Sparkle Saturday Meets 11 Week Mani Challenge

Hello Lab Partners,

This is week four of the 11-week mani challenge. The prompt for the week: a zebra or other striped mani OR a mani with the colors of your favorite sports team or alma mater. Before checking to see what the theme of the week was, I had already decided I wanted to do a mani with ring and thumb as accent fingers, which seemed to fit perfectly when I saw the prompt. Initially, I wanted to go with the colors of the Orlando Magic, but the thought was too depressing given the current state of NBA affairs. Instead, I went with the black and gold of my alma mater, the University of Central Florida. Simple enough: black on most fingers, with gold on the ring fingers and thumbs. As I was selecting a gold polish, my eyes landed on my brand new Color Club Gingerbread from the Beyond the Mistletoe collection. A-ha! The perfect opportunity to try this holographic gold glitter! On all fingers, I applied two coats of Zoya Raven. On the thumbs and ring fingers, I added two coats of Gingerbread:

Inside, artificial light

Inside, with flash

Inside, with flash

I took a couple of flash photos to show how the holo glitter lights up when it's hit by direct light.















In case you're wondering how difficult this glitter was to remove . . . I used the foil method on it and had no problem!


Until next time, sending lab love your way!

Allison

Sparkle Saturday: Cult Nails Living Water

Happy Saturday, Lab Partners!

I hope you're having a great weekend. Personally, I'm still on a Cult Nails high, following my recent acquisition of Unicorn Puke, so I wanted to show you some more glitter awesomeness from Cult Nails: Living Water. This polish is a dark blue jelly, with blue and green glitter. I wish the photos captured the glitter better--you wouldn't believe how it seems to glow when light hits it!

Cult Nails Living Water. Outside, natural light.

Living Water. Inside, artificial light (Sorry about the lights reflecting off the polish!)

This polish applies like a dream! In fact, the notes I scribbled on an index card just after applying Living Water say, "OMG. I'm dying here!" I would have been fine with only one coat, but I applied two for good measure.

Blurred a bit to help capture the glitter.

Living Water is easily one of my top ten favorite polishes. Naturally, it was a bit  difficult to remove, but that's par for the course with a glitter polish. Believe me, this one is definitely worth it!











So what do you think of Living Water?

Till next time, sending you lab love!

Allison

Sparkle Saturday: Carnival Vert

Hello Lab Partners!

Welcome to another Sparkle Saturday! For this mani, I started with a base of RGB Vert:

RGB Vert.

I adore RGB polishes, and I was a little surprised that this one was somewhat streaky on the first coat. Most RGBs that I've used have been entirely streak-free and opaque, or nearly so, in one coat. But with two coats, Vert was gorgeous. I don't normally associate green with vampy, but this one definitely falls in that category. I'm absolutely in love with this polish. It's a perfect fall and winter color--earthy, yet moody. And it dries to a gorgeous glossy finish. Here it is without top coat:

RGB Vert, Two coats, no top coat. Inside, artificial light.

NYX Girls Carnival

  As much as I adore Vert on its own, this is Sparkle Saturday, so it was time to break out some glitter! I used NYX Girls Carnival, which is very similar to Deborah Lippman Happy Birthday. It's filled with multi-color, multi-sized round glitter suspended in a clear base. Carnival is true to its name--it's just plain FUN! It's even fun on the brush!

I had intended to apply only one coat of glitter, but once I got started, I was enjoying Carnival so much, I ended up applying two blingy coats, which entirely transformed the look of Vert. With glitter, the dark green of Vert appears even darker, like a black-green. And the mood is transformed from soulful to lighthearted. What a nice way to mix it up!

Two coats NYX Girls Carnival over two coats RGB Vert. Inside, artificial light.

A still shot really doesn't do this glitter justice, so I made a little video clip to show you how it sparkles (and honestly, even the video doesn't do it justice!):

So what do you think of this combo?

Until next time, sending you lab love!

Allison

Sparkle Saturday: Gilded Braziliant

Hello Lab Partners!

It's officially Octber; we're now ten days into fall. Would someone please fill the Florida weather pattern in on that fact? I want to break out my smoky greys, my olive greens, and my blackened teals. But I just feel wrong wearing those colors when I'm buzzing around the city sporting short shorts, a tank top, and flip flops. Oh, and lots and lots of sunscreen. So what's a girl to do? Hello, orange polish! The perfect summer to fall transitional color, where all the blazing brightness of a great summer polish meets the warm earthiness of a great fall polish. Of course, I really don't need any excuse to wear orange polish, as it happens to be one of my personal favorites. And, as you may recall from Thursday's post on Butter London's Yummy Mummy, I was ready for something bright and blingy. So here it is, Essie's Braziliant layered with NYX Gilded Glitter:

Essie Brazilliant with NYX Gilded Glitter. Inside. Artificial light, no flash

Essie Brazilliant with NYX Gilded Glitter. Outside, natural light.

I started with two coats of Essie's Braziliant. Over the summer, I bought several colors from the Braziliant collection, and I've been pleased with each of them. This one was no exception. The brush provided good control, and I achieved opacity with two streak-free coats. This polish is a lovely orange leaning ever so slightly toward apricot. It has a subtle shimmer, which lends this color a luminosity and makes it slightly more complex than I would have expected.

But this is Sparkle Saturday, so I couldn't stop with all the brilliance that is Braziliant! I added two layers of NYX Gilded Glitter, a chunky glitter top coat:

NYX Gilded Glitter

 What's the best thing about Gilded Glitter? It's actually easy to remove! That's right; you heard me correctly--it's easy to remove. Now that this little piece of info has settled in, allow me to add that I also found it very slow to dry, even with a quick-dry top coat like Out the Door or Poshe (and yes, I tried both). Now, perhaps I just happened to get some funky, slow-drying batch. But assuming that my bottle is typical, this glitter polish comes with a trade-off: ease of removal at the expense of quickness of drying. Further research is needed to determine whether a different quick-dry top coat, such as Seche Vite, would alter the results.

That's all for today, lab partners. Until next time, sending you lab love!

Allison