December Daze - Nyx Enchanted Forest, Hit the Bottle's Chromeo, Hit the Bottle's Drop Red Gorgeous, Born Pretty BP-L053

Seasons greetings, everyone!

[Red, Green and White]

I had ordered Christmas themed stamping plates but they still haven't arrived yet, so I decided to make use of a plate sent to me for review.  So in the photo above, the base nail polish is Nyx's Enchanted Forest. A rather old nail polish, with amazingly dense green and gold microglitter. You can see close-ups of the polish here, in an older review. It's still as gorgeous as ever!

For the ring finger, I stamped over it using Hit the Bottle's Drop Red Gorgeous which is a red chrome, and for all the other nails, I stamped over them using Hit the Bottle's Chromeo, a silver chrome. The plate I used was Born Pretty's BP-L053, as photographed below.

[Born Pretty BP-L053]

The patterns on this plate are obviously not meant for this December holidays' theme but the one I chose passes muster with the right colours, in my opinion.

I seem to have overwritten one of my photos from a different angle so instead, have another nearly identical photo to the one above.

[Base: Nyx Enchanted Forest
Stamping: Hit the Bottle's Chromeo, Hit the Bottle's Drop Red Gorgeous
BP-L053 Stamping Plate]

I also stamped all the patterns on a paper with varying success.

I quite like the patterns and can't wait to try them out!

You can find the BP-L053 plate here and yo can use the code above to get a discount on other items at Born Pretty!

Walking Dead - Halloween Challenge #5: Zombies

The topic of the day is 'zombies', and in no universe are zombies easy on the eyes (sorry, zombies, but it's true). So I decided to pretty much try for a weird-looking, maybe even gross-looking, manicure.

Here's what I started with:

[Two coats of Nail Pattern Boldness Madam Rose over Orly In The Navy]

Nail Pattern Boldness' Madam Rose is a red and silvery-white matte glitter. With three thin coats, it could probably be opaque on its own. Nail Pattern Boldness really packs their glitter in their bottles! Orly In The Navy is a very dark, almost black, navy blue.

[Top: Sponged Missha SV03
Base: Nail Pattern Boldness Madam Rose over Orly In The Navy]

Then, I sponged on Missha SV03 - a gray creme - randomly over the lot. Alright, I'll admit, in my enthusiasm for this creepy subject, I was going for a zombie's gray patchy skin over rotting flesh. (At first, I was going to do tendons and bone as well, then I decided to leave it a little abstract.)

[Top: Sponged Ulta3 Pacific Fever over Missha SV03
Base: Nail Pattern Boldness Madam Rose over Orly In The Navy]

I added a little green to the gray for more of a rotting look. How does this look? I don't think I quite made it to icky zombie skin and flesh heights, but it did look a little gross in person. It definitely achieved a certain level of ugliness though!

Then I thought it would be interesting to try to make it something that I could actually wear out without getting bombarded by questions about my taste...

[Top: Nyx Enchanted Forest
Middle: Sponged Ulta3 Pacific Fever over Missha SV03
Base: Nail Pattern Boldness Madam Rose over Orly In The Navy]

Glitter hides all flaws, right? Hmmm...not quite in this case, but close enough. This is the sparkly edition of zombies! Perhaps when Twilight vampires turn into zombies...? The glitter is Nyx's Enchanted Forest and it has all sorts of green holo hex suspended in a green jelly base. It's gorgeous, and I love how it looks like it's floating in that second picture above.

Here's the mandatory blurry picture for maximum shininess:

[Top: Nyx Enchanted Forest
Middle: Sponged Ulta3 Pacific Fever over Missha SV03
Base: Nail Pattern Boldness Madam Rose over Orly In The Navy]

So how did I go? 'Zombie' was a rather tough challenge for me, and perhaps I took it a little too literally. /o\

Holly-days: NYX Lime Sparkle + NYX Girls Gilded Glitter

Good Monday! We're heading straight for the middle of the silly season, with Christmas parties galore - that means dressing up, nails included! Here's a quick look I did for a casual work lunch we had, filled with delicious goodies.

[In the bottle: NYX Lime (Sparkle)]

Listed as NYX Lime Sparkle on Cherry Culture, the bottle is simply labelled NYX Lime. It is a fantastically shiny kelly green jelly base with tons of gold glitter. Unfortunately, it is a bit sheer, but dry time is not bad so I didn't mind layering it on. Layering with glitter-jelly combinations also makes for gorgeous depth!

[Four coats: NYX Lime (Sparkle)]

Here's four coats of NYX Lime Sparkle. I was so disappointed that I couldn't capture how shiny this was!  Imagine twinkly nails glinting every time you move your hands - magpie heaven!

[Four coats: NYX Lime (Sparkle)]

Another angle to attempt to capture sparkle....

[NYX Lime Sparkle (4 coats) + NYX Girls Gilded Glitter (1 coat) + Rhinestones]

It was already plenty shiny, but I slapped on a coat of NYX Girls Gilded Glitter. Jme has already swatched it here but briefly again, it's basically heaps of pale gold flakies suspended in a clear base. Even more shiny! I then placed three red 3mm rhinestones as holly berries on my ring finger. The leaf was a green triangular rhinestone.

[NYX Lime Sparkle (4 coats) + NYX Girls Gilded Glitter (1 coat) + Rhinestones]

Different angles, and closeups to capture the shine! I love festivities and special occasions (whether I do or do not celebrate them...) because I'll take any excuse for sparkles!

I hope everyone has a great week in the lead-up to Christmas - here's to lots of delicious food, great company and shiny polish!

Matte and Shine: LA Splash Arctic Gleam / Nyx Algae

On today's menu, we have two different nail polishes that I tried a couple weeks ago.

The first is a mish-mash of polishes! I mainly wanted to try my LA Splash Arctic Gleam.

[Close up: LA Splash Arctic Gleam]

I bought LA Splash Arctic Gleam because I was entranced by the pink, purple and blue small flakes in the pale blue jelly base. I knew it would be a sheer colour, but my photo really doesn't capture the pretty iridescence of the purple and blue flakes.

Sadly, I don't think the flakes actually stand out much against the polish, but I am doing something strange with it here.

[Essie Matte About You over three coats LA Splash Arctic Gleam over one coat Savvy Coal]

This is Arctic Gleam layered over Savvy's Coal which is a black polish, and then I matte-fied it all with Essie's Matte About You. As usual, you can click on the pictures for a bigger version to better see the flakes.

[Essie Matte About You over three coats LA Splash Arctic Gleam over one coat Savvy Coal]

There's something sedate, but unusual about the overall look. It looks like dark blue frosted glass, with the addition of random flakes of colour to liven it all up a little. An interesting result, I thought.

[Essie Matte About You over three coats LA Splash Arctic Gleam over one coat Savvy Coal]

The flakes were sparser than I expected, but then again, I do like my flakes big and visible from an arm's length away. :)

Perhaps I'll try Arctic Gleam on its own to see how the flakes will look instead of layered over black and matte-fied. Next time then!


I swatched Nyx's Algae during a long week of rain and barely any sunlight so I didn't take many pictures. These are all indoor photos:

[Indoor: Nyx Algae]

Algae on the nails is pretty true to the colour in the bottle. I really like this shade, and I feel like wearing it again soon just looking at the bottle. Algae is a dusty light green and entirely opaque at two coats. I think you could get away with one coat, depending on the length of your nails.

[Indoor: Nyx Algae]

To me, this shade of green looks elegant, while standing out among regular colours. But then again, I do have a fondness for dusty colours.

The Dupe Test - Zoya Charla vs NYX Advanced Salon Formula Be Jeweled

Exactly as it says on the cover: This post will be to find out if NYX Advanced Salon Formula Be Jeweled is a dupe for Zoya Charla.

As always, you can click on the photos for larger views of them. I did not use a topcoat for these swatches.


[In the bottle: NYX Be Jeweled and Zoya Charla]

They are both blue-green jelly-ish bases with a lot of gold and blue-green microglitters. They have a duochrome look, changing from blue to green-gold depending on the angle. In their bottles, they look very similar (and so very pretty!). However, you can also see that NYX's Be Jeweled looks a touch lighter and greener. It doesn't show up as well in photos, but Zoya Charla looks shinier in the bottle.



[One coat: NYX on index and ring finger, Zoya on middle and pinky]

I'm applying thinner coats than I usually do for the sake of comparison. From this first coat, it's obvious that Charla has a darker base. Charla also applies smoother while Be Jeweled's microglitters are just a little chunkier.


[Two coats: NYX on index and ring finger, Zoya on middle and pinky]

At two coats, Charla is very close to completely opaque and it has denser microglitters, while Be Jeweled is still a little jelly-ish. I wondered at this point if the colour difference was due to opacity, so I went for a third coat of Be Jeweled.


[Three coats of NYX: NYX on index and ring finger, Zoya on middle and pinky]

Now we have reached nearly complete opacity! Be Jeweled has three coats here, while Charla is still on two coats. While Be Jeweled's formula is thicker, Charla's darker colour and denser microglitters mean that Charla requires less coats for the same opacity. Both polishes are similarly shiny in terms of glitter, and in colour, they are very close as well.

I think you can clearly see the difference through the photos, and if I told someone I had different polishes on, I think they'll be able to pick out which is which. But it's actually a lot less obvious at a glance.


[Different angle: NYX on index and ring finger, Zoya on middle and pinky]



[Under direct indoor light: NYX on index and ring finger, Zoya on middle and pinky]

Both polishes are remarkably shiny under indoor halogen light or under direct sunlight. Very distracting, and very, very pretty! The colour is not very accurate here though.  





[Low indirect sunlight: NYX on index and ring finger, Zoya on middle and pinky]

You can see that when the nails aren't directly side by side, it's actually quite hard to distinguish between the two different polishes.



[Colour corrected: NYX on index and ring finger, Zoya on middle and pinky]

I have colour corrected this picture because I feel that my camera captures the polishes as bluer than they really are, and misses out on the blue-green tone.
And so, what's the verdict?

Drumroooooolllll...

I have to conclude that Be Jeweled is not an exact dupe, but it is very close. Be Jeweled's base is just a little greener and lighter, and there are more gold microglitters while Charla has a different distribution of gold and blue microglitter. 

While Be Jeweled is not in any way gritty, it can be further smoothened out with a topcoat. I do like Charla's application over Be Jeweled, but in general, I tend to be fond of Zoya's formula.

If all you're after is the blue-green duochrome with gold glass flecks look, then NYX's Be Jeweled will serve the purpose just as well as Zoya's Charla.

In terms of price, you can get NYX Be Jeweled online for about USD4 with ~USD2 shipping, but if you wait for discounts, it gets even cheaper. Zoya Charla can be bought from Ebay for about ~USD6.50, with up to USD6 shipping, depending on where you live.

I would pick Zoya Charla over NYX Be Jeweled if I had both at hand, because Zoya Charla has an edge in terms of smoother application and denser microglitter. But Zoya Charla is harder to get your hands on because the major online distributors don't stock the brand, and I have seen official sellers in Australia sell it for up to $16. 

Cherry Culture often has discounts on their online store and they stock NYX as well as other pretty polishes, if you're interested.

Alright, one last picture before I go. This is for those who wonder about the differences in colour between NYX Be Jeweled and NYX Enchanted Forest

[NYX Enchanted Forest on index and middle finger, NYX Be Jeweled on ring pinky]

When they're side by side, you can definitely see that Be Jeweled is a teal-ish polish with a gold gleam while Enchanted Forest is a greener polish with a green-gold shine.

Salon At Home: Nyx Femme, Be Jeweled, Gilded Glitter

My first two swatches are from the Nyx Advanced Salon Formula collection, and I quite like them.

[Nyx Advanced Salon Formula Femme]

Nyx's Femme is a very pretty and classy silver polish with a touch of lavender-grey. I thought it would be a foil polish, but I don't think this is a foil. It's closer to a chrome polish, but shinier, and looks like it has an extra shimmer. In any case, I really like it!


[With Nyx Advanced Salon Formula Femme bottle]

Femme is easy to apply, dries smooth and you can get full coverage with just one coat. No topcat for this one.

[Nyx Advanced Salon Formula Be Jeweled]

My camera really was being strange for this collection. There are no bits, bubbles or bumpiness in any of the manis, but my camera might be picking up a reflection of some sort through the shiny surface of the polish.

In any case, Nyx's Be Jeweled is a gorgeous blue-green duochrome with dense gold micro-glitter giving it that shiny golden sheen. This is definitely a dupe for Zoya's Charla, but how close is it? Well, that's for another post, when I have Charla on! :)

[With Nyx Advanced Salon Formula Be Jeweled bottle]

Two coats were enough for full coverage. These pictures are all taken under indirect sunlight. Look at the polish in the bottle, isn't that gorgeous? 


The next few photos are from the older Nyx Girls collection.

[Nyx Girls Gilded Glitter over Nyx Advanced Salon Formula Be Jeweled]

I couldn't resist trying out Nyx Girls' Gilded Glitter layered over Be Jeweled.  Gilded Glitter is a clear based polish with assymetrically shaped solid gold flakes (not duochrome flakies). Among the bigger flakes, there are actually finer tiny flakes which will give manis a gold tint.

Don't my nails look like they could be used as a reference picture for dragon scales in some fantasy book? It's rather gaudy, but such an interesting look!

[With the Nyx Girls Gilded Glitter bottle]

It took four coats to get such dense coverage, but I did have rather long nails then. While it dried rather smoothly, I used Orly In A Snap topcoat over this because it's really hard for polish to dry all the way through when you layer on so many coats.

I thought I would try Gilded Glitter over something lighter.

[Nyx Girls Gilded Glitter over Carlo di Roma's white glass fleck polish]

I broke a nail on this hand so they're all rather short here. Gilded Glitter on its own has a golder/yellower look, and there's no way to cover my tips since it's actually a clear polish. So I thought I would try layering Gilded Glitter over a thin, white glass fleck polish. Works rather well I think! It's a very clean look, while still being quite interesting and shiny.

[With Nyx Girls Gilded Glitter bottle]

I got a few rather nice comments on this polish at work. This is two coats of Gilded Glitter over Carlo di Roma's very light, white unnamed polish.

There seems to be an identical gold polish from Nyx's Advanced Salon Formula line, and it's called Gold Glitter. I don't see any difference between Gilded Glitter and Gold Glitter from the pictures, to be honest.


If you're thinking about buying Nyx nail polish online, I suggest checking out their website for their pictures. You can click on the pictures for larger versions and those are much better than the swatches on Cherry Culture.

My next post will be a comparison between Zoya Charla and Nyx Be Jeweled. See ya!