Ninja Polish Alexandrite, Eye Candy and Zultanite

 

Hope you all enjoy your (long) weekend! Today I have some Ninja Polish polishes to show you which I have been trying out over various colors other than black.

First up is Alexandrite. Its a fine glittery duochrome nail polish that can be worn alone if you’re willing to waste this beauty on layers, or it can be worn over other colors. The duochrome effect is very strong and evident on this one. It sparkles turquoise to purple, sometimes a bit pink, gold and blue too. I used one coat over MAC Peppermint Patti.

I tried Alexandrite over various other colors, but I like it the best over mint. I also thought it looked cool over a vivid medium blue, such as essence shopping @ portobello road.

With Eye Candy, I had some difficulties finding a good base color. It is a very colorful tiny glitter mix consisting of blue, purple, green, gold/orange, and most probably other colors, but that’s primarily what I see. Unexpectedly, I liked this best over purple (p2 cool plum)….

… and blue (p2 wintry blue). 

 

 I’m a big fan of polishes with a gold-greenish color, so Zultanite looked the most fun to me from the beginning on. It has this unusual color shift from copper to olive but an intense golden glow (it is never, ever, brown.) I love colors like this! I decided to layer it over a similar base color – obviously the color shift is stronger if layered over black, but I think everything looks so alike if layered over black! – but it looks the most “natural” over Revlon Spanish Moss.

 

Did you find any other layering combinations you could share? I’m always interested!

Sunday Spam: Jessica

Today I want to show you some Jessica polishes that I like and wore lately.

Amira / Smitten Kitten * (part of the collection where Jessica named polishes after her friends) is not just a standard pink, no! It has a subtle silver shimmer that peeks through at times that makes this polish special. As a pink lover, I was convinced immediately! 2 coats.

Ava / New Kid in Town * (same collection as above) is a very white-leaning lilac. It’s a very vivid but at the same time subtle color. I don’t wear colors like this often, but I think I will wear this in summer, as it looks so happy! 2 coats.

Desire was, if I’m not mistaken, part of a collection with three polishes that looked like Chanel April, May and June (see comparisons here). It’s a bit of a duller red, which I personally don’t wear. If you like this kind of color, the advantage of Desire is that it is not bright red, very wearable and applies very nicely. 2 coats.

Flirtation looks very similar to Chanel May. It is very difficult for me to find a baby/barbie pink that fits me, and unfortunately this wasn’t it. Definitely a great alternative if you missed the Chanels and wanted one, or if you’re looking for your perfect baby pink creme and want to give this one a try. Application was a breeze, 2 coats.

Love Story is similar to Chanel June…. I very much dislike this color, and even more because June is my birth month, and I wanted a prettier color. Sorry about my self-centered rambling. Love Story applied perfectly and it is very shiny and all, I just didn’t like this type of orange. 2 coats.


Prune Whip * is a great pink creme that dries so glossy, it looks like a jelly. There’s not so much more to add except that if you’re looking for a pink like this, Prune Whip is a good option. 2 coats.

Strawberry Shake It* is a very pale baby pink with a high percentage of white. It is cool-toned so it works with my skin. The application was a bit chalky and the polish dragged, so unless you’re super into this color, I’d suggest to sit this one out. 3 coats.

Do you have a favorite Jessica nail polish? Let me know!

All polishes marked * were sent to me for (obviously, honest, reflecting-my-opinion) review. Thanks to the Jessica PR-Team!

Your weekly dose of holo: color club harp on it

Hi there! I know, I know, it is not really your weekly dose of holo. It’s mor eof an eventual holographic nail polish related post. Well, I try to keep it up again, thanks to the seasons, I have more opportunities to make nice pictures for you again.

color club Harp on it – your “standard” silver holographic nail polish. The color is silver, there’s no doubt. Plus you can see the rainbow effect, so it must be a holographic polish. I used 2 coats. The first picture is taken in the lightbox (indirect light).

Well. Your average silver holo looks your average silver holo on steroids if you see it in direct light.

See the awesome rainbow effect? I think this is the strongest silver holo to ever reach my tips. (Pictures were made with flash!)

What do you think?

essence – new show your feet polishes

Hi there! You know what the best is about today? Tomorrow. Fridays. Full of hope and expectation what the weekend may bring. (lots of sleep in my case…!)

Anyhow, essence released new “toe nail polish”. I have zero idea what the difference to “finger nail polish” may be, but what shall I say, it is a marketing trick. So I decided to exercise some civil restistance and show them on my fingers, not toes.

The gladiator (they are all named after certain shoe types, cute I think) is a lime green creme, very vivid and a color I really like. I used two coats, the application was ok.

The peeptoe is a very vivid almost neon coral. 2 coats again, application ok.

The pump is a chalky barbie pink. The application was a bit streaky but ok to handle. 2 coats.

The stiletto is a shimmery medium purple, it has a blue shine which is more apparent in the bottle than on the nail. I don’t like this color at all. Application was ok, 2 coats.

The wedge looks like a very vivid medium blue creme, but there is just a hint of shimmer in there, so it looks more glossy. I don’t wear blues like this on my nails, but I like the color itself. 2 coats, it was a bit difficult to control while applying it.

All in all this collection has really nice colors, but nothing breathtaking. I assure you my nails felt fine after wearing this polish, so it’s safe to say it isn’t toe nail polish only!

essence guerilla gardening TE

Hi everyone! Hope you’re having fun with the giveaways. You can still enter a few!

Anyhow, I thought, why not take a break and show you something else today. This essence LE came out recently, it is asomewhat spring-y mix of colors and pink and green flocking powder that I chose not to show you – I have tried blue flocking powder and found that quite something else, and to be honest, it’s enough of an experience for now.

Floral Glam is a tomato red creme. It has just the slightest bit of a jelly consistency, but it covers completely in two coats. It’s a red essence does well, so if you have one, you won’t need another.

I’m the moss is a fir-tree green creme. It’s pretty solid, except for the name. 2 coats.

Mission Flower is your rather standard pink creme. It had just the teensiest hint of a blue shimmer in the bottle, but it looks rather plain once applied. 2 coats. 

Plant the Planet is my favorite color, but the application wasn’t good. I needed three coats and a somewhat loose hand in applying it and more or less hoping that if I just put on enough polish, the bald spots would dissappear. In effect it worked, but there are so many other great lime/chartreuse/light green cremes out there, that you’d easily find an alternative. 

Anything that you liked from this TE?

I’m 2! The Giveaways evolve…

I’m not even going to talk much about this particular Giveaway – a nail polish connaisseur knows what’s at stake, hence the super mysterious dark picture.

(For those of you who don’t know but would like to, you can win Ninja Polish Divinity, Ambrosia and Shillelagh. I don’t have any of these so I can’t provide swatches, but I will participate in my own giveaway. Or let’s say I would if I could!)

Rules!

Entering this Giveaway is really simple. You have to be a follower on Facebook and fill out the form below. You can only enter the Giveaway once otherwise you’ll be disqualified.

Terms and Conditions

The deadline to enter the Giveaway is May 15th. This Giveaway is open internationally, exceptions apply for countries that don’t accept liquids in the mail. I cannot be held liable for your parcel (or loss thereof). The winner will be announced on the blog and must email me his/her adress within 48 hours or I will choose another winner. To enter the Givaway you must have reached the age of majority in your country or provide consent from your parents.  Void where prohibited by law.

* PR Sample. Special thanks to the sweet ladies of ninjapolish.com!

Sunday Spam: OPI pink & red

Well, I hope you’re enjoying your sunday! Meanwhile I am working on emptying my swatch folders, so I’m showing you a couple of pink and red OPI/NOPI/SOPI polishes today.

OPI I’m all ears, from the Minnie Mouse Collection (LOVE Minnie and Mickey!) over Jessica Strawberry Fields. I had no patience to apply multiple coats of this beautiful but sheer raspberry red glassfleck. Beautiful, but not unique, I think.

NOPI Great Minds Pink Alike, a coral Creme with glassfleck-y shimmer. Love the idea, and that it covers perfectly in 2 coats, but the coral looks stripper-y on me.

OPI Aphrodite’s pink Nightie is really old (in polish years). It is part of the Greek Isles (?) collection from 2004. It is frosty and pink, and no-one likes colors like this anymore, but I love it. I am weird sometimes and it has been on more than one occasion, that people told me that my taste was interesting. 2 coats.

OPI Charged up Cherry is extremely difficult to capture. My lightbox, skintone and the fact that this is almost neon, do not do it any good. It looks washed out in my pictures – somehow unsatisfying. I will try to show you in an How I wore it post soon. 2 coats.

OPI If you moust, you moust – I love this flawless pink, and the application is great. Perfect bubblegum pink – the only downside is that it doesn’t really suit me. I was really sad when I realized that! I kept it anyway. 2 coats.

OPI Pompeii Purple is one of those pinks I wear over and over. It dries just the slightest bit streaky, and needs three coats, but it glows! It has this blue shimmer over a very vibrant pink, but it’s not too much and doesn’t look too girly. One of my favorite summer pinks!

OPI Schnapps out of it. I don’t know if you  have heard this before, but I hate hate hate medium brown nailpolish (and clothes). This one has a somewhat orange-pink tint, but it’s definitely mostly brown. The silver shimmer can’t safe it for me. Good thing is that the application is easy and it needs 2 coats. Nevertheless, in my eyes, horrible color. Also, it is pretty useless to tell someone to snap out of something when drinking schnapps. I tried and failed.

OPI The color of Minnie. This is a wonderful, wonderful strawberry red, with intense silver shimmer, application is a dream, and it just looks amazing. Eternal love. 2 coats.

Catrice Candy Shock LE

 Good morning, nail polish fanatics! Today I will still your hunger for colors with the Catrice Candy Shock LE. I didn’t find the pearls anywhere (you know, big thing, pearls on your nails, texture, fun 3D nail art, etc, etc, ugly.), so I can only show you the polishes.

Bring me Peach is a somewhat sheer orange at first. It’s a darker egg yolk color, but then pastel and somewhat color-drained. It’s, as you can guess, not my favorite. It took three coats for opacity, and dried satin-y. No idea if that was the intention.

Play it blue is a pastel light blue. It also dries with a satin finish and needed three coats. It’s cute, and somewhat happy and spring-y, but you can take any other light blue and add a matte topcoat.

Vanilla Love looks like vanilla pudding. I hate pudding of any flavour, but I do like soft yellows. This was patchy and difficult to apply, but that was obvious. I only have 2 yellow cremes that apply good… 3 coats.

I scream Ice Cream is such an old joke a pastel lilac, which has awesome shimmer in the bottle, but that doesn’t transfer on the nail. You can see it in the sun, if you look really closely, and really want to see it. Bummer. 3 coats.

All in all, I think pastel colors aren’t necessarily Catrice’s great strength. I like the blue, but for the rest I am not so amazed by the colors.

essence Floral Grunge TE

essence releases TE after TE again, it seems to be a spring-thing. Today I’m showing you the Floral Grunge TE.

It seems more and more that essence focuses on a target group of girls aged 7 to 13. I am not at all interested in the TE’s they put out if I’d only judge by theme. I mean, what’s floral grunge? Dead flowers? The ghost of a rabbit in a flower bed? Grunge music to which hippies dance? A happy emo? The cyber goth movement? I can’t answer any of this, but I am certain that puberty-ridden girls will find something as undefined as this interesting. For a fact I know that I would have, and I am ashamed to admit it. Luckily, growing up is inevitable.

essence Be flowerful. 2 coats. A shiny coral-orange pastel polish. 3 coats. I assume this is part of the “floral”?

essence Black to the roots. Ah, the word joke. So funny. Black (…) polish with silver glitter in there that dries gritty and matte. It has a sticker saying that this is supposed to be textured, but it really isn’t. It looks more like a lab accident (aka the whole jar of silver glitter fell into the matte black nail polish! Oh no! What shall we do! How about we call it texture. No one will notice.). 2 coats.

essence Grunge me Tender (no comment on this name. I mean, really.) is a pale mint shade with some shimmer-adding particles. It dries rather anticlimactic to something between shiny and matte, but definitely not to a suede. It is also amazingly patchy, you can see that even at 3 coats.

essence Lily Bloom, a white polish with a little bit of shine that doesn’t transfer on the nail all too well. Less patchy than the mint, but still not amazing. 3 coats (and no idea what “the pearl” means – a sticker on top of the bottle – this doesn’t look pearly to me).

essence Madly Purpled – now finally, this is a success. Medium dusty purple, dries matte, with shimmer, so it doesn’t look flat. Easy to apply, dries quick, 2 coats. If you pick one from this TE, pick this one.

Sunday Spam: essence polishes

Welcome to another edition of Sunday Spam, featuring essence polishes.

EDIT: Something happened here with the text. As I don’t remember the witty comments I made, but I assume it was a hilarious read, let me just tell you what the polishes are called.

Essence Bioho Chic, 2 coats.

essence chic reloaded, 2 coats.

 essence cookie love, 2 coats. (HATED this on me.)

essence cool breeze over date in the moonlight. generic, if you ask me.  1 coat

essence date in the moonlight, 2 coats.

essence glitter on me over that’s what I mint. 1 coat.

essence love’s recipe. 3 coats. WORST FORMULA EVER.

essence pom-berry. 2 coats.