Surprising Suedes from Avon

I'm really excited about these polishes!  Avon's cheaper range, Colortrend, have brought out some new polishes including a set of 3 suedes.  These are my first suedes and I'm quite impressed, considering the rrp is £3, but I got them for an introductory price of 99p each!

Soft Violet, Fuchsia and Blue Royale

I was so excited about these I actually swatched them!  I know!  Me, swatching!  Fortunately, suedes are easy to swatch because they dry so quickly.

There are three colours, first up is Fuchsia, a rich deep pink.  All the polishes applied smoothly - I could have got away with one coat but used two.  They did chip quickly, but show me a matte/suede effect which doesn't!

Next up is Soft Violet. The pics don't really do it justice, although it does lean towards silver/grey.

Finally, Blue Royale, almost a navy.  I lost the sun on these swatches so the pictures aren't really true, but IRL the colours are beautiful.

You may have noticed I've been using different materials to take pictures against - I'm trying to find something that shows off the polish but also makes my pictures unique.  What do you think of the different materials I've used so far?

Nubar Purple Rain Glitter - I love it!

I love all polishes, all colours (except red.  And orange), but my favourite colour is purple, and Nubar Purple Rain Glitter is my perfect colour.  If I had to wear one nail polish for the rest of my life (perish the thought!) then this would be it.

In the bottle it looked a browny purple but on the nail it is a deep rich purple with micro glitter which just lifts the polish from the mundane to the extraordinary.  It needs 3 coats for maximum coverage, so I think I'd better get a back up of this one, because I'll be wearing it a lot!!

What really got me about this polish was how it transforms in bright sunlight - suddenly there are holo particles scattered throughout!  There is no hint of the holo in natural daylight, but in sunlight it comes to life.

I love this polish so much, thank you Jen, for sending this to me!

Can you see the holo?

Holo Diamonds!!!

I'm still not brilliant at nail art.  I don't have much time to practise, and then I get frustrated when it goes wrong, so mostly I just let the polish be the art.  But when I saw this fantastic tutorial by Jin Jit from Superficially Colorful I knew I had to give it a try.

It took me forever, I used several different holos, the base was GOSH Hero holographic, the blue and the dark pink are UP holos and the pale pink is A England Princess Tears (I think, I did this mani a few days ago and have only just got round to posting!).

I loved this so much, it was worth the effort.  I got loads of comments too, even the girl at the Illamasqua counter in Selfridges was amazed I'd done it myself.  Next time I do this tho, I will do one hand first and then the other otherwise the polish is dry by the time you take the tape off.  If you want to see how it's done then please please go visit Jin's blog for yourself.  But here's my effort, I thought it looked like pretty Argylle socks!

Check out that holo!!!

I haven't got a camera with macro yet, this is the best I could do!

Is there a Doctor in the house?

Sorry for the hiatus.  Things are pretty crazy and I stopped doing my nails for a bit.  But I'm back into it now.

A few of my fellow lacquernuts are also Whovians (apparently the term for fans of Doctor Who), which returned to UK screens this week - wahooooo!!!  So to celebrate the return we are all doing Doctor Who themed manis!

Of course I had to use my Doctor inspired polishes for this mani, so I used Cult Nails Time Traveller as my base and topped my fingernails with Nerd Lacquer's I Think You Call Me...Sexy?  I based my thumbnail design on the Van Gogh exploding Tardis picture.

Doctor Who Exploding Tardis

Anyway, onto the manicure:

Doctor Who mani

Doctor Who mani

Doctor Who mani

Did you watch it?  Wasn't it good?!  And sad?!  Can't wait for next week :)

If you want to have a look at the other Doctor Who manis then check out the blogs below.

Hot Neon Mattes and Cool Polka Dots

I managed to get the lovely Traci at The Trace Face Philes to send me the fab China Glaze Poolside Collection Neons which had to be worn with a different colour on each nail... like so!

The yellow and orange were a little sheer and there was a bit of VNL even with 4 coats.  Although not sold as matte they have a lovely matte finish to them.  Perfect for such bright neons.


Well, they were just asking for a polka dot touch weren't they?!!

This is only my 2nd or 3rd use of my dotting tools and I think the first time I've used them actually on my nails, not on a nail wheel.  The dots weren't perfect but I was pretty impressed with how they turned out.  I used a random white I had to create the dots.


I had so many compliments on this mani!!!  They really caught peoples' eyes and I kept being asked who had done my nails for me!  So I think I'll have another got at this some time.  Sometimes it's hard to see it properly on your nails, but now I'm looking at it in the pics I'm really pleased!

Magnetic Mani - A Success and a Failure!!

Although magnetic nail polish came out last year, there seems to have been a revival this spring with new brands coming out with magnetic polishes, such as Barry M, along with some new magnet designs.  So I've been having a bit of a play and I had one really successful mani, and one really pants one!

First up is the successful mani I did using Nabi Magnetic Polish sent to me by my friend Ana.  I thought this was a lovely polish with a great shimmer to it.  I used the China Glaze star magnet to create this and was really impressed with it.  I found that if I held the magnet for 30 seconds it created a much stronger, defined effect but once the magnet was moved away it blurred more.

I accented my ring finger with a scattered holo top coat.

So, I really liked this mani which made me want to try the new magnetics I'd picked up from Barry M.

These are fresh colours with a couple of magnet designs we've not seen before. The black has a silver shimmer to it, the red is a pretty red, and the blue has a very denim look, which is THE colour this season.  There is another colour as well but it wasn't in stock when I picked these up.  I decided to go for the blue polish, but with what looked like a fishnet effect magnet on the black bottle.

Sadly, although a fairly pretty effect, it doesn't come out on the nail as a fishnet, more just wavy lines.  I need to play around with how long you leave the magnet over the nail as I think it would affect the pattern on the nail.  Where I really messed up on this mani was topping it with my half used, gloopy Seche Vite.  Because the SV was gloopy I didn't get a proper coverage on the nail so it left streaks, which meant it chipped pretty easily as you can see on my thumb.

The SV also blurred the magnetic effect a bit.  I didn't put SV on my pinky and you can see the difference as to how much more defined the effect is without the topcoat.  Another time I'd use drops.

Chipping on my thumb where I couldn't get an even cover with SV

You can just see how much more defined the effect is without the topcoat on my pinky.

What do you think of magnetic polishes?  Do you get on with them?  I find them quite time consuming to do but enjoy the effects.

Why Do I Collect Polish?

People often ask me why I've got so many bottles of polish.  'You can't possibly wear them all' they say.  Or, 'How do you know that you haven't already bought that particular polish?'  'Why do you need so many', and 'but they're all the same colours just different brands' are also favourite comments.  So here's a chance for me to set the record straight and explain my personal fascination about nail polish.


Firstly, it's not just about wearing it on the nails.  It's about the bottle of polish itself.  There's nothing so pretty as a whole load of polishes in different colours from the same brand in matching bottles.  No wonder so many polishaholics display their stash on shelves.  They can look so beautiful.  And every polish lover has her own way of organising her stash.


Secondly, why does anybody collect anything?  Some people collect stamps, others, china, others collect funny little toys or whimsies.  I collect polish, and at least my collection is useful, it doesn't just get stored in a book or cupboard to be looked at occasionally.  Everyone can see my collection on my nails :)


Every colour is a little bit different.  Yes, there occasional dupes, but usually every colour is slightly different, or has a different effect.  It might be matte, shimmery, glass flecked, glossy, jelly.  And it's fun tracking down that hard to find polish, or receiving a totally unexpected, surprising polish in a swap.


That's why I collect polish - what about you?

A display of essie polishes - look how pretty they all are!!