Bitches Brew

Today's NOTD is "Bitches Brew" by Deborah Lippmann, an awesome dupe of the now HTF Chanel Malice.  I love the name of this, it might not be Ocalways in a Halloween kind of mood (just ask the zombie in my garden....he's plastic but that's not the point).  I already own Malice, but for £5 this seemed like a great backup (as part of a 3 for £15 TK Maxx win)


Deborah Lippmann "Bitches Brew" - Sunlight

Shown here I'm wearing Nail Envy base, two coats of colour, and topped of with a single coat of Seche.   This was my first experience of Deborah Lippmann polish, and bearing in mind the RRP of £15 I'm not hugely impressed.  The shade is awesome, but I found the formula a bit on the streaky side.  I'm also not a fan of the brush, the shape of the bottle (which I think is pretty cool actually) means that the brush is really short.  It's also very narrow, with tight bristles, so although it applies the polish smoothly I find it really hard to cover the whole nail in just 3 swipes (which might have added to the streaky impression).  Wear time hasn't been the best either, I had visible tip wear after just a day.  No chips as yet (day 4) but definitely not anywhere near as hardwearing as the Chanel, or even a number of brands with cheaper price points like OPI or Leighton Denny.

For £5, and as a really credible Chanel dupe, this polish is a big win.  But if your only option was to pay the RRP, then it's not such a good deal.

Update: I just removed this and it stains like crazy! It looks like I've done a murder! Sheesh.

Bargains and Nail News


Hello again mani-maniacs.  Exciting news for UK based NP addicts like me - TK Maxx has stepped up in the awesomeness stakes - they now stock Deborah Lippmann polishes! I picked up a pack of 3 for £15. FIFTEEN QUID!  That's literally 3 for the price of 1.  In my pack I got "Bitches Brew" (a Chanel "Malice" dupe, comparison here), "Don't Tell Mama" (a sumptuous emerald/jade shimmer, apparently similar to Illamasqua "Veridian" which I've been lemming for ages), and "Wicked Game" (a silver/green/pink duochrome similar but not a dupe for this season's hot shade - Essie "The Twill of It" and OPI "Peace Love and OPI", comparison here).  Swatches to follow in due course.  This is the first time I've seen Lippmann polishes for sale anywhere else except House of Fraser/Jenners so fingers crossed we'll be seeing more of these in TK Maxx.




Deborah Lippmann polishes are now at TK Maxx

Also spotted at TK Maxx were pack of 5 Essie polishes for £10.  That's just redonkulous compared to the £8 pricetag for a single polish in Boots.  Sadly the sets they had all contained polishes I already own, and I'm crazy but I'm not that crazy.

There was also a lot of Color Club and Barielle shades.  The Color Club offering included the current season (Fall) Girl About Town polishes, £4.  I picked up the duo below of "The Uptown" and "Williamsburg".



Color Club Fall 2013 - Williamsburg (left) and The Uptown (right)

"The Uptown" is a gorgeous indigo-based flakie polish that certainly looks similar in bottle to Layla Ceramic effect 52 (which is a dupe for Nfu Oh 51), so expect comparison swatches of these at some point.

On the topic of flakies, the Barry M flakie "Crystal Ball" will be released this week (review here). It will be released in Superdrug on the 25th of September, and in Boots from October 2nd and is set to retail for a bargain-a-licious £3.99.

Finally, I'm super excited about the upcoming launch of Rainbow Connection UK. This is a new UK-based online nail shop that starts trading at 8pm tonight (22/09/13) and will be selling indie polishes that were previously unavailable in the UK without paying mental P&P charges.  On launch there will be polishes from Liquid Sky Lacquers, Cadillacquer, Crows Toes and pre-orders for KPT polish. As if that all wasn't exciting enough there's a 10% off opening offer on all orders, just use the code OPEN until 6th October.  I can't wait! Keeping my fingers and toes crossed that I can snap up a couple of Crows Toes polishes that I've been lusting after from afar....

So that's it ladies.  This week's top tip is to shimmy on down to TK Maxx if you have one - certainly the Edinburgh stores have just had big stock-drops of bargain polish and these things never last!

 Disclaimer: I am in no way affiliated to any of the stores or blogs that I post links to or mention.