Imagination In Colour UK Nail Polish Blog

I’ve seen this tag a couple of times now, most recently on the nail polish tag post from Fee at Makeup-Savvy.

1. What is your favourite nail polish company?

My favourite higher end company would have to be either Ciaté or China Glaze, while my favourite high street company is definitely either Barry M, GOSH or Revlon!

2. Glitter or no glitter?

Glitter! I love glitter, despite the removal pains, glitter is just so eye-catching and makes your nails so much more interesting!

3. OPI, China Glaze or Essie?

I’m going to be a pain and say all of them at different times for different reasons. If I’m looking for a unique, very eye-catching polish I’ll probably go for China Glaze, although I do find I have a few application problems with China Glaze due to the tiny brush and I also get tipwear with their glass-fleck polishes. Essie are good because the polishes tend to apply well and last well, but I don’t like Essie  as it’s owned by L’Oreal. Sad day. OPI are okay, they do do some very pretty polishes but their price in the UK has increased to £11 and I just don’t think they are worth that, and their minis are about one manicures-worth of polish!

4. When do you change your nail polish?

I do actually change my nails either every day or every other day. I kind of feel like it’s because I have too much time on my hands and certainly on busier days I will leave them a day or two,  but I like to change things up.

5. What’s your favourite colour on your nails?

I don’t actually have a favourite colour on my nails, but I think if you were to look at my collection you would see that I tend to gravitate towards blues and greens. So I suppose that means blues and greens are my favourite! I think this is similar for my favourite colour in general – I wouldn’t have said there’s a particular colour that I LOVE any more than the next colour, but most of my clothes, my bedroom, my bike and my various bits and bobs are often blue, turquoise or green so…

6. Darks or brights?

Hmm. I think probably brights – I hate black on my nails and pretty much all ‘near-black’ polishes. I’d say I wear a fair mix of darks and brights though.

7. What are you wearing on your nails right at this moment?

Models Own Hedonist from the Hedkandi collection – SO neon you wouldn’t believe. I’m not looking forward to trying to photograph this as it’s going to confuse my camera like crazy! It’s basically a super bright neon coral colour. It dries matte but it is absolutely luminous!

8. Matte nails, in or out?

I would never like to cut matte nails off the spectrum for me, but I just never ever wear matte polish. I think it’s just that extra thing to think about and because I’m so out of the habit of using my matte topcoat it just doesn’t occur to me to use it, although matte is definitely VERY pretty and looks amazing in a matte/gloss combo.

9. French Manicure?

I’ve never had a French mani, but I always think they look lovely. Very polished and well-kept. However I am a little fussy about them – I hate seeing bright white tips or tips which take up the majority of the nail space, it just doesn’t look right! And when the ‘natural nail colour’ is a nude creme – no.

10. Favourite Summer colours?

Brights! I’ve never really been a pastel girl so it’s definitely hot pinks, oranges, turquoises, corals, blues and greens for summer.

 

I tag everyone! Let me know if you’ve done this tag and link me up!

x

Last Easter I did mini egg nail art, so this year I was casting around for more inspiration. You know when you get the cute little chocolate eggs in coloured foil? That’s what inspired me this time. My camera seemed to be playing up a little, the second photo is a bit blurry (sorry!).

These were done with sellotape (lots of it!) for the straight lines and many many polishes…! Here’s what I used:

• BeautyUK Moonstone
• Max Factor Angel Nails
• 2True Shade 4 (Crystal Polish ‘Regal Purple’)
• Deborah Lippmann Glitter in the Air
• Accessorize Goddess
• Boots 17 Fury
• Models Own Indian Ocean
• OPI Rainbow Connection

Hope you like them! What did you adorn your nails with this Easter? Link me up if you have any pictures/blogposts on Easter manicures!

x

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’m sure we’re all well acquainted with Chanel Peridot on the blogosphere, if you don’t already own it, you’ll probably have seen photos no less than a million times. And of course, one season on and the dupes are coming out already! Can’t say I’m complaining, there’s no way I can justify spending so much on one single polish, even if it is amazing. And I’ve heard tell that Hidden Treasure is pretty much spot on identical to Peridot – if you don’t believe me, have a look at this Chanel Peridot comparison with Topshop Hidden Treasure from Fleur De Force.

It’s very pretty. I know that people were disappointed that Peridot wasn’t as duochromey as anticipated from the bottle – Hidden Treasure is much like that. In the bottle the polish looks a petrol mixture of green and blue, a very distinct duochrome, while on the nail the blue barely shows up unless you are looking at the edge of the nail (see photo 5 for reference!). Nevertheless, Hidden Treasure is very lovely. It leans very gold in most lights, with that hint of bronzey-green. The polish flowed beautifully, it looks like I’ve just layered foil directly onto my nail, not a brushstroke in sight! No complaints.

Application:

The photos show 2 coats. Yes, 2. Totally totally opaque, yay! Not only this but the polish is very smooth and has a wonderful chrome finish. Barry M Foil Effects eat your heart out! Not the kind of polish I’d put a topcoat over, but it wouldn’t do it any harm if you did. My only little qualm is that any nail imperfections, and I mean, ANY, will show right through. If you have ridges I suggest using a good ridge-filler before using Hidden Treasure.

The best news is that Hidden Treasure is just £6 in Topshop, and very easily found!

What do you think? Are you going to hop on the Peridot bandwagon (albeit in a shamelessly cheapie way?) I am very pleased with this polish – unique, not too expensive and very good quality.

x

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.

 

Another Models Own polish, this time from the new Hedkandi collection. Disco Heaven is a very pretty gold glitter topcoat with iridescent green-blue hexagonal glitter in the mix.

From my point of view, this is definitely a topcoat polish. At four coats it doesn’t quite cover the nail enough to wear alone – you can still distinctly make out the free edge, and the gold in the polish seems to give an orange cast to the nail, making it look more stained than it actually is. However I’m sure if you layered it up enough this wouldn’t be a problem. The blue, sadly, doesn’t really show up unless you are looking closely.

Application:

The 3rd and 4th photos show the polish at 3 coats –  not by any means opaque. Although like many glitters, the light reflection from the polish does help to disguise the nail beneath. The polish dried quickly, and also dried quite smooth. I guess this can be attributed to the small proportion of glitter to clear polish – the clear polish must help smooth things out, I think? So in that vein, I personally don’t see a need for a topcoat. Again with Models Own not being Big-3-free, the polish had a strong chemical smell, so I would recommend you apply it in a well ventilated area.

I did a little swatch of Disco Heaven over Rimmel London Black Cab – a plain black creme, to see if the iridescent blue glitter would show up better (you’ll have to excuse the mess that is my nails!) :

Sorry for the rubbish lighting – it was literally the only light in which I could capture the blue glitter in at all! Hopefully you can see it, a little bit? While I love the idea of the blue iridescent glitter, it’s just too pale for me and it only really shows up (in real life) under bright light – it’s just too subtle to make it this polish worth the £5 price tag, for me. Don’t get me wrong, I love the polish and a gold glitter is always a good staple, but if I was to design it, I’d put in opaque blue glitter and make sure it stands out against the rest of the gold glitter (oh and get rid of the Big-3!).

Maybe I’m just too fussy – what do you think about this one? I suppose another way to save yourself some pennies is if you already have Maybelline Flash Cosmic glitter polish and any old gold glitter top coat, this look is easily re-creatable.

Have you tried any of the Models Own Hedkandi polishes? What do you think of them? I also picked up ‘Hedonist’, a neon coral colour. I have yet to decide how much I like it! I do really like the look of ‘Ibiza Mix’ , but my Boots seems to be permanently sold out of it. I am also a big fan of all the companies really pushing the boundaries with nail polish lately, it feels like they just keep getting better and more unique! This Spring has been really good for we nail polish addicts, not so good for our purses…!

x

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.

Hello all, I have a second Models Own Beetlejuice polish for you today! This is another one from the Spring/Summer 2012 release of 3 new Beetlejuice polishes from Models Own. I’m not going to rant about the Big-3 chemicals today, if you want to read it it’s all in my review of Models Own Tropical Sun. I do really really love these polishes, sooo pretty!

 Soo pretty, right? My only issue with this (other than the Big-3 chemicals) is that it’s very sheer. The polish is essentially a blue-green seafoam colour base packed with pink shimmer. There’s also a bit of gold in there too, in some lights! Gorgeous, very reminiscent of a pink sky over the sea at dusk. The shimmer is almost flakie-esque, it has that lovely glass-fleck sheen to it.

Application:

Indian Ocean, like I said, is very sheer. The pictures all show 4 coats, and even then the free edge of my nails is very visible. Saying that the pink shimmer helps to reflect light off the nail, masking the free edge somewhat. The blue really comes out over the free edge, making it stand out quite a lot compared to over the pink of my nail. The polish dried relatively quickly, but not as quickly as I’d have liked for 4 coats. Indian Ocean dries to a high shine, so you won’t need a topcoat.  My only other little niggle was the chemical smell, it really doesn’t feel healthy to be breathing it in, so make sure you apply it in a well ventilated area.

It’s definitely a candidate for layering – I’ve seen various layering combinations over the internet the last few days, so I thought I’d try a few of my own. I definitely prefer Indian Ocean layered as the green in the polish can make your nails look a little dirty when the free edge is showing. There’s a lot more green to it than I first realised – I noticed this when I layered it over white. I also think it would look fab over black, but that’s for another day!

Thumb to pinkie: Barry M Matt White, Barry M Mint Green, Barry M Blue Moon, Revlon Dreamer, Revlon Charming.

You’re going to have to take my word for it that these combos look amazing – the picture really doesn’t do it justice! I’ve had many a compliment on them too, the duochrome nature of Indian Ocean is absolutely stunning, it reminded me of beetle wings. Very very amazing, you really have to see it to know what I mean.

So, despite their containing Big-3 chemicals, the Models Own Beetlejuice SS12 gets a huge thumbs up from me. I didn’t buy Copper Pot because it looks a little like Boots 17’s Fury, and that didn’t sit very well with my skin tone.

Have you tried the Beetlejuice SS12? I’m starting to feel won-over by Models Own. Hope you are all doing well, let me know what you think of Indian Ocean!

x

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.