NOTW - Kit 'Big Bang' with Australis 'Glitter Strikes Back'

 

This weeks nail of the week is from 2 great Australian brands with Kit - Big Bang, and a glitter top coat of Australis - Glitter Strikes Back.

I must say that I tend to steer away from purple generally as I picked it as my "one colour to hate" a million years ago and never looked back, silly I know... until recently. My friend had this colour at her house and I fell in love instantly! The brightness hooked me in, and it is such an interesting shade I ended up borrowing it from my friend and wearing it. Lucky for me, I have great friends and she got it for me as a present a month later. ^_^

This Kit 'Big Bang' nail polish, like all others I've reviewed previously has a perfect strong pigment, is easy to apply, and lasts well (these photos were taken after the polish had been on my nails for a week, so I apologise for the small chips!). The actual colour is kind of hard to capture, I think it's a little brighter than it looks on here in reality.

The Australis 'Glitter Strikes Back' nail polish is a mix of small round gold and purple and large hexagonal gold. It was the first nail polish of theirs that I've tried since their re-vamp of the brand (which I'm LOVING... so many great colours I want/need!) and I'm really impressed. I saw it in Priceline and couldn't resist buying it then and there. 

It was quite easy to apply an even coat of the glitter, and it lays flat on your nail really well so you don't have chunky glitter catching on your clothes etc. I used a top coat of Seche Vite to smooth it all out and last a little longer. This glitter would pop even more on another coloured base coat I think because some of the purple glitter colours blended into the purple of the base. The gold looked amazing though!

You can purchase Kit's 'Big Bang' from your nearest Kit store for $15.95, or you can also buy them online here or check for your nearest Kit store online here. I purchased the Australis glitter nail polish 'Glitter Strikes Back' from Priceline for $7.95 and you can also see their range and order online here.

Have you tried any of the new Australis glitters? What's your favourite glitter and base coat combination? x

NOTW - Kit 'Rose Macaroon' with American Apparel 'Light Year'

 

This weeks Nail Of The Week is Kit's new shade 'Rose Macaroon' with an accent on the pinky finger of American Apparel's 'Light Year'. 

After a visit to Kit recently, I walked away with even more shades from one of my favourite local brands! Oops. I couldn't wait to try this sweet little number out, and I knew just like the rest of the Kit range, it would be a nice creamy colour. 

'Rose Macaroon' is from the new limited edition Sweet & Chic macaroon scented collection which was released last month. The collection comprises of 5 feminine colours to mimic macaroon flavours, and each one comes with a sweet scent to match! Unfortunately the Rose Macaroon colour didn't have too much scent, not as much as compared with the Revlon scented nail polish I've used previously, but it was definitely noticeable at least and a lot better scented than nail polish generally is! 

The nail polish applied just as well as any other Kit nail polish I own. The polish is thick, the colour applies exactly as it looks in the bottle, and I got the colour seen above in only 2 coats. Almost one was enough, but I like to apply a second coat just to even it out. I also applied a coat of Seche Vite on top to give it that extra shine in the photos above. 

The colour is a really subtle rose, which is a nice change to any colours similar that I own - mostly baby pinks come to mind. This is a lot softer and I think it would suit most skin tones well. 

I've been wanting to try out the American Apparel glitter polish ever since I purchased it with the 'Smoke Dazzle' as seen in my previous post here and it really didn't disappoint! The glitter is a round holographic silver in a clear polish. It was fairly easy to get an even distribution of the glitter with this polish too as there is a lot of glitter chunks in the polish itself. I just applied the glitter, waited until it was dry enough to not move, then applied another coat to even out the gaps. You could use this glitter polish really densely or sparsely

I think the addition of the glitter in this manicure turned it from something super feminine into something a little more playful which I liked a lot. Being on the pinky instead of the index finger the glitter isn't a main attraction, but more of an offset. I think I'll be using my pinky more often like this!

I purchased Kit's 'Rose Macaroon' from the Kit store in Chadstone shopping centre for $15.95, or you can also buy them online here or check for your nearest Kit store online here. I purchased the American Apparel glitter 'Light Year' from the American Apparel store in Melbourne in a deal of 3 nail polishes for $28, or it was $14 for the single nail polish. You can also see their range and order online here. I think I need every single glitter shade they have. They all look amazing!

Have you tried any of the new Sweet & Chic scented nail polishes from Kit or any American Apparel glitters? What do you think of this sweet and spunky combo? x

NOTW - American Apparel - Smoke Dazzle (Metallic range)

 

[with flash]

This weeks Nail Of The Week is American Apparel's - Smoke Dazzle - from the Metallic collection. 

I wasn't sure if I liked this nail polish when I first put it on as I'm mostly a fan of cream nail polishes and other finishes often just feel cheap and strange, but after wearing it for a week I can say I definitely fell in love a little! 

The colour is a nice dark silver in most light, and reflects as a dark grey, green, pink/purple depending on what light you're in and how you move the angle of your nails. I guess you could definitely describe it as a duochrome for that reason, but not as much of a shift as some others I've seen and almost impossible to photograph the colour shifts as you can see in my attempts above! Quite impressive though really. Most metallic nail polishes I've tried have this lovely transformation about them, but depending on the colour and finish it can look a bit cheap, but that's not the case here. 

The formula was really easy to work with, and for a metallic nail polish it was relatively streak free which is a definite bonus. You generally get the streaks from the brush in the nail colour, but I didn't really work hard to avoid this and as you can see, there are barely any brush strokes to be seen. I only used 2 coats of this colour to achieve the look above. You could layer it over a black to get a more intense look too which would be interesting.

I thought this colour would be quite comparable to Chanel's 'Black Pearl', but Black Pearl is definitely darker, less silver and more green. 

American Apparel nail polish is Manufactured in the USA. Cruelty free, DBP, toluene and formaldehyde-free.

Overall I think this is a perfect metallic nail polish that would be a great addition to any nail polish lovers collection. I will definitely be looking to get a few more American Apparel nail polishes now, as this was my first one that I've tried. The Neons look super pretty too! 

I purchased this from the American Apparel store in Melbourne in a deal of 3 nail polishes for $28, or it was $14 for the single nail polish. You can also see their range and order online here. 

What do you think of this metallic colour? Have you tried any American Apparel nail polishes? What's your favourite metallic colour? x

NOTW - Kit - Siesta Indigo

 

[natural light]

[with flash]

This weeks nail of the week is Kit's 'Siesta Indigo' which is an indigo blue so deep, it's basically black!

This nail polish was part of the Viva La Colour range from winter 2011 which drew inspiration from Mexican delights and included mostly bright colours like green, yellow, and purple, but of course I was drawn to the darkest colour of the bunch (typical, haha).

The formula of this nail polish was great. It's nice and thick and you could use just one coat if you're careful, but I used 2 just to even out the colour. The nail polish dries with a super slick sheen and the finish wouldn't even need a top coat, but as always I used Seche Vite as a top coat to get the quick dry and glass like finish you can see in the top picture.

It was hard to take a photo of my nails to show the true colour because it just looks black in most light. The only real indication of the blue coming through is on my rough edges (sorry about that, haha). This is a colour that I love because it's such a contrast to my pale skin. Great in winter where I'm extra pale!

I purchased this from Kit Cosmetics for $15.95 when the range was released in 2011, but it appears to have been quite popular and has been added to the permanent range. It's available online from Kit here or Mecca here or you can pop into your local Kit or Mecca store to check out their full range instore, it's super impressive! I can never decide which colour I want next.

Have you tried Kit nail polish? What's your favourite colour? x

NOTW - Essie - A Crewed Interest & Essie - Shine Of The Times

[natural light]

[with flash]

This weeks Nail Of The Week is Essie - A Crewed Interest, with an accent nail of Essie - Shine Of The Times. 

Essie's 'A Crewed Interest' is from the Spring 2012 Navigate Her collection, which was full of nice lights and brights as can be seen in the full collection swatches here. A Crewed Interest is a beautiful peachy creme which applied quite well considering it is such a light colour. I was able to get an even opaque coverage in 2 coats, but then decided to put 'Shine Of The Times' over all my nails, then regretted it so did a top coat of  'A Crewed Interest' again on all the nails except the thumb and accent finger. Haha. I'm ridiculous I know! So that's why in the pictures the nail polish looks so thick! Sorry about that. 

The colour really is wonderful though. This is one of my favourites in a long time. It worked well against my pale skin, and was a nice colour in the sun, or in artificial light. Not too orange, but not too washed out either. If you're pale, I would definitely recommend this one! 

The Essie - Shine Of The Times flakie nail polish is a really soft highlight on this colour. Not too noticeable, but a gentle glimmer in the right light. It reflects a silver and gold mostly, and because it's over a light colour, the colour it reflects is a lot lighter too. 

This is definitely a nail polish I will be turning to again, and would work well with almost any outfit as it's so light and neutral. Essie nail polishes are yet to disappoint me and I can't wait to get more!

This is another nail polish I bought in my last haul (as seen in my post here) from mbeautylounge and was $7.10 ($US). You can probably also find this on ebay for around the same price, or BeautyBay.com are now stocking Essie and have A Crewed Interest available online for $11.90 ($AU) AND have free postage to Australia. Myer also stock Essie, but I'm unsure of their availability on every collection so just head in to your local store and see what they have. :)

What do you think of Essie's 'A Crewed Interest' and 'Shine Of The Times'? Have you got a favourite Essie nail polish? x

NOTW - Deborah Lippmann - Candy Shop over Kit - Winner Takes

This weeks Nail Of The Week is what I can only describe as a party on the nails! This is quite fitting too as the main nail polish in focus here is from the Deborah Lippmann - Get This Party Started nail polish trio box set from 2011 which featured Candy Shop (Happy Birthday glitter in a pink jelly base) alongside Happy Birthday and Forget You (Happy Birthday glitter in a black jelly). 

I started with a lighter base than I have previously used with the Candy Shop jelly top coat. I used one of my very favourite pale pinks - Kit - Winner Takes. This is a really light pink that is pretty much the exact colour that it looks in the bottle. It goes on really opaque like all Kit nail polishes that I've used, which makes it easy to have a nice base with pale colours. I used 2 coats just to get a nice even finish before I put on the glitter top coat. 

The glitter in Deborah Lippmann's Candy Shop is definitely not lacking at all. One quick swipe was all I needed for the thick coverage of glitter that you can see on my nails above. It comes out nice and even and applies really easily. The pink jelly base with the glitter actually made my nails a more fluro pink than I was expecting over the pale pink base colour. I didn't know if I liked it at first, but it really grew on me and it's a nice effect in the end. I've only ever used this over a barbie kind of pink previously so the colour of the jelly base wasn't noticeable at all, but over this you can really tell that the jelly base has a colour of it's own. 

I'm still yet to use Candy Shop on it's own on my nails, but from watches that I've seen the jelly base builds up to quite a nice colour making it not too sheer. It might be something I need to think about trying in the future. There are some good swatches of the whole 'Get This Party Started' set here. 

I received the Deborah Lippmann 'Get This Party Started' set which included Candy Shop for my birthday, and it's from 2011 so I'm not sure that it's available online anymore, but it may still be on ebay! I know you can order Candy Shop on it's own from the Deborah Lippmann website (not 100% sure that it posts to Australia sorry!) or from 

The Kit nail polish 'Winner Takes' is still available in store at Kit and Mecca or online at Kit and Mecca too.

What do you think of this combination? What's your favourite glitter nail polish? x

NOTW - OPI - Black Cherry Chutney

This weeks nail of the week is OPI - Black Cherry Chutney from OPI's India collection from 2008. 

This was another nail polish that I had recently received in my haul from mbeautylounge.com and as soon as I saw it in the bottle I couldn't believe how pretty it looked. I couldn't wait to get it on my nails! Unfortunately, I was a little disappointed once I did. 

In the bottle it looks a deep purple with flecks of red undertones, however on the nail I lost that almost completely. It looked like a flat colour of deep purple, and the only way to see the undertones is in direct sunlight, and even then it's not so noticeable. In the second picture I've used flash, so you can almost see the other flecks of colour coming through there.

I thought this would be comparable to my previous post OPI - Midnight In Moscow and I guess in a way it is, but this is a lot more purple, and the undertones aren't as noticeable. It almost looks black without direct light on top. I definitely can't complain though, it's another awesome vampy colour to add to my collection, and OPI do these sort of colours oh so well. 

This was a little harder to apply than Midnight In Moscow, one coat was quite streaky, but it evened out with the second and I left it at that. Maybe a third coat would really intensify it, but I think 2 is plenty!

Overall I really do like the colour that this turned out, I was just a little disappointed with the initial lack of shimmer once it was on the nail. If you love a deep vampy purple this is a lovely colour. 

I purchased this from mbeautylounge.com for $6.15 (US) but it may still be available in stores too. In Australia David Jones stock OPI instore for around $19.95 (AU), or check out the OPI website for a stockist near you! 

What do you think of OPI - Black Cherry Chutney? What's your favourite OPI colour? Do you like vampy shades? 

NOTW - China Glaze - Peachy Keen

This weeks Nail Of The Week is China Glaze - Peachy Keen. 

Peachy Keen is, as the name implies, a light creamy peach colour. It was one of the nail polishes I received recently from mbeautylounge.com as seen in my last haul post and is from the Up & Away collection of 2009. 

The colour is actually quite bright, almost a neon against my pale skin, but muted slightly by the creaminess of it. 

The polish applied quite well. It's thick and didn't streak too much when it was applied. Although, like most China Glaze polishes it can be so thick it can get a little hard to manage unless you work quickly. Even so, mine is quite thick with 2 coats and still finished neatly. It stayed on well for a full week, only just chipping towards the end.

This will definitely be a colour that I'll come back to. It worked really well with my skin tone, and it's a nice bright colour that would be great for summer!  

China Glaze - Peachy Keen can be found online at mbeautylounge, or crush cosmetics for an Australian site that will ship faster, and other sites that sell China Glaze that you know may have it in stock still too. I wish there were stores that stocked China Glaze in Australia, it's such a great brand that never fails to impress me so it'd be great to have it more readily available. 

What do you think of Peachy Keen? What is your favourite China Glaze colour? x

Haul - mbeautylounge.com - Nail Polish!

I've finally had some good light (silly cold days) to take photos of the nail polish haul I recently received in the mail from mbeautylounge. 

If you've never been to the website http://mbeautylounge.com/ before and you're from Australia, you may be in for quite a shock at just how cheap some of your favourite brands are on there! They have OPI from as little as $5 US, Essie from $4 US, and China Glaze from around $4 too among a couple of other brands Zoya, Color Club, and Orly. 

Despite the prices being so cheap, there is a bit of a catch... the postage can be a little bit steep, which is why my friends and I always make a big order together. But in doing that we also tend to have bad luck with our orders getting mixed up and almost every order at least one nail polish gets missed or we are given the wrong thing. I'm not saying it's not going to happen EVERY time you order from them, but I think it's happened 2/3 times for us, and getting a reply via email from them about rectifying it can often prove a little difficult! So fair warning. Postage also takes a long time - we waited 6 weeks this time around! Try your luck though, it's usually worth it as they almost always have new collections on their site as soon as they are released which is awesome news for us Aussies!

The shades I purchased this time around were:

1. China Glaze - Peachy Keen (from the Up & Away collection)

2. China Glaze - Sugar High (from the Up & Away collection)

3. China Glaze - Flyin' High (from the Up & Away collection)

4. China Glaze - Four Leaf Clover (from the Up & Away collection)

5. OPI - Black Cherry Chutney (from the 2008 India Collection)

6. OPI - Tasmanian Devil Made Me Do It (from the Australia Collection)

7. Essie - A Crewed Interest (from the Navigate Spring 2012 Collection) 

8. Essie - No More Film (from the Resort 2012 Collection)

I had actually ordered a different red than the OPI - Tasmanian Devil Made Me Do It... I had ordered OPI - Red Lights Ahead, Where? from the Holland collection. Just another thing I was talking about with the little "issues" you can have with this site. My friend and I both also ordered China Glaze - Happy Go Lucky from the Up and Away collection and they just didn't send that to us at all, not even one bottle of the 2 we ordered. Sigh. 

I really can't complain though. I got a lot of nail polish, for really cheap! Keep an eye out for more of these in my Nails Of The Week posts coming soon. This week I've used China Glaze - Peachy Keen and I'm in love! 

What do you think of my little haul? What are your favourite places to buy nail polish? x

NOTW - Essie - No More Film + China Glaze - Meteor Shower

This weeks nails of the week is a little disappointing from my point of view, so I apologise as a first priority to my readers. As you may be able to tell by some of the scratches and chips in my nails, I didn't get to take photos as soon as I finished my manicure, it was actually a few days before I found time to take photos, and of course by then they had already started to chip! I forgot how absolutely horrible long square nails are for that. HORRIBLE. Lesson learnt on that front - shorter than my fingers, or not at all.

But moving on to the colours, which I actually loved... I have Essie - No More Film on most of my nails which is from the Essie Resort 2012 collection that came out around March this year. This is a new nail polish that I recently got from mBeautyLounge and I'll be posting a haul picture of the rest of the nail polishes I got in my order very soon. 

The formula on this nail polish, like most Essie nail polish was really rich and easy to apply, although as you can tell from my messy cuticles, it was a little harder to get neat than some others I've used before. You could probably get away with one nice coat of this colour as it is thick, but I believe I used 2 coats in the pictures above just to even it out. The true colour of this nail polish is so hard to capture with photos, as it feels as though it almost has a creamy purple tinge to the base which makes for a beautiful blue in real life that sets it apart from any other dark blue or navy nail polishes that I've used before. The formula finished in a lovely shiny polish, but I topped mine with Seche Vite top coat just to give it an extra bit of shine.

On my ring fingers I have China Glaze - Meteor Shower which is a coarse glitter nail polish. I didn't need to use any coloured base undercoat with this nail polish, it's pure glitter and dark base gives a deep shimmer of blues which are hard to capture the depth of within the photos above. It's extremely sparkly, trust me, and it's beautiful! As you can see in comparison to Essie - No More Film, China Glaze - Meteor Shower is a true navy blue so that may help you visual what I was attempting to say about the purple undertones earlier. I feel this nail polish definitely works best with a top coat, as without it it is textured and not as sparkly in the light. The formula on this is really thick, and a tad hard to apply as it is so chunky with glitter, but the top coat evens that out anyway. You only really need one coat of this because it's so thick.

I haven't worn this nail polish much since I purchased it around a year ago, not because I don't love the colour, but more because when I did wear it previously it chipped so easily and it is quite painful to remove. This time around with using a base coat and top coat it actually lasted a lot longer than the Essie colour did really, I was quite impressed. 

Essie - No More Film should be available in Myer and other major retailers that sell Essie for around $15-$20, or you can purchase it online. As I said, I purchased mine from mBeautyLounge for $7.20 US.

China Glaze - Meteor Shower is an older nail polish now, and I purchased mine from Crush Cosmetics at least 12 months ago, and from what I can see it's no longer available on there. They are great for China Glaze though and an Australian based website. If anyone knows where you can still buy this nail polish online, let me know and I will update this post. You might need to try ebay even, sometime's you get lucky there! 

What do you think of this colour combination? Have you tried Essie Nail Polish before? What's your favourite colour? x