Cruelty-Free

Marks & Spencer Quick Dry Coral

July 27, 2011 6 Comments

First of all I would like to wholeheartedly recommend this colour for unique summer nails 🙂




This is a beautiful salmony pink colour, perfect for the summer. It surprisingly goes with a lot of colours clothes-wise, so is quite versatile. It also brightens up a neutral outfit with an interesting look, not the classic red or pink.

In terms of application, this took 3 coats, but that was due to the hideous staining on my nails, it just shows through anything >:( so I reckon if you have perfect nails or a French mani or just short nails, this will take 2 coats. The polish glided on my nails smoothly and it was very pigmented, not streaky like a lot of the summery brights. Dried in no time at all, with a lovely glossy finish, and it levelled itself out. The brush is pretty average.

This will cost you £5 from the M&S; range, and is it worth it? YES! I’ve never seen a ‘drugstore’ brand come out with this colour, I’m sure that China Glaze or OPI have done one similar but this is readily available if you, like me, hate the wait for internet shopped goods! Also it’s a lot cheaper than most of the eBayed or Amazoned nail polishes.

Hope you’re all well, I’m preparing to go on holiday on Friday morning – to North Uist! This will be for 2 weeks so if you don’t hear from me in that time, that’s why 🙁 I’m sad to be leaving my blog, please bear with me and don’t leave me haha!

Emma xxx

Disclaimer: Everything mentioned in this blog post was either bought by myself with my own money, or given to me as a gift from friends/relatives. All opinions expressed here are my own.

Marks & Spencer Neon Pink

July 10, 2011 5 Comments

First of all, sorry for not doing the 2nd Missguided freebie post but I’ve come down with a hideous virus and frankly feel like the waking dead, so I haven’t taken pics of my nails today so that may have to wait. I’m sorry. I do however have a couple of pictures from a few days ago so hope this will suffice.

Contrary to what the pictures will have you believe, this is actually a very very bright pink. It’s not neon, but it’s closer to neon than not, if that makes any sense? If you have Eyeko’s Punk Polish and feel it’s a bit too neon but still want that eyecatchingly bright pink then this one is the one for you. I personally have been searching for a neon pink that is as neon as Punk Polish as I found the formulation terrible… but that’s another story. Blog post.
Neon Pink applied beautifully – you are seeing 3 coats because my nails are in a right state and the nail line was showing through ever so slightly at 2. However if you have lovely clean nails or if you were to wear a base of pure white this polish would be perfect in 2 coats.
The polish was a good consistency – dried quickly and with a high shine so all in all je suis tres satisfied. I am still however on the lookout for a good neon pink so if you have any suggestions please feel free to suggest 🙂
Finally, as you’ve probably gathered if you’ve been reading my blog for a while, M&S; beauty products are BUAV Approved (they don’t test on animals) so that is another bonus of this lovely polish. You can view the M&S; nail polish ranges here.
Hope you’re all doing better than me because I feel absolutely dreadful, the laptop screen is burning my eyes, hence the brief(er) overview of this polish. I may have to revisit this post at a later date.
Emma xxx
Disclaimer: Everything mentioned in this blog post was either bought by myself with my own money, or given to me as a gift from friends/relatives. All opinions expressed here are my own.

Marks & Spencer Quick Dry Sherbet

July 1, 2011 3 Comments

I stumbled upon the new M&S; beauty range last Sunday on my shopping trip, which, can I say, is HUGE compared to how it always was (in my M&S; at least!) They have a huge range of nail polish so obviously I was in heaven. You can have a browse here. I am absolutely in love with the beauty range as you can probably guess, because it is BUAV approved (non animal-tested).

I limited myself to one polish, which was this one, from the Quick Dry range. It retails at £5. The pictures show two thin coats.

So the polish – the polish was opaque in one coat but I added a second for good measure. It dried quickly and glided on my nails beautifully 🙂 it dries very glossy so doesn’t require a topcoat and lasts wonderfully, I didn’t experience any tipwear, which I usually do with most polishes after a day of wear without topcoat. The ragged edges on my cuticles were because I was watching Being Human all day and was chewing on my nails 😐 don’t ask…

The polish was also unusually ‘tidy’ for a red, I don’t know about you but I always find that reds make an absolute mess of my nails and fingers during cleanup and also removal, which wasn’t a problem with this colour, so I was very happy about that!

The only thing I’m not sure of is the name – I’ve never seen any sherbet of this colour!

What do you think? I am very happy with the polish, I know the colour isn’t unique but they have a big range of colours, and at £5 for 10ml (compared to GOSH’s £5 for 8ml for example) I’m happy!

Hope you are all doing good, I have a few lovely polishes coming up so look out for them 😀 Spent a lovely day at the Garden Centre with my mum, we bought the most beautiful Dahlias I’ve ever seen (they’re called Mystic Enchantment, Google them if you haven’t already seen them!) and also some bright pink Gerberas for my room (which I am utterly convinced I will kill within a day but there we go). What have you been up to in this gorgeous sunny weather?
Emma xxx

Disclaimer: Everything mentioned in this blog post was either bought by myself with my own money, or given to me as a gift from friends/relatives. All opinions expressed here are my own.

Marks & Spencer Duck Egg (EM)

April 7, 2011 2 Comments

I realised I haven’t really gone into detail with the M&S; polishes. For just £3 you have a full 8ml of polish. The back label claims that the polishes are “High gloss, fast dry, chip resistant.” I agree with two of these three claims. The polishes all have so far been fast dry, and as far as I can see chip resistant (apart from on my split, peeling index nail, which to be honest is only to be expected).  However, I do not agree with the high gloss claim. I would put a polish by Barry M, BeautyUK, GOSH etc in the high gloss category, however I’ve found that the Marks and Spencer polishes, thus far, are incomparable. They have a lovely finish but it’s very muted in that it is not glossy whatsoever. I’m sure a topcoat would solve this issue but I don’t have one since wasting a good £10 on a particularly bad one, but that’s another blog post 😉

Anyways, this is my third and penultimate M&S; polish, as you can see all three so far have been blue-based:

If you click on the photo it will enlarge it, you may even be able to see the green shimmer!
3 coats.
This baby is beautiful right? Well what you can’t see (damn you camera!) is the gorgeous green shimmer packed into this polish, I mean it is stunning! I always worry with shades this pale that they’ll cause havoc clashing with my pale skin, but this one is just perfect. It’s a very very pale blue base with the pale green shimmer and has a gorgeous pearly shimmer finish. I can’t fault the colour. I don’t know if anyone remembers when the Body Shop used to do polishes as a permanent line, but I had three, one of which was a pure white polish with green shimmer and ever since that one dried up I’ve been desperate to find a dupe, and I reckon this is about as close as I’m going to get.
The formula I’m not as amazed by, it was a tiny bit on the thick side and resulted in a couple of tiny bubbles but that’s possibly because I haven’t yet mastered the art of applying a thin layer of quick-dry polish! Nevertheless the bubbles are barely visible IRL and really aren’t a problem.
This took 3 coats to reach full opacity, which I’m not fussed by myself as it’s a quick-dry polish and doesn’t look too bad at 2 coats if you’re in a hurry (I wore 2 coats all today and only added a third for the photos – hence the messy cuticles!)

This is surprisingly flattering to my skin tone and I imagine will be for darker skin too. I can’t tell you how much I love this polish (although I say that every time right? Lol, maybe I’m just psycho about colour!)

The photos are somewhat deceptive because the green shimmer is very much more visible to your real eyes, but was just impossible to capture. So frustrating!

To begin with I wasn’t sure about the name, but looking at it on my nails it really does capture the blue-green combo of duck egg, if in a slightly more unique way, perfect naming is my verdict 🙂

This one I also love too much to take off right away so I’ll be trying some nail art tonight (if I don’t fall asleep first!)

I can’t tell you how much I recommend the M&S; polishes, if only for their unique shades, I am awestruck 😀

Hope you are all well and smiling, I’m so relieved it’s nearly the Easter holiday because with my paper round I just never get a lie-in during term-time, even if it is only an extra half an hour! Also lots of revision to be getting on with 🙁 Ah well.
Emma xxx


Disclaimer: Everything mentioned in this blog post was either bought by myself with my own money, or given to me as a gift from friends/relatives. All opinions expressed here are my own.

Marks & Spencer Lagoon (RC)

April 5, 2011 3 Comments

First of all does anyone have a clue what the weird (RC) and (M2) etc naming code is all about on the M&S; polishes?
Here is the most beautiful blue shimmer ever. Well apart from Barry M Navy. And many others. Actually I’m just a blue addict full stop…

3 coats… Look at the beauty 😀
This polish has a cobalt blue base packed with greeny-blue shimmer. It’s beautiful, it absolutely gleams in all lights. This is perfect for those of you that love blue nail polish but feel that Barry M Navy is just a bit too dark for your liking. Trust me, despite having a dark base, this one is bright! A male friend even told me today that he liked this colour and that it suits me and I should wear it more often! (Rare moment!)
Application-wise this polish has been perfect. It dries very quickly and is totally opaque within 2 coats. The only reason I added a third is because I had a bit of tip wear on my index finger where my nail is totally split underneath… but you weren’t to know that 😛
I would most certainly recommend this polish to ANY blue polish lover. It kind of reminds me of ice and winter, I love it! Can definitely feel some nail art coming on with this one. I don’t want to take it off yet, which is rare for me, usually polishes only last one day on my nail before I’m itching to wear a different one! 😀
I just wanted to draw your attention to the BUAV Bunny logo in the bottom left corner. This essentially verifies that the brand is Cruelty-Free, which I haven’t yet seen on any other drug-store brands! (Urban Decay and Too Faced are BUAV Approved by the way, you can find the list of approved brands here.)
Oh and how cool is this pen?! My mum picked it up from her 4-day Vet conference, which is where all my freebie pens come from! They always have weird animal drug names on haha. This is the sort of thing that appeals to the child deep within me haha.

Hope you are all well, I am feeling rather cheery today, I’ve had a haircut which I’ve finally worked out how I want to wear it, it’s cake day in Chemistry tomorrow, I won a Twitter giveaway from Daisy at Daisy Loves, I won some national Creative Writing competition for something I can’t even remember what it is! I’ve got GOSH’s Golden Dragon somewhere in the post, I’ve lost weight in 3 weeks and everything has gone right for a change! Andy’s business is really starting to take off,   Let this be noted as a very high point in my mental state lol. Probably won’t last the week given the mounting pile of revision awaiting me. Work Experience next week and a blood test at the hospital because my GP surgery don’t have the equipment to find my veins, apparently I have really deep veins.

How are you all? Are things going right or wrong for you? By the way I honestly don’t mind if you want to use my comments box to vent or whatever, I know you probably won’t want to but I’m totally okay with it, it’s your chance to share your opinion 🙂
Emma xxx

Disclaimer: Everything mentioned in this blog post was either bought by myself with my own money, or given to me as a gift from friends/relatives. All opinions expressed here are my own.