Nails Inc. Franklin's Row — Swatches & Review

Nails Inc. Franklin's Row is another polish I got while I was in NYC earlier this month. This is my first Nails Inc. polish, and I took forever picking out which color polish I would try first. I picked this shimmery pink/purple/blue duochrome because it really stands out from the other colors in the display. It looks so gorgeous in the bottle that even though I know full well that I hardly ever actually wear anything besides cremes, I found myself bringing it up the register.

I like the Nail's Inc brush. I found it had just the right fullness and flexibility for easy polish application. I did three coats, but I probably only needed two.

I bought this polish at the Sephora on 5th Ave between East 48th and 49th, which is just a block from Rockefeller Center. (Yes, I was indulging in typical tourist activities! Luckily it wasn't horribly crowded that afternoon.) If you're ever in the neighborhood, I recommend going shopping in this location. This was the Charles Scribner's Sons building and it's just gorgeous. Because it was designated as a landmark, the building is preserved outside and inside. The interior has a vaulted ceiling with fancy moldings and all sorts of other pretty details. If you're like me and you have a thing for interesting architecture, you'll enjoy seeing this place. Besides, it's full of so many makeup goodies. There's even a display completely dedicated to nail polish from various brands.

You can click either of these pictures for an enlarged version. Here's the plaque on the outside of the building which explains some of its history and architectural style.

Sephora has Nails Inc. in a lot of their stores, and also on their website for $9.50. Next time I'm going to pick out a creme. Anyone have a favorite?

China Glaze Prize Winning Mare

Here's a polish from China Glaze's Fall 2008 Rodeo Diva collection. Prize Winning Mare is a rich gold with a strong hint of brown.  It's got complex, multicolored shimmer.

China Glaze Prize Winning Mare

China Glaze Prize Winning Mare

I used two coats and application was fairly easy. This collection came out around when companies had just switched over to the new B3Free formulas, and it has a little of that odd runny/thick texture, but it's easy to overcome those issues with a little extra attention and care.

Vintage Maybelline for Pink Wednesday!

Happy Pink Wednesday, everyone! This week's pink is an old Maybelline Express Finish polish from sometime around 2002 or 2003. It's called Tutu Tango, and from what I vaguely remember it was part of a seasonal display. This is a baby pink with lots of gold shimmer, so it becomes a very peachy pink. This is certainly the type of color a tutu might come in.

I applied two thin coats and a third thicker coat. This is an old formula polish, so it was smooth and dried quickly. The brush is really nice; it's flat but not mop-like, very similar to the L'Oréal brush.

How To Do A Simple Glitter Gradient Manicure — No Sponges Necessary!

Lately I've really gotten into browsing Pinterest. It's a cool way to discover beautiful, interesting things. There are plenty of fellow nail fanatics on there, and I'm having fun finding them and following their pin boards. This manicure was inspired by all the glittery manicures people have been pinning up on Pinterest.

This is a manicure that looks fancy but is super easy to do:

 — Paint the base color. (After your base coat, of course!)
Use any color you like. I painted my nails with four coats of OPI I'll Take The Cake. It's a sheer pink with very fine multicolor shimmer. Four coats seems like a lot, but this polish goes on so smoothly it was no trouble.

— Let it dry.
It doesn't need to be completely dry, just let it dry for a few minutes. You want the base color to stay in place without wrinkling when you add the glitter.

— Add the glitter.
Use any color glitter polish you like. I used Wet n Wild The Gold & The Beautiful. It's glitter in a clear base, which made it perfect for this technique.
- dab a small to medium drop of glitter at the base of the nail.
- wipe the rest of the polish off the brush and back into the bottle.
- lightly drag the drop of glitter outward in small, short strokes.
- fade the glitter by making short strokes starting partway up your nail. This will drag some glitter particles to the middle of your nail, but will not catch too many by taking glitter from the densest part at the base of the nail.

— Finish the manicure.
All you need now is a quick drying topcoat and some cuticle oil!

Here's what I'll Take The Cake looks like on its own, for good measure:

I hope my instructions made sense. Tell me if anything needs clarifying! What color combinations would you try? I want to try taupe with silver glitter, but I have to buy some silver glitter polish first!

OPI Midnight In Moscow

One of my favorite super dramatic vampy nail polishes is OPI Midnight In Moscow. This is another one from the Russian Collection that came out in Fall 2007. It's a deep charcoal with red shimmer. In low lighting it's velvety and almost black, but in the sun it has this glowing, smoldering look.

The formula is great, it's neither thick nor runny. I needed just two coats for opacity. These pictures are without topcoat, and you can see even on its own the polish is quite glossy.

Zoya Nidhi

My manicure today is Zoya Nidhi from the Sparkle Collection. It's a bright, apple-y red with gold and pink/blue iridescent sparkling flecks. A number of people noticed and complimented me on this color, so it's bright and sparkly enough to catch some attention.

Application is quick and easy. It needs just two coats for opacity, and each coat went on perfectly and dried rapidly. I know sometimes people have trouble with Zoya polishes drying super slowly, but I don't think this is one that will give anyone problems. Even though this came out as part of a summer collection, I think it's a very festive and Holiday appropriate red. In fact, I may try combining it with Zoya Ivanka (the sparkling green from the same collection) a little later in the season.

Chanel Strong — SoHo Story 2010

I admit, I bought this polish for the name. I couldn't help it! And it seems only appropriate to feature it on this blog. Chanel Strong came out last fall when the SoHo boutique had just been remodeled. This was part of a special makeup collection that tied into that store. I've been to that particular boutique a couple of times (most recently to buy Blue Rebel) and each time I have received excellent customer service. Sometimes high end designer boutiques can be intimidating, but the SoHo Chanel is completely delightful. The clerks are very friendly and nobody looked at me funny for clomping in there wearing my tennis shoes and band t-shirt. So if you're in lower Manhattan and you're in the mood for some Chanel, don't hesitate to stop by the corner of Spring and Wooster.

The polish looks more exciting in the bottle than on the nail. In most lighting conditions it appears almost black. But if you look closely, you can detect the plummy shimmer. To me it has a very velvety appearance, even if it is very dark. The application is a dream. It's nearly perfect in one coat, but I prefer to do two thin coats. The formula is thick but not hard to work with. The viscosity makes it incredibly easy to control where the polish goes, and avoid the cuticles.

Zoya Cheryl with Art Deco inspired nail art

The rich brown sparkle of Zoya Cheryl makes me think of elegant dark wood furniture in Art Deco styles. That's what inspired this experiment in nail art, which is not particularly good but why not show it to you anyway? I used a striping brush and Cover Girl Bronze Beauty.

And here is each polish on its own:

Zoya Cheryl is another one of Zoya's gorgeous glass-fleck sparkles. It takes two coats for opacity and applies easily. Cover Girl Bronze Beauty is also opaque in two coats, and gives no trouble with application. It's a sort of pale gold with coppery bronze flecks which give the shade complexity.

Zoya Sarah

In my opinion, Zoya makes the best shimmer/sparkle finish nail polishes available. I normally prefer creme finish to the average shimmer, but Zoya's shimmer is special. All the little flecks give the finish an extra depth and complexity that most shimmer doesn't have. Zoya Sarah has this type of fantastic shimmer:

This red seems to simultaneously lean warm and cool, although more cool. The formula was easy to apply and totally opaque in two coats. Sarah is available for $8 at Zoya's website. You can get free shipping with the code SHIP2ME through 10/26!

Nubar Faded Jeans VS OPI What's With The Cattitude?

I am so done with being sick; I really miss blogging! Tonight I had enough energy to swatch Nubar Faded Jeans and compare it to OPI What's With The Cattitude? First here's Nubar Faded Jeans on its own:

Faded Jeans is a pretty pastel blue with a very subtle pearly shimmer. It's perfect in three coats, and though it's a pastel the application is quite smooth and easy. They did a very nice job on the formula. This is the Nubar Jeans version of Chanel Coco Blue, but unfortunately I don't have that one to compare it to. I can, however, compare it to OPI What's With The Cattitude?, a pale blue creme.

Index & ring: Nubar Faded Jeans. Middle and pinky: OPI What's With The Cattitude?

The most obvious difference is that Cattitude is a creme without the subtle shimmer that Faded Jeans has. Cattitude is also just half a shade lighter. It also requires three coats and is pleasantly easy to apply for a pastel.

Pink Wednesday: Zoya Gilda

It's still Wednesday, right? I still have time to get in on this week's Pink Wednesday!

This is Zoya Gilda, from the gorgeous Sparkle collection. It's an awesome bright pink, full of glass fleck sparkles. After three coats there's still a little visible nail line, but the color and the sparkle easily distract from it.

Isn't that sparkle just beautiful?

Pink Wednesday — OPI Aphrodite's Pink Nightie

Here's another classic OPI shade for Pink Wednesday: Aphrodite's Pink Nightie. It's a cool toned pink shimmer. It's leaning toward the frosty end, and it can be a little tricky to apply with the brush strokes. They're not too bad, though. They look more obvious in pictures than they do in real life. I believe this swatch was three thin coats, though I could've gotten away with just two.

Finally, I just want to say thank you to everyone for reading, following and commenting! In the past month I have been discovering so many great nail blogs and meeting so many lovely people. The community of nail bloggers has been so welcoming. I'm having a lot of fun on our little corner of the internet! =)

Nostalgia — Sally Hansen The Good Earth

Remember the old line of Sally Hansen Salon polishes? In the spring and the fall they would come out with six colors inspired by that season's fashions. They came in these great square bottles with a rubberized cap. For some reason, I just really love the way these old square bottles look. I know I bought colors that I might not have been interested in otherwise, simply because I think polish looks so good in this kind of bottle. There's plenty of colors in the new line that I like, but I never wind up getting them because the bottles are so ugly.

The Good Earth was from the Fall 2008 collaboration with designer Tracy Reese. There were so many good colors in that collection, now I wish I'd gotten all of them. It's a rich, dark, chocolate brown with very subtle gold shimmer.

The formula is lovely. I did three coats, but you could certainly get away with just two. The brush is a traditional round brush, and much easier to use than the gigantic mops of the new line. (Did I mention how much better the old line was??) The rubbery cap is just perfect for precise control of application. Why do they always discontinue the products that were so perfect?

L'Oréal Owl's Night — New LE Project Runway Collection

Here's Owl's Night, the second of the two L'Oréal polishes I picked up yesterday. This one belongs to the Watchful Owl subsection of the new Project Runway collection.

I swatched this with three coats, but you could easily get coverage with only two. Owl's Night has a deep, dusty plum base with lots of gold shimmer. I think this is a perfect fall color and I like it a lot. It looks like it might be a cousin of Chanel Or de Russie, but I don't have that one for comparison. In any case, it's a very luxurious color.

Pink Wednesday : OPI Shanghai Shimmer

My very first Pink Wednesday, in fact! And this polish is the very first bottle of OPI that I ever owned. It was given to me by a good friend in High School. We were on the fencing team together, and one day I spotted this beautiful color on her nails. Next time she was ordering some nail polish, she remembered how much I liked it and got an extra bottle for me! So nice! I wore it to senior prom.

This bottle is from before OPI went "Big 3 Free" and has the old black label. As you might expect, it applies easily and smoothly. It has a subtle greenish iridescence. This swatch is with three coats. As far as I know, this color is part of the permanent line and is still available (although now in the new formula.)

OPI Tease-y Does It fits today's weather

This polish was released for last year's Burlesque holiday collection, but the color makes me think of fall. It's not officially autumn yet, but the weather today is cool and crisp. I included an excessive number of pictures because this polish is complex and changes subtly with the light.

It has magenta flecks of shimmer in a charcoal base. It also has more sparsely distributed gold flecks. It's a little thick to apply, but covers nicely in two coats. And sadly the dazzling duochrome is only visible in the bottle and does not transfer to the nail. However, it's still very sparkly under the sunlight. This polish reminds me of China Glaze Side-Saddle, but they are not identical. Side-Saddle has a little more purple/plum in its base color, and all gold shimmer.