Deborah Lippmann Mermaid's Dream

Hi guys! Did you have a good weekend? I went to the ice hockey with some friends last night. In my opinion it's not a good game unless there's a fight, and there was the FUNNIEST FIGHT EVER yesterday. A player from each time got pissed off with the other and were both sent to the sin bin. As soon as they were released they threw their hockey sticks to the ground, then their helmets, then their gloves. They stared at each other for a while sizing their opponent up, circled a bit, and finally went for each other. The players and referees just stood there and watched. The whole thing was hilarious/ridiculous.

I managed to cross something off my wishlist recently - it was actually number one on my wishlist! Between March and August I was working seven days a week between my regular job and my internship. It was pretty tiring but my internship is over now (I wanted to do it to improve my CV), so as a treat to myself for all my hard work, I bought Deborah Lippmann Mermaid's Dream on eBay.

Mermaid's Dream has quickly become one of DL's best-known polishes, and it's easy to see why. Its seafoam base with microglitter and larger blue glitter is pretty unique - and simply, well, pretty. There's nothing worse (slight exaggeration...) than getting a nail polish you've wanted for ages and finding out it's not worth the hype, but Mermaid's Dream doesn't disappoint. I think it's actually one of my favourite polishes now. The colour is stunning, and it has a great formula - this is two coats.

SO PRETTY. And it reminds me of this, which makes it even better:

Illamasqua Muse Blinged Up

OK, I promise I have some more non-blue nail posts coming up, but in the mean time here's one that's not exactly blue. Illamasqua Muse is a bright teal creme that is opaque in two coats. As with all Illamasqua polishes I've tried, it goes on easily and effortlessly. I topped it with one coat of Lilacquer Selkie (you can see swatches of it over black here), a duchrome top coat with a blue/green shimmer, and finally a line of square studs down my ring finger.

Unfortunately my top coat bubbled horribly when I put it over the studs. Boo.

I only have ten days until I go to Spain! Not that I'm counting or anything... Being the insanely organised person I am, I'm already compiling a list of all the places I want to visit while I'm there. I'm going to Seville and Madrid, so if anyone has any suggestions of what I should see, please let me know! :)

OPI Glacier Bay Blues

OPI Glacier Bay Blues has been on my wishlist for a while, but as it's hard to find these days it was one of those nail polishes that I thought would stay just that - a wish. Then, a few weeks ago, a friend from my internship came in with a couple of nail polishes that she'd got from her mum and didn't want any more. One of them was an OPI polish that looked like it had barely been used, so when she asked if I wanted it I said yes immediately. The label on the bottom was missing but I thought it looked kind of familiar, so I did some Googling...and realised I had got my hands on a bottle of Glacier Bay Blues! I love weird coincidences like that.

Glacier Bay Blues originally came out in 2004 and I can tell my bottle is from then because it smells absolutely horrendous - definitely pre-3-free. It's a shimmery blue/teal/green duochrome with a bit of purple at extreme angles, but it was elusive on camera. It's really pretty and I don't know why OPI don't release more like it.

I love it! The smell might put me off wearing it too often though...

Do you have any HTF nail polishes that you got through a stroke of luck?

Orly Rococo A Go-Go

Now that it's September and autumn is approaching I'm slowly transitioning to wearing darker colours on my nails. A perfect autumnal colour is Orly Rococo A Go-Go, which has a red-toned purple base with flashes of gold, red and orange. It's the love child of a glass-fleck and a duochrome polish. It's quite pigmented and was opaque in two coats.

Yikes, my hands look so pale in these photos. I swear I'm not so ghostly-looking in real life!

Nails Inc Garrick Street

Hello! Is everyone having a good weekend? I was at my internship today, but last night I saw the Olympic torch again, this time as it passed through Guildford. The weather was surprisingly nice and my friends and I went for a lovely meal afterwards, so I was very happy. :)

I've been showing quite a few Nails Inc swatches recently, mostly because I have so many of their polishes and I haven't actually worn half of them before! Hopefully I'll catch up eventually and have swatched them all. Today's Nails Inc is one I bought on eBay recently at the same time as Regent's Park Road. Garrick Street is a blue/purple duochrome, which shows best in the final photo:

I have a bit of a love/hate relationship with chrome finish polishes. Some of them just don't agree with me. Sadly, this was one of them. It's such a gorgeous nail polish and my photos really don't do it justice, but it was such a faff to apply. It took quite a while to dry, too, hence the dent in my index finger. Boo.

Deborah Lippmann Wicked Game

Deborah Lippmann polishes aren't widely available in the UK and they're pretty pricey. Until recently, the only polish I had from this brand was Razzle Dazzle, which came in a GlossyBox last year. However, I saw some nice swatches of Wicked Game online recently and it looked like my sort of colour, so I took the plunge and bought it. At £14, it now has the distinction of being the most I have ever paid for one bottle of nail polish!

Wicked Game is a purple/green/grey duochrome that is often described as looking like an oil slick. Application wasn't great. It dries to a chrome finish so it shows every imperfection. It also bubbled like crazy. Sad. Anyway, photo time:

Despite the application issues, I like it. It has a very strong duochrome effect, and I love the colours it shifts to (even the green!). There are various similar, if not identical, polishes out there though - so if you're not willing to splurge on this brand, I believe Wet n Wild Anatomy, Essence Where's the Party?, OPI Not Like the Movies and Nubar Purple Beach are all quite close.

W7 Metallic Jupiter

Sometimes you come across a nail polish that just looks so much cooler in the bottle than it does on the nail. I hate to say it, but I think W7 Metallic Jupiter is one of those polishes. I picked it up in a set of three W7 colours from TK Maxx for some ridiculously cheap price, lured in by the rainbow in the bottle:

On the nail, the red/gold disappears and you're left with what is essentially a blackened purple/blue duochrome. It's really pretty, and it makes a nice change from all the pastels and neons I've been wearing recently. But I hate that it held so much more promise in the bottle!

If you are less picky than me and love a good duochrome, W7 Metallic Jupiter is priced at £1.95 to buy online - what a bargain!

Topshop Hypnotic

I realised the other day that I've been wearing a ridiculous amount of blues and purples on my nails recently, so here's something a bit different. Topshop Hypnotic is a silver frost with a pink duochrome shimmer. The pink is a bit camera shy; it's much more obvious in the shade than in the sun. It is a very pretty polish though - it's a nice change from your average silver frost.

In my opinion, Topshop nail polishes are really underrated. I hardly ever find them mentioned on other blogs, which is a shame as they have interesting colours and a fantastic formula. Hypnotic is no exception. It applied perfectly and built up well - this is three coats. I believe it's part of a collection of four polishes called Sisters of the New Moon, priced at £6.50 each.

Comparison: Nubar Innocent Whispers & OPI Give Me the Moon

Last month I showed you Nubar Innocent Whispers, a pretty grey/pink duochrome. I mentioned that it reminded me a bit of OPI Give Me the Moon, so here is the proper comparison between them!

In the bottle, these two polishes are clearly very different. The Nubar looks lilac with a blue shimmer, while the OPI just looks...grey. But as we all know, what a polish looks like in the bottle very often doesn't translate onto the nails, so here's what they look like on me:

From left to right:
Nubar Innocent Whispers (two coats)
OPI Give Me the Moon (two coats)
Nubar Innocent Whispers (four coats)
OPI Give Me the Moon (four coats)

Hmmm, they're still not as similar as I thought they'd be! The Nubar is much pinker - and sheerer. The OPI is paler and more opaque, and it doesn't shift colour the way Innocent Whispers does. What is similar, however, is the blue shimmer apparent in both these colours. Oh well, at least we know now that they're not even remotely dupes!

P.S. Apologies for the horrendous state of my hands! The freakily warm weather in March has played havoc with my skin, and even my beloved E45 cream has been powerless against it.

Models Own Beetlejuice Spring/Summer 2012 - Summary

In the previous three posts I've reviewed the new colours from the Models Own Beetlejuice Collection Spring/Summer 2012. I thought it might be helpful to put all three together in one post, so here they are again (this time with minimal commentary).

Copper Pot

A copper/bronze duochrome. Three coats. Not my cup of tea.

Tropical Sun

A pink/peach duochrome. Three coats. Me likey.

Indian Ocean

A blue/pink duochrome. Extremely sheer; this is five coats. My favourite of the three by far!

To be honest, I'm a bit underwhelmed by the new collection overall. The promo pictures looked incredible, but I should have known they wouldn't be reliable - we've been burned before. They're nice colours, just not quite as cool as the promo pics made them look. I don't think much of Copper Pot, especially as a duochrome, but I like Island Sun and I really like Indian Ocean. The formula is much improved on last autumn's collection, and for a fiver they're pretty good value for money. I'm not going to tell you to run to the shops and buy them immediately...more to go there at a leisurely stroll if you like the look of any of them.

Models Own Beetlejuice S/S 2012: Indian Ocean

Here is the final polish from the new Models Own Beetlejuice Collection, Indian Ocean. According to the press release it's an "iridescent blue with soft pink undertones", which is bang on the money. It's basically a pale blue with a pink shimmer running through it. As the name suggests, it reminds me of a tropical ocean with a pink sunset reflecting in the water.

Before I show you the photos I have a warning about this polish, dear readers: it was incredibly sheer. If you wear it I highly recommend you layer it over a complementary blue. I knew just from looking at the bottle that it was going to be sheer, but I decided to wear it on its own to better show you what it looks like au naturel. I was determined to see if I could get it opaque, but I gave up at five - yes, five! - coats. Anyway, onto the pictures:

The final photo was taken indoors, and it really illustrates just how pink Indian Ocean looks in some lights. Despite how sheer this polish is, it's definitely my favourite of the collection. It has the strongest duochrome effect of the three, for one thing, and for another - well, you probably know by now how I feel about blue polishes!

Models Own Beetlejuice S/S 2012: Tropical Sun

Here's the second of the new Models Own Beetlejuice Collection, Tropical Sun. The PR release describes it as a "glistening sunset", and this is pretty much accurate! While it's not as orange as the promo pictures would have you believe, it does still resemble a glorious tropical sunset. In the bottle it looks very peachy (in fact, when I first unwrapped it I initially thought they had sent me Golden Peach, another Models Own shade, by mistake!), but on the nail it takes on more of a salmon pink colour that shifts to a glowing peach. It also has sparse, itty bitty silver glitter in it. It was incredibly sheer. I did three thick coats on my nails but it could have done with a fourth - although the VNL was more obvious in real life than in my photos.

I also took a couple of photos indoors, which really brings out the peach colour:

Hmmm, I don't have an awful lot more to say about this polish, except that I rather like it. Definitely more than I like Tropical Sun, anyway. I think it's because it genuinely does look like a sunset. It's pretty cool.