Born Pretty Duochrome 205

Hello ladies! Today I have a lovely polish to share with you, which was kindly sent to my by Born Pretty Store for my review.  This is a multi-chrome polish from their "Chameleon" range Born Pretty Chameleon Nail Polish 205 ID#18622.  I'm a huge fan of multi-chrome polishes, so I was very excited to try this one out.

Born Pretty Chameleon 205 - natural shade

Multi-chrome polishes often give the strongest effect when viewed in shaded natural light, and this is certainly true of this polish (pic above).  The multi-chrome effect is nice and strong, showing the range of colours simultaneously across the nail.  The colour transition is a lovely maroon to gold with a lovely shade of green in there too.

Born Pretty Chameleon 205 - full sunlight

What I especially liked about this polish is that it was also really sparkly.  Viewed above in full sunlight you can see the effect of the shimmer in this polish, which gives it a real extra special finish.

Born Pretty Chameleon 205 - artificial light

Above and below I've captured some pictures that show the dramatic colour shift of this polish - from a beautiful maroon (this is the main colour, visible most of the time), through shades of bronzy/gold to finally a lovely olive green (this is the least seen colour, visible at extreme angles of the nail to the light source).  Pictured here I am wearing two coats of the Chameleon polish over the recommended 'black undies' (a single layer of A England Camelot, a rich black creme).  Multi-chrome polishes should be worn over a coloured base coat to give the colour shift the maximum 'pop', and black works best.

Born Pretty Chameleon 205 - artificial light

The Chameleon polishes are mini-polishes, with 6ml volume.  That's a good size really for this type of polish, because a little goes a long way so this size will  last you quite a while.  However, as with all mini-polishes, the brush is also small.  On this bottle the cap is very fat, and the brush is short, and the combination of these factors did make it a little tricky to handle.  The consistency of the polish, dry time and overall finish however were all excellent.

The Mini-Brush

I received this polish for free, but I have checked and the RRP is $12.88 (approx. £8.57) and at time of writing it is on offer for 25% off at $9.66 (£6.42).  You can receive a further 10% discount by using the code included in the banner below.  World-wide postage is free, although be aware that it ships from Hong Kong so typically takes 2-3weeks to arrive in the UK.

Born Pretty Chameleon 205

Conclusion: Overall this is a really lovely multi-chrome polish.  The multi-chrome effect is strongly visible in shaded natural light, and under artificial light this polish appears a very pretty shimmer mostly in the maroon shade.  My only criticism is that being a mini-polish the brush is a little difficult to use and also the pricepoint for 6ml does make this quite expensive in comparison to some other brands.  I did really like this polish, and I'm sure it's one that I will be wearing again.

Visit Born Pretty Store for a wide range of polish and Nail Art supplies, and use the code below for an additional 10% discount off any order.

Spotted! New Brands in Boots

Hello ladies!

Exciting things are afoot at the Boots store in the Gyle (Edinburgh).  I'm not sure how far reaching this is, but I'm guessing it must be nationwide in at least the larger Boots stores.  A new set of counters has popped up in the Beauty department, for fancy hair products and nail polish. There is even a specialised assistant staffing the counter like they have on the Chanel counter etc.  These new counters are in a separate part of the store to the main nail displays so I almost didn't spot it...

As you can see, there are a large number of brands on offer:  Butter London (the biggest range I've ever seen), Orly, Mavala, Nails Inc, Sensationail, Eve Snow and LondonTown.  The last three in that list are brands I'd never heard of, but they're selling for top dollar prices (£9-11 ish) so these are at least being marketed above the regular 'drugstore' brands that Boots carry.  I was particularly excited by the Orly and Butter London displays, I haven't seen this range of shades anywhere else outside of London.

So keep your eyes peeled ladies - perhaps a new premium nail display is coming to a Boots near you!

Picture Polish "Lollipop"

Hello ladies! Today I have a really amazing shade to share with you - it's one of the latest collaboration shades from Picture Polish - "Lollipop".  This polish is so much prettier IRL than these swatches can capture but I've done my best!

Picture Polish Lollipop - day light lamp

My camera flat out refused to capture this colour properly.  The dodgy cameraphone picture below is much closer to how it really looks, but the best description is that this is the perfect Cadbury's purple.  I'm not sure if this is a UK thing, but Cadbury's purple (from the Dairy Milk chocolate bar wrapper) is instantly recognisable and hands-down my favourite colour of all time.  It's so recognisable in fact that Cadbury tried to trademark Pantone 2865c

This is a purple jelly base packed with small hex glitters and tiny round glitter pieces, both in the same royal purple but with a hint of blue for an extra pop. The first coat was really sparse but it was perfectly opaque in two. I'm wearing it here with a new base coat in fact - Leighton Denny Undercover Base Coat - and a generous coating of Essie Good to Go.  The finish was nice and smooth.

Picture Polish Lollipop - artificial light

I loved this polish and the wear time was surprisingly decent for a glitter.  It was a real pain to remove though, even with the foil method, so it's a definite candidate for PVA basecoat next time - and there will be many next times with this fabulous polish.

Picture Polish Lollipop - day light lamp

I highly recommend this, it's fantastic. I picked mine up from Rainbow Connection for £10.75.

Picture Polish Lollipop - day light lamp

AEngland - Jane Eyre

Hello ladies!  Today I have another AEngland polish to share with you - one that I picked up in the last AEngland bundle sale (3 polished for £18!).  This is Jane Eyre from the Gothic collection, a blackened russet shimmer.

AEngland Jane Eyre - artificial light

Pictured here is two easy coats over NE base and beneath Essie Good to Go.  As with all AEngland polishes application, formula and wear time were all flawless.



AEngland Jane Eyre - artificial light

 All of the Gothic beauties collection are black based polishes with a coloured shimmer that peeks through. In these pictures you can see the russet/red shimmer really clearly, but this is the only place that you will see it.  On the nail, in virtually all lighting conditions, this polish just looks plain black.  It was quite a disappointment in that respect.

This is the second shade from the Gothic collection that I own, and I really only got this because it happened to be in a bundle with two others that I wanted.  I personally wouldn't recommend the Gothic collection unless you really like black polish and don't mind that the shimmer is only peeked very rarely.

Snowflake Foil Decals - Born Pretty Store

Hello ladies!  Today I'm reviewing a nail art product, sent to me by Born Pretty Store who sell a wide range of Nail Art supplies.  The product they sent me are these super pretty ultra-thin gold foil 3D nail decals (http://www.bornprettystore.com/30pcsset-ultrathin-snowflake-deer-design-charming-nail-decoration-p-16678.html).  I enjoyed playing with these and learned some handy tips for application that I'll share with you.

First, let's get some details.  These decals are 4mm wide, and made of ultra-thin gold foil (the bronze colour you see below is the back).  These come in a small resealable plastic baggy which keeps them nice and flat.  Because of their thin profile, they are fairly bendy to wrap to the shape of your nail. Pictured here I'm wearing them with A-England 'Camelot' (black) and OPI 'From Me to Q' (red) to show you the contrast, and a generous coat of Essie 'Good to Go' topcoat to seal them in.

How to Apply:

you will need: your decals, your chosen colour polish, a good topcoat, a blunt pointy object (like a dotting tool, I used a plastic headed pin), and a little dish of water

Start by applying your usual base coat and your chosen colour. When your final colour coat is still fairly wet, wet the tip of your pointy object and tap it onto the decal to pick it up.  Gently deposit the decal on your nail, but don't push down much.  When your colour is almost dry, just slightly tacky, you can gently use your blunt pointy tool to press around the edges of the decal to bend them to the shape of your nail and stick them to the polish.  Be careful though - if you do this too soon, your colour will pool up and flood over the top of the decal.  When you're happy with the shape, apply a thick layer of topcoat to seal it.

I found out by trial and error the best way to apply these, but I have left the errors in my picture so you can learn from my mistakes!  In the picture below you can see that I didn't wait until my colour was dry enough before applying topcoat and the colour smeared across the decal.  If you can, use a non-smearing topcoat.

In this picture you can see that I didn't press firmly enough on the edges to stick them into the base polish, as a result the decal is not sitting flat against the nail.  You might have to try a few times to find exactly the right level of tacky-ness to stick the decal without flooding it.

Conclusions

This is the first time I have tried 3D decals, and they make an easy pretty effect for those of us that can't paint a freehand Picasso on our nails.  Personally I would prefer a smaller decal, so that I could fit several on each nail.  Application was easy when I got the hang of it, but I did find that even through thick topcoat the sharp edges still peeked out a tiny bit, which was enough for them to get caught on my clothing and to feel a bit scratchy.  I think this might be due to the design - the snowflake has very spiky edges, perhaps a smoother edged decal would not catch as much.

Shopping at Born Pretty

These products were sent to me for review, but I have previously purchased nail art supplies from BPS.  They have a massive selection of nail art supplies for really low prices (typically just a few dollars), and they provide free worldwide shipping.  The only downside of that is that shipping time can be quite long, my order took about 4 weeks to arrive which I gather from nail forums is fairly typical.  So, BPS is a great place to grab a bargain, but be sure to order well in advance of when you might need something,

BPS have kindly provided me with a discount code PFT10K31 for all my readers to receive 10% off.  You can use the code as many times as you like.

A England Festive Bargains

Festive greetings ladies! This is just a quickie to share some exiting news...AEngland are having an awesome festive sale...It's well worth a look, and as Christmas shades go I can't recommend "Perceval" highly enough. It is quite simply THE perfect metallic red. If by some horrible trick of fate I was forced to choose only one red from my collection to keep then I would pick this one without hesitation. Check out my blog post on Percival for more...

I would also highly recommend Avalon, if like me you live metallic purple then this is also hard beat. I also loved Dragon...

Sadly for me I already have a lot of these and none of the AEngland shades that I've been lemming are this offer but hopefully you'll find a nice bargain amongst them :-)

Go to http://www.a-england.co.uk for details

Crown of Thistles by AEngland

Hello ladies! Today I have a gorgeous polish to share with you from the brand new A England "Elizabeth + Mary" collection.  A new A England collection is something to get very excited about, and this one is no exception.  Taking inspiration from two of Britain's most famous Queens - Elizabeth the 1st, and Mary Queen of Scots. The history of these two women is steeped in murder, betrayal and intrigue.  Mary was considered by many to be the rightful heir to the English throne, and Elizabeth in turn kept her cousin imprisoned for 18 years before finally having her beheaded for treason. 

A England - Crown of Thistles - artificial light

Today's polish is 'Crown of Thistles', a shade inspired by Mary, the Queen of Scotland, whose national emblem is the thistle.  This is a beautiful shade of Orchid (pinky purple) that really captures the colour of the tufted top of the thistle:

Crown of Thistles is also a very strong holo finish, far more prominent than the usual soft dusty holo finish that A England are famous for.  Seen here in the bottle shot you can see the polish comes alive with a rainbow of colour from that dense holo finish.

Crown of Thistles was a lovely polish to wear, and for someone that owns a lot of pink and purple shades this one also has managed to be unique in my collection which is quite some feat.  I'm in awe of Adina at A England and her creative polishes.  Each one is truly a piece of art in a bottle.  Application is butter smooth, glossy and flawless.  Pictured here I'm wearing a couple of coats with NE base and Essie GTG, although this polish is easily a one-coater.

A England - Crown of Thistles - artificial light

I love this shade, and I'm looking forward to getting more from this collection.  I particularly fancy Fotheringay and Virgin Queen, so expect to see those at some point in future! In the meantime, UK customers can head over to A England http://a-england.co.uk/ where I picked up my bottle of Crown of Thistles for £9.  They are also currently having a special offer for November on the Gothic collection, with individual shades for £6 or bundled for even less.  With free P&P on all orders it's a bargain for polish of this pedigree.

Spotted : Barry M Glitteratti !

Barry M Glitteratti polishes have arrived! What's even better is that they are currently 3 for 2 in Boots :-) well it seemed rude not too...these look perfect for the party season but I'll definitely be breaking out the peel off base coat for these!

Have you tried any of these yet? What's your favorite? In the bottle I'm loving the purple Fashion Icon. Can't wait to try these out!

A England Promotion! Gothic November, on now...

Hello ladies! Just a quick post to let you know that A England are having another of their legendary promotions with shades for just £6, and special bundles for even lower than that! With free UK P&P it's s steal. 

This promotion is called Gothic November and contains all the Gothic collection shades.  Go to http://a-england.co.uk/14-gothic-november/ for details.

I have one of the Gothic collection polish - Lady of Shallot - which I have worn but haven't swatched yet. TBH I was a bit disappointed with it, it was a blackened shade that to my eye just looked black all the time on the nail. I have a friend with the Jane Eyre shade and she had the same experience. If that's what you like in a blackened polish, that it's more black than the accent shade, then crack on this promo is for you :-) there are also non blackened shades in the offer too...

Nine Realms by Crowstoes : Nidavellir

Hello ladies! Tonight I have the final post from the Crowstoes 9 Realms collection.  Tonight's polish, "Nidavellir", takes its name from the homeworld of the dwarves in Norse Mythology.

Nidavellir by Crowstoes - natural light (shade)

  Like collection-mates Muspelheim and Vanaheim, Nidavellir is a duochrome micro-glitter polish.  Densely packed with colour shifting glitters this shade shifts from teal blue to purple.  Pictured here in natural light (in the shade) you can see all the colours on the nail at once, but in all other lighting conditions one of the three shades will dominate depending on the angle of the nail to the light source.

Nidavellir by Crowstoes - artificial light

 The microglitter duochrome formula is really intriguing in these polishes....they remind me of pointillist paintings, tiny spots of colour coming together to make something beautiful.  In artificial lighting (below) you can see the lovely jewel tones of the blue-indigo-purple shades in transition.  The bottom of the bottle lets you see the full spectrum in the polish, but the gold tone you see peeking through doesn't translate to the nail (nails aren't as curved as the inside of a bottle!)



Nidavellir by Crowstoes - artificial light

In these pics I'm wearing two coats over black undies, with NE base and HK Girl topcoat.  No issues with formula and application, all Crowstoes polishes are top notch in the quality stakes.  Below you can see the final swatches which are taken in direct sunlight.  Here you can see that the main shade is far more of a teal green/blue than the royal blue shade you get under artificial light.  Also, the end tone is much more of a magenta than the purple you get under artificial light. This polish, like its collection mates, is a real chameleon.  I really liked this one.

Nidavellir by Crowstoes - sunlight

I picked up my bottle for £10.25 from Rainbow Connection (link in the suppliers page).   This is my last post in the 9 Realms collection series, I hope you've enjoyed it :) This is a very special collection, and well worth a look if you can find it in stock.

Nine Realms by Crowstoes : Muspelheim

Hello Ladies! Today I have another of the fabulous polishes from the Crowstoes 9 Realms collection - tonight's offering is the lovely (but unpronounceable) "Muspelheim":

In Norse legend Muspelheim is the flaming inferno volcanic home of the fire giants.  I don't know that I would have picked a blue based shade to represent a fire planet, by hey I'm not the creative at work here.  Muspelheim the polish is a multichrome glitter in a blurple base.  It is packed with teeny tiny glitter particles in royal blue and golden yellow that produce a multichrome spectrum from royal blue to purple.  The golden particles don't really show on the nail as clearly as in the bottle (except in the closeup thumb nail shots below).

Pictured here I'm wearing my customary two coats with NE base and HK girl topcoat.  In the swatches at the top of this post you can see Muspelheim in the sunshine - in the shade is the only time you'll see both colours on the nail at once, otherwise the main colour is either the royal blue shade or the blurple. The magenta shade here is really hard to capture because it's not really seen except at really high angles to the light source.

 

In the thumbshots below you can see all the lovely details of this polish.  Unfortunately these details aren't quite so obvious on the nail unless you look quite closely.  I really did like this shade a lot, but it's one of those that's just not quite as fabulous as it promises in the bottle.

I bought my bottle of Muspelheim for £10.25 from Rainbow Connection (link in the Suppliers page). This is a lovely shade, I think I was just a little spoiled by this point because I'd tried collection-mates Huginn and Muninn, and Vanaheim, right before - and those are bonkers good!  I do recommend Muspelheim, especially if like me you're a big fan of purple/blurple shades.

Nail mail : Colors by Llarowe Fall 2014

I just couldn't wait to swatch these before sharing :-) The colors by llarowe Fall collection is out now in the UK (@ rainbow connection) and I was so excited to grab three of the shades (although if I had the money I'd buy them all!). I picked (left to right) Burning Embers, Midnight in Montana and Obsession.  I can't wait to try these out!

Shown here are all the shades in natural and artificial light. My initial thoughts are that Midnight is the clear standout of the bunch. Obsession reminded me of A England Briarwood but a quick side by side comparison shows that Briarwood is much redder. I'll compare these properly when I post swatches.

Nine Realms by Crowstoes : Vanaheim

Hello Ladies :)  Tonight we're continuing with the incredible 9 Realms collection by Crowstoes.  Tonight's offering is a simply astonishing polish - "Vanaheim".  In Norse Mythology, Vanaheim is the home of the Vanir, an ancient breed of sorcerer gods.  I don't know much about that, but I think there might be some sorcery involved in the making of this polish...

Vanaheim by Crowstoes  - artificial light

Vanaheim is a glittering fusion of emerald, gold, bronze, and tiny flecks of sky blue.  I'm at a bit of a loss to describe the finish of this one - its predominantly made up of tiny foil glitter particles, suspended in an emerald base, and this makes it a duochrome.  In some swatches here (like the above), you can see this clearly coming across as a deep metallic shimmer, and in others the foil glitter finish is dominant.  However you choose to describe it the effect is simply stunning and this is one of my favourite polishes of the whole year.  For me, this polish was like the skin of a magnificent dragon, the green and gold combined with the iridescent glitter would be perfect as dragon skin.   

Dragon skin

In these swatches I'm wearing two coats over my usual NE base and beneath a generous layer of HK Girl topcoat.  The finish was totally smooth, no bumpy lumps on this dragon.  Application, formula and wear time were also all top notch as you'd expect from Crowstoes.



Vanaheim by Crowstoes - 9 Realms - artificial light

In these swatches (above) you can see the deep emerald shade that dominates in direct lighting (top), and the burnished olive gold (bottom) that appears in side-on lighting conditions.  I really love this antique gold shade, I find that a lot more interesting than a straight gold shade and it works beautifully in transition with the emerald.

Vanaheim by Crowstoes - 9 Realms - natural light

The swatches above and below here show this shade in natural light, which is quite different and equally lovely.  The green is a bright jewel tone that really pops on the nail, and the gold is a much deeper bronze.  This was one of those polishes that I just couldn't keep my eyes off, and I was really sorry to remove.  Usually when I try a new shade I stop noticing it so much after a few days and I'm excited to try the next shade in my untried pile.   But with Vanaheim I could have quite happily gone straight back to it.

Vanaheim by Crowstoes - natural light

I seem to say quite often on here that I'm not really a green person, and it is one of the least represented colours in my stash, but all the greens I post about I then say I really like.  I still don't think I'm a green person, but I think I like the right kind of green, and Vanaheim certainly fits the bill.

I bought my bottle for £10.25 from Rainbow Connection (link in the suppliers page) and I'm really glad I did.  This was my 'wildcard' polish to make my total high enough to qualify for the cheap postage rate and it ended up being my favourite of the bunch.  Vanaheim and Huginn and Muninn would be my two top picks for the collection.