Xmas Tips - femme fatale, Ulta3, essence, China Glaze

Hello, hello, it's that time of the year again! I thought I would try out Christmas-themed manis. Except I didn't get the colours quite right, oops!

[Base: femme fatale Shimmering Snowcap over Ulta3 Crystallina
Blue-green strip: essence Choose Me!
Red strip: China Glaze Ring In The Red]

My fondness for femme fatale's Shimmering Snowcap results in yet another appearance! One layer of it over Ulta3 Crystallina meant that the gold shimmer from Crystallina came through quite strongly.

I used essence Choose Me! for the strip of blue-green, which turned out bluer than I expected. China Glaze Ring In The Red makes the strip of red. The red was definitely brighter in person, what with all the glitter that my camera is ignoring.

[Base: femme fatale Shimmering Snowcap over Ulta3 Crystallina
Blue-green strip: essence Choose Me!
Red strip: China Glaze Ring In The Red]

That looks a bit better right?

[Base: femme fatale Shimmering Snowcap over Ulta3 Crystallina
Blue-green strip: essence Choose Me!
Red strip: China Glaze Ring In The Red]

And a customary blurry photo so you can better see Crystallina's gold coming through and the glittery red.

You Jelly! - Color Club Holiday Splendour

A bit of a photo overload in this post today... This is one gorgeous (and appropriately festive!) polish, but oh so difficult to capture!

[Bottle to nail: Color Club Holiday Splendour (2 coats)]

This is Color Club Holiday Splendour from the Beyond the Mistletoe collection from 2011. My photos lean about bluey-teal but it's really more of a green shade.

[Close-up: Color Club Holiday Splendour]

Holiday Splendour contains chunky holographic glitter in a vibrant cool-green jelly base. It is so marvellously blingy! If you like China Glaze Atlantis, this is a green-er version, so I've heard~

[Bottle to nail: Color Club Holiday Splendour (2 coats)]

Application is wonderful, perfect and squishy in two coats. The jelly base is very richly coloured - I was totally impressed.

[2 coats: Color Club Holiday Splendour]

Sorry for the image spam! I tried taking so many photos to capture the gorgeousness of this one but I don't think I succeeded very well. Totally recommend this polish though if you don't already own it~! =)

Digital Space - Nail Pattern Boldness I Believe I Can Fly

We have posted photos of Nail Pattern Boldness nail polish before, but here's one I don't think we have reviewed yet.

2 coats of Nail Pattern Boldness I Believe I Can Fly over peach nail polish

Nail Pattern Boldness I Believe I Can Fly is a squishy dark blue jelly with silver square glitter and red microglitter. The silver glitter always look like flashy blue-silver because of the dark blue base. I quite love this nail polish! It looks like digital abstract art for some reason and that random bits of red in it just adds to its flavour.

The base of the nail polish will usually come through one coat of I Believe I Can Fly, but in this case, I used a peach coloured base and I Believe I Can Fly was dark enough that it gave the mani a navy blue base colour, and without any visible nail line.

The rest of the photos are taken indoors:

2 coats of Nail Pattern Boldness I Believe I Can Fly over peach nail polish

This nail polish is smooth and easy to apply, no need to fish out any glitter.

Looking at pictures of it... I like it just as much this time round!

Greeny Gradient - BB Couture Studio 54, LA Girl Purge, ORLY Here Comes Trouble, Mode Vicious Venom, Nubar Meadow Sparkle

Hello hello, today I have five lovely greens to show you today! I combined them together a while ago to make a gradient/ombre skittle manicure~ =)

[Greeny Glitter Gradient Galore]

I've been obsessed with finding the perfect green for a long time (I may just have found it, but that's a post for another day!). So one day when I saw how many bottle I had of just green glitter, I decided to pick a couple to make a gradient...

[The Lineup]

Here's my pick... from left to right: BB Couture Studio 54 for my base colour, LA Girl Glitter Addict in Purge, ORLY Here Comes Trouble, Mode Vicious Venom and Nubar Meadow Sparkle.

[Bottle to nail: BB Couture Studio 54 (2 coats)]

Here's my base colour - BB Couture Studio 54. This is a gorgeous green shimmer in a slightly blued base - a bit of a muted pine green. Not super bright. Formula was good and this was two coats iirc.

[Gradient Skittles (L-R): Nubar Meadow Sparkle, Mode Vicious Venom,
ORLY Here Comes Trouble, LA Girl Purge]

I then popped on varying amounts of glitter polishes on each nail.
Pinky: Nubar Meadow Sparkle. This is a fairly fine pale green. Very neutral shade.
Ring: Mode Vicious Venom. This is a gorgeous green glitter, leaning a bit warmer than my photo suggests. Great coverage.
Middle: ORLY Here Comes Trouble. This one is very similar to Mode Vicious Venom but there are also larger green hexes in the mix so the effect is a whole lot bling-ier. Great colour and coverage.
Index: LA Girl Purge. A mix of large and small kelly green hexes. Love this one too. It's more like a topper so I had to use 2-3 coats to achieve full coverage.

[L-R: LA Girl Purge over LA Girl Blackout, LA Girl Purge over BB Couture Studio 54,
ORLY Here Comes Trouble over BB Couture Studio 54]

I didn't have a darker green glitter so for my thumb, I used a black base coat instead so it would show through a layer of LA Girl Purge (left), giving it a darker shade than the index. =)

[Pinky to index: Nubar Meadow Sparkle, Mode Vicious Venom,
ORLY Here Comes Trouble, LA Girl Purge]

... and here are both hands together! LOL... I took this photo by propping my camera up on the back of my chair and pressing the shutter button.... WITH MY CHIN. =D

oh my purple! - essence oh my glitter!

Work has been really busy so I'm going to keep this one simple.

This is essence's oh my glitter! which has recently reached Australia's shores.

essence oh my glitter!

oh my glitter! is a mid purple creme with red and blue microglitter. The brush is rather thick so you have to be a little careful with it if you have narrow nails. It was smooth to apply, and opaque in one coat. I used a quick dry top coat and that caused some shrinkage.

essence oh my glitter!

You can see the red shimmer/microglitter better here.

I'm a real purple lover so it's no surprise that I like this and will recommend it. The microglitter isn't super bright and obvious, but it's a nice extra touch to a creme polish. Plus, it's totally worth essence's low cost!

Dazzle Fox - Revlon Fire Fox, Australis Speck-tacular, Kleancolor Chunky Holo Purple

An old-ish mani, layering with flakies!

[Bottle to nail: Revlon Fire Fox (2 coats)]

I started out with Fire Fox, from Revlon's Matte Suede collection... This is a strange finish, it is matte, but in the more hmmm... rubbery/plasticky-looking way, quite interesting.

[2 coats: Revlon Fire Fox]

It's a bright red, quite festive, so I might pull it out again as Christmas approaches! Good formula and coverage, I think this was maybe two coats?

[Base: Revlon Fire Fox (2 coats); Topper: Australis Speck-tacular, Kleancolor Chunky Holo Purple]

Being incapable of leaving a mani alone, I topped this with Australis Speck-tacular, a multicoloured flakie (thumb/middle/pinky), and Kleancolor Chunky Holo Purple, a orange-to-green duochrome glitter (ring and index).

[Base: Revlon Fire Fox (2 coats); Topper: Australis Speck-tacular, Kleancolor Chunky Holo Purple]

And here's a darker picture which shows the shift better!

I have unfortunately been very very busy lately so apologies for the craptacular posts from me this month. =( I'm really looking forward to 2013 though, fingers crossed, my schedule should clear up heaps in the new year! Yay!!!