I made an Ulta order for Revlon Whimsical recently. I feel like it's similar to Wet n Wild's Gray's Anatomy (maybe with China Glaze Fairy Dust or Northern Lights topcoat), but without directly comparing I feel like Knackered is a bit more brightly duochrome and has a more metallic finish.

butter LONDON - Knackered over Essie Fair Game

Knackered is a somewhat sheer purple to green duochrome metallic with silver holo micro glitter.  I decided to layer it over Essie Fair Game because it didn't seem like it'd be easily opaque on its own (it'd probably take 3-4 coats to be fully opaque). Plus, at $14 for .4oz (11mL) of polish, I'd like to conserve it. Essie Fair Game is kind of a gunmetal blue/grey shimmer and I used one coat under two coats of Knackered.  The edges in person look a tiny bit more green than in the pics above.

The thing I love about this polish is that in low light the duochrome really stands out, and in bright sunlight the holo glitter brings it to life. Luckily, the glitter doesn't seem to make the metallic finish look too lumpy.

This picture in artificial light shows off the metallic finish and pretty green to purple duochrome depth nicely:

Knackered is a part of butter LONDON's spring/summer 2012 collection and is available at Ulta and the butter LONDON website.  I also got Disco Biscuit which I'll be showing soon as well!