Pleiades, my beautiful franken!

Hi everybody,

Hope you're enjoying your weekend. Today is my last day here in the Netherlands! I can't believe I'm leaving tomorrow and I've been ill the whole time I've been here. I'm just starting to feel better, it's so typical!

Anyway, I have a franken to show you today.

I first started creating this in my head just after Christmas. I got the Nails Inc Blair duo from the Gossip Girl Collection (The Wyndham Collection to all you Americans!) and although I loved the blackened teal colour, I absolutely HATED the formula. It was thick, gloopy, stained my nails... It was just a nightmare from start to finish so I vowed I'd make something out of it when the right glitter came along.

Then one day I was out shopping and I spotted a glitter polish from BeautyUK that looked perfect! So of course I bought it!

I didn't mix drops of each polish or anything to test the combination of these polishes, I just gambled and went straight ahead! To make it I took an empty nail polish bottle, filled a third with clear nail polish, then another third with the Nails Inc Blair polish and finished it off with a third of glitter. Then I added 3 stainless steel balls and shook it up for as long as I could manage! When I was done shaking it, I nervously unscrew the lid and tested it. As soon as I saw the colour, I breathed a sigh of relief because I LOVED IT! I wore it for days and was a bit heartbroken when the time came to take it off!

I called this polish Pleiades, because the colours remind me of the open star cluster that I can't wait to finally see one day with my telescope when I have time! It's a blackened teal creme with blue, green and teal square shaped microglitter. There is the odd gold bit but it's very sparse!

Here's a macro shot of the polish!

Click "Read More" to see the rest of my photos which all show two layers of Pleiades with one coat of Seche Vite.

Nails by Topshop Gypsy Night - Slightly Pic Heavy!!!

Good Afternoon!

I've got a Topshop nail polish to show you today. I am a huge fan of Topshop's clothes and I do shop there a lot, but this is actually my first nail polish from them. I'm usually quite wary of clothes shop cosmetic ranges because I think brands should stick to what they know and on Topshop's case that is clothes. However, I think I may have to take that back after Gypsy Night!

I read about this polish a while ago and needed it straight away so I bought it online with a couple of things. Gypsy Night is a black jelly polish with a lot of gold microglitter, small holographic glitter and copper/green colour shift flakies.

All my photos show two coats of Gypsy Night with a coat of Seche Vite. I got a little bit of shrinkage with this, sorry! First I planned on using my Nº7 top coat so I didn't wrap my tips, then I couldn't find it and had to get the Seche Vite on ASAP while the polish was still wet so it didn't crinkle up! So massive apologies for that!

Inside in the shade

My camera did NOT want to focus on this! All the different types of glitter was throwing it off! This means of course that I had to take a few pictures! Click "read more" to see the all of the photos and the rest of my review.

Oh My Gosh Pink Red

Hi everyone,

Today's post is a cheerful pink! It's the other polish I bought from the Oh My Gosh by GOSH collection and the shade is called Pink Red... It's a shame all these shades have such unimaginative names! Especially seeing as this polish isn't actually very red at all! It's just pink!

Pink Red is a very bright pink, not a neon, but very bright, it's almost impossible to photograph.

I never used to like this type of colour, it was too bright for me, but this is a jelly polish, and that makes all the difference! I love it when a nail polish finish really suits the colour and this is definitely one of those occasions!

The application of this was pretty good, very typical jelly application: VERY sheer and seemed like it was never going to build then all of a sudden at four coats I was there. Squishy perfection with an amazing gloss, there was no way I was putting top coat on and insulting the natural shine this gave me!

Here it is in the natural light

Click "Read More" to see the rest of my photos. In the sunlight you can kind of see this polish leaning slightly red, but I still don't think that justifies the name Pink Red!

Mint Green by Gold by Giles

Hi all, hope you're having a lovely day!

I posted a really glossy black polish about a week and a half ago that I picked up in New Look and I promised a follow-up post on the green one that I bought with it, so here it is! I think it's about time I posted it seeing as yesterday's post was a dark polish.

Mint Green is everything you'd think it would be, a mint green creme that is perfect for spring. The formula on this was as I expected it to be, streaky for the first couple of coats. Three coats gave me full opacity as you can see in the photos. I also used a coat of Nº7 Stay Perfect fast dry top coat to give it the bit of extra shine I thought it needed. 

Here it is in the natural light

In the sunlight

Macro

This colour is so pretty, green is my favourite nail polish colour, so I'm glad I have this! I think it could be quite similar to Jade Stone by Models Own, which I have floating around somewhere, probably in the attic, it's nowhere to be found!

This polish is exclusive to New Look stores and online here, however it's currently out of stock. It retails for the bargain price of £2.99 so I'd definitely suggest heading to your local store to see if they stock it!

Famous Starry Night

Hi everybody, hope you've all had a good day!

Today I have my second Famous by Sue Moxley nail polish. I bought this the other day because I'm a sucker for dark sparkly things!

Starry Night is a charcoal grey glass fleck polish that leans slightly blue in bright sunlight.

The formula on this polish was... AMAZING! It was so smooth and pigmented that there was no way it would need more than one coat. It applied itself and I wish all polishes were like this!!!

All of the photos below show one coat of Starry Night with no top coat. If I was going to wear this for longer I would have used top coat for protection, but this polish is so shiny it doesn't really need it!

Natural light - Look how shiny it is!

See how the polish leans blue in the sunlight?

Macro

I know this polish isn't very spring like, but every now and then I like to mix it up and not wear pastel cremes! 

If you like the look of Starry Night, you can find it in Superdrug for £4.50.

GOSH Special Edition Prima Donna

Hi guys,

This is later than I wanted to post today, but I've been really ill! I've got a throat infection that's been getting worse and worse, between that and looking after a baby, I really haven't been up to writing a post!

Despite all this, I have a GOSH Special Edition polish to show you. It's called Prima Donna and it is a brick orange with a gold shimmer. I didn't notice the shimmer in the shop but it's so pretty and really visible on the nail, which I love!

The formula was good on this. At first I thought it was going to be a one coater, but it went on in two effortless coats! 

Natural light

Sunlight - Look at that gold shimmer! 

Macro

I love this polish and I'll definitely be wearing it again. I have a few outfits it would be perfect with! I got it in Superdrug for £5.

New York Colors Lexington Yellow

Good afternoon! 

I've got a gorgeous yellow polish to show you today! This is the first yellow nail polish I've ever owned but I've really been wanting one since it's been sunny! I bought this on my haul the other day and I've been excited to wear it.

This is a true yellow, in my eyes it doesn't lean blue or red, it's just yellow! I think it complements my skin tone unlike most yellows I've seen, which is why this is the first I've bought.

The formula was okay on this, nothing exceptional. If I'd have been more careful I could have got away with 2 coats, but I used three for the photos below.

Natural light

Sunlight

Macro

If you're looking for a true yellow polish to wear now the weather is getting nicer, I would definitely recommend this! I got it in Superdrug for £1.79.

Oh My Gosh Baby Blue

Hi everybody, 

I hope you're all having a good weekend! Today I've got an Oh My Gosh by GOSH polish to show you. I picked this up a few days ago on my haul. The shade is called Baby Blue and it's perfect for this time of year!

The formula of this wasn't the greatest. It was runny and streaky, but three coats gave me adequate coverage. The colour of this is really pretty and I'll definitely wear it again during the Spring and Summer months!

In the photos below I'm wearing three coats of Baby Blue with no topcoat. 

Natural light

Sunlight

Macro

I got this polish at Superdrug where it retails at £3.50.

Famous Purple Dazzle

Greetings from the Netherlands!

Today I have the first polish from my most recent haul. I had never seen or heard of Famous by Sue Moxley when I saw it in Superdrug so I had to buy a couple of things just to see if I liked it, and I do! I understand the brand has been around for a few years in selected stores but I guess those stores where never anywhere near me!

This is called Purple Dazzle and it's a dark purple glass fleck polish with a slight duochrome. I say slight because I didn't notice it until I started taking photos! The colour shift goes from purple to gold and it's really pretty in a subtle way.

I had so many problems trying to get a colour accurate photo of this! It kept photographing as blue, even though it's definitely 100% purple. In the end I fiddled about with my white balance, so if my skin looks a bit off colour then it means the colour of the polish is right! 

In the photos below I'm wearing two coats of Purple Dazzle with a coat of Seche Vite. Click "Read More" to see the rest of my photos.

Here it is in the sunlight

Speciallita HITS No Olimpo Poseidon

Hey everyone,

Before I go to the Netherlands, I've got a really nice polish to show you. I bought this at the same time as Festival, the flakie I posted yesterday, from Llarowe. Speciallita HITS is a Brazillian company that have some amazing polishes. I posted a picture of their Phenomena collection on Tuesday and I really can't wait to get it!!!

No Olimpo is a pale blue linear holographic polish. It's so sheer so I had to use 4 coats, but once I did, it looked amazing. It's blindingly holographic in the sun! I wore it for 3 days with no chips and I only took it off last night because I'd bought 8 new polishes that I couldn't wait to try out!

In the photos below I'm wearing four coats with Nº7's Stay Perfect Fast Dry top coat. I didn't use Seche Vite because as much as I love the glass like finish, it doesn't last well on me and usually ends up peeling after a day.

This is indoors with natural light

Look at that holo in the sunlight!

Macro

One thing worth mentioning is that the HITS polishes aren't 3-free as they contain formaldehyde. I always paint my nails in a well ventilated area so I don't mind, but if you paint yours in a closed room, it might be an idea to open a window.

I think you'll agree this is an lovely polish! If you like it as much as I do, you can find it here at Llarowe where it costs $10. I love this polish so much that I bought Hefesto and Apolo too. I'm waiting to receive them, but as soon as I do, I'll swatch and post them!

Models Own Beetlejuice S/S 2012

Hey guys,


Check out the new Beetlejuice multichrome polishes from Models Own! 

I have Golden Green, Pinky Brown and Emerald Black, and I'm waiting for Purple Blue, so I was really excited to find out they were releasing more.

This collection consists of Copper Pot, Tropical Sun and Indian Ocean. 

L-R Copper Pot, Tropical Sun, Indian Ocean

The collection was released exclusively on the Models Own website on March 19th but will be available at Boots and other online retailers nearer the end of the month. I've bought Indian Ocean already, I'm just waiting for it to arrive. I'm going to wait until they're in the shops to buy the other two. 

Find the collection online here where each polish retails for £5

piCture pOlish Festival

Evening guys,

I'm posting a bit later than I wanted to today, I managed to fall asleep at 5pm for two hours! I went for a really long walk today to do a nail polish haul so I guess I just got too much fresh air!

Anyway, I told you I had a gorgeous flakie to show you didn't I? I bought this from Llarowe in January and I'm so in love with it! It's no secret that I'm gutted I didn't get my hands on Unicorn Puke or Clairvoyant, so I was waiting patiently (okay, maybe not so patiently!) for a multicoloured flakie, and this was worth the wait!

Festival has a clear base with multicoloured flakies suspended in it. My favourite flakies are the ones that have a lot of bright blue in them, and this one is a turquoise explosion. It has a lot of bright pink as well. Turquoise and pink together remind me of drawings I used to do of my name on MS Paint when I was younger!

The formula of this polish was a little bit thick, and meant that sometimes I had gaps with no flakies near my cuticles, but that was easy to fix. I'm more than willing to put up with a thick formula for this effect!

This covered okay with one coat, but two coats was so much better. This is one of those polishes where it goes on thin for the first coat then the second coat seems much thicker and more densely packed with flakies. I've included a one/two coat comparison just to illustrate my point!

In these photos I'm wearing two coats of Festival over two coats of the black polish I swatched yesterday.

Comparison: One coat on my index finger and middle, three coats on my ring finger and pinkie

Outside in the sun

The flash really showed off the turquoise

This polish is so beautiful! It's available here at Llarowe where it retails for $16.50. Llarowe ships internationally and from personal experience, I've found their customer service to be really good!

I'm travelling to the Netherlands tomorrow afternoon to see my Dad for 10 days, but don't worry, I'll be swatching as much as I can with the new polishes I bought today. I'm hoping to find a few continental beauties out there too!

I've also got a gorgeous post for tomorrow, it's a good one!

Speciallita Hits Phenomena

Check out these multichromes!

HITS make some amazing polishes, their No Olimpo collection is great, I'll be showing one of their polishes over the next couple of days and I have two more to come in the mail soon.

I'll for sure be snapping this whole collection up as soon as I can!

Black Polish from Gold by Giles

Good morning everyone!

Today I have a black creme to show you. I've got a thing about black cremes, I can never have too many! I have 4 right now: two from 17 at Boots, Rimmel Blackout, and this new one. I promised myself I wouldn't buy any more until Cult Nails release their Never More one coater, but I still bought this polish on Sunday when I was shopping with my Mum in New Look. !

New Look have collaborated with the designer Giles Deacon to create a range which includes high fashion at lower prices, as well as a range of cosmetics that includes nail polish, nail wraps, false eyelashes etc. I'm not usually a fan of these collaborations because nothing is usually to my taste, but I caved a couple of months ago and bought a pair of the eyelashes, which I HATED! The glue was awful and the lashes felt completely solid. So I never went back, until Sunday! The trick is obviously to put shiny and pretty things where I queue up to pay, it never fails! I grabbed this black creme and a mint green creme which I'll swatch later in the week.

None of these polishes are named, so I'm just calling this one "black polish." The formula was really good in this, it applied really well, no dragging, no bald spots. It almost applied itself! If I had done a really thick coat it probably would have been a one coater, but I used two coats. My favourite thing about this polish is the shine! It's so shiny, by far the shiniest black polish I've ever had.

In the photos below I'm wearing two coats of black polish with no top coat!

Inside in the natural light

Look at that shine! You can see the reflection of me, and the blue sky in my nails!

I absolutely love this polish! If you like it, you can find it in New Look stores and on their website, where it retails for a bargain £2.99!

Everybody should have a good black creme like this in their stash, especially with special effect topcoats (can you say flakies?) becoming more popular and accessible. Speaking of flakies, I've got a gorgeous one to show you tomorrow!

Have a lovely day!

Models Own Champagne

Good afternoon everybody!

Today's post is a bit unfortunate! I wore this polish yesterday and swatched it then, when it was dull and slightly rainy, and now it's so sunny! Normally I swatch my polishes a few hours before I post, but I did two in one day yesterday because I had too much time on my hands!

Anyway, this polish looks lovely no matter what the weather is like! It's from Models Own, which are probably my favourite nail polish brand. Their polishes all retail at £5 and they usually have a buy 3 save £3, buy 5 save £7 deal, so it's always worth buying a few! 

The shade is called Champagne, and it's a foil effect polish. The colour is really hard to explain, it's a silvery gold/goldy silver! It matches with everything. I'm one of those people who can't wear a bag with silver bits on if I have gold bits on my shoes, no matter how small, so I really love this in-between shade!

The formula in this is my favourite kind, fluid, not thick, and really heavily pigmented. I've worn this polish 10+ times and because I know the formula inside out, this is easily a one coater for me!

In the photos below I'm wearing one coat of Champagne with a coat of Seche Vite.

The bottle

Inside in the natural light

Outside in the "sunlight"

This polish is so pretty! It can be found in Boots, online at ASOS.com, or on the Model's Own website here where it retails for £5. 

"Happy Mothers' Day" franken!

Hello everybody,

Happy Mothers' Day to all the Mums out there, hope you all got very spoilt today! 

Here is the franken I made for my Mum for her present. I took an empty nail polish bottle and filled it to just under a third with clear polish. Then I added two thirds of Pulsating (see yesterday's post) and filled the bottle to the top with the Nail Pop Sequin Effect shade 24 polish that I used in my franken, as seen here. To top it off I added five measures (with one measure being enough to fill the end of a straw) of my imitation Spectraflair scattered holographic pigment.

Indoors in the natural light

Here I'm wearing three coats of my franken with one coat of Seche Vite. Click "Read More" to see the rest of my photos

Rimmel - Pulsating

Hey, 

Today I have a Rimmel polish to show you all. It's part of their 60 Second range. Pulsating is a bright blue leaning pink polish, and it's the kind of bright where it looks like it's glowing. 

Inside in the natural light

I bought this polish online for a franken I was planning for my Mum for Mothers' Day. The colour didn't look as bright online so I bought it knowing that my Mum usually loves this colour for nail polish. 

Honestly, I'm a bit gutted I didn't just buy it for myself! The colour is so pretty and perfect for summer, and spring... And even now when it's cloudy and you need a bit of cheering up! 

In the swatches below I'm wearing 2 coats of pulsating with no top coat, this polish is just so glossy!

Outside

Flash

Look at that glossy finish!

This polish can be found in your local Boots or Superdrug or online for around £3.50.

Max Factor - Fantasy Fire

Hi guys,

Here it is, the one and only Fantasy Fire. This polish has caused such a stir that it's almost impossible to get hold of! Luckily I live in a part of the country where there aren't too many nail polish fanatics, so I managed to pick it up and I'm so glad I did. It's fair to say I'm a little bit in love with it! I even got complimented on it last night at the gym which was lovely.

Here it is in all its glory!

Fantasy Fire is supposedly a near dupe for the legendary and long discontinued Clarins 230 which, sadly, I do not own. It has a multichrome shimmer that shifts from red to gold to green depending on the angle. It can be worn on its own, where you'll need about 4 coats (depending on your application) to get full opacity. Alternatively you can layer the polish over another shade, which is how I wore it. The base colour in Fantasy Fire is gorgeous, but I just can't stand having a visible nail line!

First I layered Fantasy Fire over black so the shimmer could take centre stage. Then I layered it over the most similar shade I had in my stash, which was Rimmel Lycra Pro Aqua Cool. This is a cornflower blue polish that is lighter than the base colour in Fantasy Fire. Layering the polish like this means that the royal blue jelly base isn't hidden!

Click "Read More" to see my gorgeous swatches! In all of the photos I'm wearing two coats my chosen shade with one coat of Fantasy Fire. I've topped it off (of course) with a coat of Seche Vite to give it that classic glass-like appearance.

My pink franken!

Hi everyone,

Today I have a franken I made last night. I really wanted to paint my nails but nothing in my stash caught my eye, so I took matters into my own hands. I wanted something girly but classy and I wanted flakies!

The polishes I used were:

Rimmel Coralicious 

Saffron glitter polish - Colour 04

17 Love

17 Simply Pink

Wet'n'Wild White nail polish

Nail Pop Pearl Effect 20

Nail Pop Sequin Effect Shade 24

I really wish I'd have written down how many drops I used of each, but this was purely an experiment. It was a few drops of each and then some clear to make the glitter and flakies more visible.

The formula on this was a nightmare! It was an off the cuff frankening session, so I didn't have a proper dish or anything. Instead, I used a piece of cellophane! I was also doing it in front of a fan heater because my boyfriend has set the heating to switch off at night and I don't know how to reset the boiler! This all meant that the polish was drying as I was trying to get in on the brush!

I used two coats of my franken with one coat of Seche Vite for the photos below

Seven Nation Army Manicure!

Hi guys,

Today I was thinking about how I could paint my nails. I wanted to do some nail art, mostly because the thought of taking off my franken from yesterday broke my heart! So I thought about it for a while, turned on MTV and thought some more. Then all of sudden Marcus Collins came on TV. For those of you who don't know, he was the runner up on X Factor. I've never been a huge fan of his, and his new single doesn't help things! It's a cover of Seven Nation Army by the White Stripes. I use the term "cover" loosely as the song as barely recognisable now it has more or less a reggae accompaniment! 

I found the song so offensive to my ears that I muted the TV, got onto YouTube and listened to the real version. Seven Nation Army is one of my all time favourite songs, so after listening a few times and dancing round the room with my son, I set about trying to recreate the video on my nails!

I used plain sellotape for this mani, but it took so long to cut etc that I gave up and did my last 2 fingers freehand. Now I wish I'd used the tape for all of them!

The polishes I used were: Rimmel Black Out and my own Star Nursery franken topcoat (see yesterday's post), then the white is a Wet'n'Wild polish, it doesn't have a name... The red polish is Rimmel's 60 Second in Rapid Ruby. I used the Konad M44 image plate for the lines. It's the image plate that has different tips for more original french manicures.

Outside in the "sun," it wasn't very bright!

I really love this mani, I just wish I'd taken more time to do the tape! But I think it's a fitting tribute to the song, after all, I doubt Jack White would criticise me for a bit of a mess!

Inside in the natural light

Just for good measure, here's the inspiration for this manicure! The White Stripes - Seven Nation Army