Nail Polish

So as we all know, it’s our good ole Queen’s Diamond Jubilee this weekend. I love celebrating being British, and I have a lot of respect for much of the Royal family. I decided to attempt Union Jack nails… they look a LOT worse in the photos than they seem to in real life, I suppose because you tend not to scrutinise real life nails like photographs allow you to! My brother thought I had nail wraps on, which is good enough for me!

If you look at my nails out of focus then they don’t look so bad 😉 This is the illusion real life has given my nail art 🙂

I used:

• Barry M Navy
• Barry M Matt White
• Boots 17 Knockout Red
• Rimmel Pro Superwear Ultra Shine Topcoat
• Nail Art Brush set

Now I am not blessed with ambidexterity. I struggled using my dominant (right) hand for this so, if you want to see how my right hand turned out, well, prepare yourself for a nail fail!

I didn’t even bother to clean up – sadly I am walking round with my right hand still looking like this. Ah well.

What nails are you sporting for the Jubilee?

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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.

I’ve never really been a lover of taupey shades. But this one has won my heart over! There are three Ciaté shades being given away free with this month’s Marie Claire, in ‘Bon Bon’, ‘Jelly Bean’ (pink with blue shimmer) and ‘Purple Sherbet’ (lilac creme). I accidentally picked up all three – oops! Though for £3.70 you really really can’t go wrong – I always say that Ciaté have unbeatable quality and are worth every bit of the £9 they retail at, so this is a total bargain!

The three Ciaté shades free with Marie Claire are all ‘new’ shades, in that you can’t actually buy them usually, Ciaté have produced them specifically for the magazine. But, unless I’m very much mistaken… they are all very similar to three shades in Ciaté’s permanent line. I think Bon Bon is pretty similar to Ciaté Iced Frappe – can anyone confirm this?

I love this shade, it’s ever so flattering and I think it will look fab on all skin tones. It’s very office-friendly and work appropriate, and also very subtle for those of you who don’t like to wear bold colours on your nails. I reckon this would make a super-sophisticated pedicure!

Application:

One word: flawless! The photos all show 2 coats – the polish was pretty much opaque at one but the shade is buildable – at one coat it is a paler, pinkier finish and at two we have the shade as shown in the photos. The polish dries quickly, and dries to a high shine. As always with Ciaté, the brush handle makes for good control of the polish and the brush itself is the perfect width, thickness and shape for a neat, beautiful application.

Would I pay £9 for this shade? I’d have to save up, and I personally don’t tend to go for taupes but this one I would most probably splurge on! Would I pay £3.70 for it? Absolutely!

Have you tried any of the Marie Claire x Ciaté shades yet? Which one is your favourite?

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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.

Before I get into how much I undyingly love this polish – there are 3 new Ciaté shades free in Marie Claire this month, in ‘Bon Bon’ (taupe creme), ‘Jelly Bean’ (pink with blue shimmer) and ‘Purple Sherbet’ (pale purple creme)… at £3.70 each you really can’t go wrong! Also there’s a code for 25% off Ciaté orders in the magazine too, so you can get your favourites for less for a little while!

Ciaté Pom Pom is nothing new in terms of colour. Coral polish has been done and done and done – I in fact have 5-6 polishes in this exact shade. Where it differs is in the formula and finish. Observe:

Pom Pom is a gorgeous, glossy coral creme. This bold colour is so perfect for summer! This is the difference between Pom Pom and other similar corals (by Eyeko, NYC, BeautyUK etc.) – in my experience, corals tend to require several coats to hide the free edge of the nail. Pom Pom – a creme, applies smoothly and creamily and in 2 coats, is totally opaque. Equally, the Ciaté brush, of medium width and thickness, really adds to the flawless application. I find the long handle and the brush shape combined allow for quick and beautiful application, even for a messy polisher like me.

Application:

The photos all show 2 coats – I couldn’t see my free-edge in person. The polish dries quickly, and dries to a lovely glossy high shine – no need for a topcoat.

In my eyes, you get every penny you pay for with Ciaté. I feel that with brands like OPI, Essie and China Glaze, often you get a great and unique colour choice, but the application/longevity/finish/opacity of the polish lets it down, for the price you pay. I consistently find Ciaté to be of high quality… which in my eyes makes their polishes worth the £9, even if I do have to save up for them or buy them as a treat. (And no… I don’t work for Ciaté! These are my genuine thoughts I swear!!!).

What do you think? Is this worth splurging £9 on? What are your favourite summer colours?

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Disclaimer: This product was sent to me by Ciaté as a gift, but not for review purposes.

First of all a HUGE thank you to the lovely Mel who sent me this rather amazing polish in our swap recently – this is my second time wearing this one, it’s gorgeous and so fun!

No.7 released a line called ‘Colour Miracle’ a while back… sadly it’s now discontinued – do any of you own the Colour Miracle shades? I’ve only been able to find two online, were there more? Basically, you apply 1-2 coats of the polish, which gives a lovely colour. Add topcoat, and the colour changes completely. Hopefully my pictures will demonstrate this!

I was a little inspired to try it out by the Barry M Chameleon Nail Paint press release – Barry M are releasing 3 new ‘chameleon’ shades next week (eeee I’m so excited!). You can probably tell that my use of the clear polish was pretty much stolen from the press release!

2 coats of the polish applied over a basecoat – this is the ‘natural’ colour of the polish.

I added a few dots of clear topcoat to my index finger, painted 1 coat of topcoat over my middle finger, painted 1 coat of topcoat over my ring finger and added dots of the original colour, and painted a very rubbish tip with topcoat on my pinkie finger!

I swear my nails didn’t look that messy in person… hence the small amount of photos compared to usual! Anyway. I love this polish, so much fun! My only gripe is for those of you who like to wear polish for more than 1-2 days, there’s no real way of preserving the original colour or the nail art design, unless you do a topcoat sandwich underneath. Hmm. Anyway, I believe that this colour is very similar to one of the Barry M colours:

If this is the case, I’ll certainly do a side-by-side comparison to show you all since No.7 Miracle Plum is discontinued 🙁 as far as I’m aware anyway… Application-wise, Miracle Plum took 1 coat to be opaque, but I wore it for a day or so at just 1 coat and got a bit of tipwear so I’d suggest 2 coats to be on the safe side, if you have this in your stash!

Let me know what you think of the colour-changing polish thing, is it something you’re interested in, or too much of a faff?

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Disclaimer: This product was kindly gifted to me by a friend. Thank you Mel! x

Candyfloss Pink was apparently inspired by Elie Saab’s SS12 collection. The name is very apt for the colour – a sugary blue-toned pink shimmer polish, I think candyfloss just about fits the bill!

 Candyfloss Pink is a gorgeous pink creme with silver glassfleck shimmer – exactly the same finish as 2True Ocean Pearl. You know me – I’m a sucker for glassfleck! Candyfloss Pink is about as girly as one can possibly get when it comes to nail polish, but it has the bonus of making your fingers look lovely and tanned, which is a winner in my books.

Application:

The photos all show 3 coats. The polish applied evenly, but required the 3rd coat just to build up enough pigment to hide the free edge. Candyfloss Pink dried fairly quickly, so the 3rd coat wasn’t really a problem. It dried to a high shine too.

I wanted to mention that this did chip on a couple of fingers in the time that I wore it (2 days), but this was only on my weaker nails (which have a habit of peeling).  Also I’d lost my basecoat on the day I applied it so substituted topcoat which may have caused the chipping… I really don’t know whether it’s down to the polish or my application/nails. Anyways, I did notice that on the nails I then added topcoat to, there was no further chipping soo… sorry for the unreliability of the review! :s

What do you think of this colour? Too pink or is it an acceptable shade for you? At £1.99 in Superdrug you can’t really go too far wrong… or you can buy 3 x 2True products for £4.99.

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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.