Nails Inc 4 Piece A Listers Nude Collection

Greek/ Ελληνικά

I was craving this set since I saw swatches of Covent Garden Ballet a few month ago and I got it at the asos sale for £15.50. What a bargain! Getting four great polishes for little over the price of one! 

First, it's Covent Garden Ballet shot through with a delicate grey with pink-bronze shimmer. It's adorable, what more can I say! We need more delicate beauties like this. 

Next is Ledbury Road, a metallic taupe colour that looks like two of my favourite eye shadows.

In the bottle it looked a lot like my Shu Uemura ME 860 (2nd generation) ...

...while on the nail it looks more like Shu Uemura Ir 850 (2nd generation). I love them both of course so I can't help liking the polish that gives me the rather odd opportunity to match my nails to my eyeshadow. 

Lower Sloane Street is a soft caramel nude cream. It's pretty, it's easy to wear and work appropriate. A nice basic colour.

And lastly there's Mayfair, a pearlescent off-white. Even though I'm not a huge fan of white, I like this one because it's not stark. It's a little bit muted to be stark and in spite of the pearlesence, there's not issues with brush strokes. The only problem I had with this was that it's a bit goopy, not goopy enough to complain though!

Comparison: Dark Blues and Dark Greens

Greek/ Ελληνικά

This is one of the oldest comparisons I haven't published since the pictures were taken back in April so excuse the dry cuticles and not very smooth application. I wanted to get Mavala - 251 Cedar Green and Mavala - 247 Mosaic Blue for some time and when I finally got them, I discovered they were exact dupes of colours I already owned, O.P.I. - Here Today...Aragon Tomorrow and Ciaté - 3 am. Girl respectively. All four polishes are great and there's really minimal differences between them.

Mavala - 251 Cedar Green and O.P.I. - Here Today...Aragon Tomorrow are very dark greens. Both require 3 coats for full opacity, though they always retain a certain jelly-ness. Both have a small amount of shimmer in that is barely noticeable in the bottle, but keeps the polish from looking too flat on the nail. The only difference I noticed was that when used for stamping, Cedar Green's pigmentation was smoother.  

Mavala - 247 Mosaic Blue and Ciaté - 3 am. Girl are midnight blues, both require 3 coats for full coverage and, like the previous couple, they have a certain jellyness to them without being true jellies. Mosaic Blue has a bit of the shimmer like the other two, whilst 3am.Girl doesn't. Again the only marked difference was when I used them for stamping where Mosaic Blue is a little bit darker. 

artificial light

with flash

stamping (natural light)

Greek Stories I: Seventeen - 533

Greek/ Ελληνικά

As I mentioned previously, I am currently in Greece. I hadn't been in a beauty supply store in Greece in ages and when I did, I was taken aback by the amount of nail polish and brands available. I try to hold myself back and not buy everything I like and I regret not having taken my polish sample wheels with me to make sure I don't get any exact dupes as too often I find myself gravitating towards the same colours and the even the same hues.

Here is the first one I want to show you by a brand called Seventeen - no relation to the UK brand 17. As soon as I saw this deep glowing orange (at the lowest shelf no less!) I knew I had to have it. It's only the second orange polish I own, but it has become a firm favourite. It's so warm and beautiful it almost soothes me when I look at it. 

I know there is a similar orange by OPI in their Germany collection called Deutsch You Want Me Baby?, but I don't think they are dupes. I haven't had a chance to compare them side by side, but from what I've seen 533 is more vibrant and less red than DYWMB. It also stamps well as it is very pigmented, a very well behaved polish that took two coats for complete coverage with no brush stroke issues at all. What I did notice with Seventeen polishes in general is that they take a while to dry, but with a quick drying top coat it's all good. All in all, I love this autumnal beauty very much.

Let me know what you think of my pretty find!

X

Stargazer 132: the Decadent Beauty

Greek/ Ελληνικά

I haven't started a post with music in a while so here's some good ol'American Punk. Punk was never as big in the USA as it was in the UK, but Ain't it fun by the Dead Boys must be one of the best songs of the genre. 

Is the polish I have for you today punk-appropriate? I think it is. There's something unusual about Stargazer's 132; this decadent beauty is much more complicated than it looks in the bottle. Ιt is one of those indiscribable colours that seem to change a lot depending on the light and colours around it. It's a little bit metallic grey, a bit pale golden, it leans towards green, sometimes it looks delicare and others it takes on a rather industrial roughness. Stamping over it is always a pleasure as the results vary a lot depending on the colours you use. 

It's a sheer polish as it takes 3 good coats to reach full opacity (4 if you do thin layers) and come to think of it, I should try it over black. I am almost certain the results will be interesting!

This polish is definitely worth more of your attention!

direct sunlight

sunshine(shade)

artificial light

sunshine (shade)

sunshine (shade) angle 1

sunshine (shade) angle 2

artificial light

Tangerine, flowers, fun and a personal challenge!

Greek/ Ελληνικά

It's been such a crazy time! A million things happened at once which is why I've been absent for so long. I am currently not in the UK, but in Greece visiting my family and checking out all the amazing new cosmetic products that have become available since I was here last. I know we are in the middle of a recession, but the Greek cosmetic companies seem to be blooming and I am so glad. You will be reading more on this as I review the products, before that though there's some things I need to get done.

Over the course of this year I've left so many manicures, comparisons and reviews unpublished. Additionally, my skills in doing my nails have developed quite a bit since I first started and anything I don't publish within a a month looks so bad to me after a while that I don't want to publish it. I've set myself a challenge: to publish all the neglected drafts I have by the time this blog turns 1 in a few days. It's a difficult challenge given that I blog in two languages (twice the fun!) and have very little time to do it at the minute, but difficulties make a challenge more interesting. Here it goes then!

Tangerine is such a fun colour! I'm glad it was this summer's colour. It's one of the very few shades of orange I like on me. This is a manicure I did a while ago using the polish I had mixed as a base, Miss Sporty - 455 for stamping and plates Dkr-b (floral deign) & Bundle Monster bm 201(stripes).