Glam Polish The Power of the Dark Side

Today I have the other, villainous half of the April Glam Polish duo. Inspired by Darth Vader, one of the most famous (infamous?) villains to grace our screens, Darth Vader. Tall and imposing, you definitely don't want to run afoul of him, especially as he goes around Force-choking people who displease him.

The Power of the Dark Side is described as a "black jelly with a mix of iridescent flakies, rainbow holographic microglitter, shifting iridescent glitter and fine holo microglitter." With the jelly formula, this was a little sheer but built up very nicely. I used three coats for the look I wanted but you might be able to get away with two! The flakies and glitters are packed in there so you don't have to worry about any distribution issues. This was easy to work with! 

I am generally not a fan of very vampy "goth" polishes-- it just isn't my natural aesthetic! That said, I do like how colorful the flakies are in the dark base. While this is definitely dark, it's also fun and has a lot of character, which I like. I don't tend to reach for darker polishes a lot, but I really appreciate how the color doesn't get lost here. Definitely one of my favorite dark side based polishes! 

Supernatural Lacquer In a Galaxy Far, Far Away and a May 4th manicure

It's Star Wars Day!! Taking a quick break from our tour of the GFFA for a special Star Wars Day manicure! I used Supernatural Lacquer In A Galaxy Far, Far Away which is another polish from the Nouveau Geek Star Wars box. I would describe this an inky black holographic with a golden shimmer running throughout. I say "inky" because this definitely has a green undertone to it, sort of like the ink you sometimes see in pens.

In A Galaxy Far, Far Away has a good formula-- not too thick or too thin. It is nicely pigmented and flows on smoothly, though a thin first coat is a tad sheer. It builds up very nicely in two coats, though I threw on my typical third coat for good measure. You could definitely just do two, though. It dries quickly and smoothly-- no issues at all!

And I had to do a May 4thmanicure, though honestly it's not much of one this year. There were some Star Wars inspired  vinyls from Toadarrific Vinyls that also came in the Nouveau Geek Star Wars box and I decided to use the Rebel Alliance starbird vinyls for my manicure.

Simple, but it works! This was actually the first time I've used vinyls (what the what?!) but it was super easy! These came off the sheet pretty easily, and were sticky but not so sticky that you couldn't adjust them if you weren't happy with the initial placement. I used tweezers which was definitely the right call, though my placement could still use a little work. I'm happy with the vinyls and how it turned out, though! What do you think?

May the Fourth be with you!

Level Up Lacquer The Dark Side

We're still looking at the villains of Star Wars, but today I'm taking a slight shift to focus on the power that binds them all together: The Dark Side (of the Force). While not all the villains in the SW universe are Force users, the leaders like Darth Sidious and Darth Vader have a strong connection to the Dark Side and it is a thread that runs through all the movies. To this end, Level Up Lacquer made a polish, The Dark Side, to give her interpretation of this power.

The Dark Side is described as a "black jelly with a purple red shimmer and red and black holographic glitters. This polish looks great over black, or can be built up over several coats." This is pretty accurate! The polish is really really really sheer with just one coat; I was a little freaked out when I first applied it but decided to soldier on. It built up nicely once the foundation was laid, so to speak, and subsequent coats had more glitter and gave a nice final look. I used three coats here.

And because I now have a matte top coat I like and is readily accessible (seriously, organize people!), I'm pretty much matting all my glitters. Why not?!

I'll be honest, I was really worried when I first applied it. But I kept going and was ultimately rewarded, so whew! This is a very pretty polish and I love the mix of glitters. I continue to enjoy the polishes I bought from Level Up Lacquer-- I look forward to showing you some more later!

NerdLacquer Hocchhh Kssshhhhh

Technically this could be a quote, I suppose, but I'm using NerdLacquer Hocchhh Kssshhhhh to kick off a week of Star Wars Villains! And today we're starting with the biggest and baddest villain of them all, Darth Vader! *cue Imperial March* "Hocchhh Kssshhhhh" is supposed to be the sound of Darth Vader's breathing. Say it out loud and it will totally make sense (well, as long as you have actually seen Darth Vader before). But Darth Vader is the most intimidating, fearsome villain the Star Wars universe has produced and made a huge stir when he first appeared on screenin A New Hope.

Hocchhh Kssshhhhh is described as a "sheer black with black hex, black square, black bar, and black micro glitter, finished off with big charcoal holo hex. The micro holo shimmer scattered throughout is The Force." It is on the sheer side, but does build up. I didn't have the easiest time applying it-- the glitters wanted to clump together and I had a difficult time spreading it around.

I decided it might be easier to see the different glitters if I matted Hocchhh Kssshhhhh, so I picked up a new matte top coat (Revlon) and it's working much better than my Zoya one, so I think there's something off with the my bottle and it's not just user error. Anyway, matte: 

Ok, I have to be honest... I was not in love with this as I wanted to be. The first coat was pretty sheer (which is in the description) and the glitters were a bit clumpy and it was a little thick and hard to spread around. Plus... I just don't know if the glitter mix really speaks to me. I think it looks pretty but I just don't love it. Which is a shame, but it is what it is!

Colors by Llarow Luke, I Am Your Father

Today's famous Star Wars quote polish is actually a misquote, but whatever. Colors by Llarowe Luke, I Am Your Father is based off what might possibly be the most famous (and most misquoted) line out of the Star Wars movies. The actual line is "no, I am your father!" but it certainly sounds more dramatic with the name in front of it. This is the last polish from the May 2015 A Box, Indied. This was such a revelation when The Empire Strikes Back came out and shapes a lot of what happens in Return of the Jedi.

Luke, I Am Your Father is an inky black holographic polish with black microglitter (though the microglitter is a bit hard to see when the polish is opaque). The holographic finish has a strong blue flash and has a strong linear flash. For a CbL polish, I found this to be a bit on the sheer side, which is a bit unusual but it wasn't difficult to work with. It applied easily and built up nicely; I found I needed three coats to get the opacity I wanted. 

Of course, Seattle has had gorgeous weather-- up until the night I applied this! So I wasn't able to get any photos in the sunlight, argh. But I did grab a quick photo with my iPhone so you can (maybe) see the blue tones to it.

This was a really gorgeous polish and I think fits the quote perfectly. The darkness of the polish with the sparkle of the holo-- it works so well! I really like how even in lower lighting conditions you could still see the holo and it was really gorgeous in natural light as well. This is a winner in my books!

Rescue Beauty Lounge Many Splendors

Today, let's tackle Texture Tuesday-- from an unexpected source no less. This is one of the last polishes from Rescue Beauty, as part of the Fan Collection 3.0. Today I have Many Splendors, which is a polish inspired by "...a night-sky black polish that, like Uluru, responds to its environment revealing fiery flashes of red orange from within." The result of this inspiration is a the polish I have to share with you now! Many Splendors has base of black glitter that is shot through with gold, orange, and red glitters. In some light the base looks more brown than black, so it's a little bit a chameleon in that sense. 

Many Splendors was a little sheer in the first coat, but built up nicely in the next coat. Unfortunately, I can't remember how many coats I used-- I think it was probably three in the end, but two might have been sufficient. I didn't have any issues applying it, and as mentioned, it does try to a textured finished. If you want to make it glossy, it will probably require several coats to smooth everything out.


Artificial light (flash):

I  wish I had put some top coat on this so I could show you what it looks like all shiny, because it looks very beautiful like that. As a texture, this wore well-- I actually wore this for 4-5 days with only minor tip wear. Awesome! This polish is no longer available, but I feel it really accurately captures the inspiration and is a pretty unique texture! I like it!

Two-fer Tuesday: Fairytale Finish Neverending Fairytales October Box

I initially meant to get this posted last week, but discovered that I had somehow deleted pictures of one of the polishes and so I had to go back and reswatch it this weekend! How annoying! But it was easily remedied, at least. So this week I can show you the October box, which was inspired by fall!

This first polish I have to share with you is Leaf Jumping, which is a salmon pink crelly with a variety of different colored glitters in there, including turquoise, blue, red and yellow. I needed to give this a good roll to get the glitters mixed up again because it had been sitting for awhile, but it applied very well. I probably could have gotten away with two coats, but used three coats here to make sure I had the glitter and opacity I wanted. I didn't really have to dab, though the first coat was a bit sparse in terms of glitter, so I made sure that I had more glitter on my following coats.

This next polish from the box, and the one that I think is the true standout is Autumn Twilight. This is a difficult polish to describe, but I'll give it a try! Autumn Twilight has a deep, blackened purple base with mix of shimmer, purple and bronze glitter. I honestly can't quite remember how many coats I used here-- I think maybe two, but I might have used three, as that tends to my MO these days. This was packed with glitter and went on very easily; no issues at all! Perfection!

Another great sub box from Amanda! I kind of wish Leaf Jumping had of a more autumnal base color, but I like the unique color combination of the glitters. Autumn Twilight is definitely the winner here, but again, I like them both!

Two-fer Tuesday: Fairytale Finish Neverending Fairytales September Box

I am catching up on my polishes! Today I've got the September Neverending Fairytales subscription box! The maker, Amanda, celebrates her birthday in the month of September and so the polishes in this particular box were made in honor of her birthday! Definitely a great theme for the month! The September box also included a lot of special bonus codes to other polish shops which was really cool and awesome!

First up: 27 Cupcakes! Like the sweet treats (mmm.... cupcakes), this polish is a sweet combination of a creamy ivory crelly base with a confection of brightly colored glitter in a multitude of colors-- green, yellow, pink, purple, and blue in different sizes and shapes. I did need to give this a good roll to get the glitters resuspended, as they sink and want to cling to the sides of the bottle. The first coat was a little sheer and sparse on the glitter, so I ended up using three coats to make it opaque and get the glitter coverage I wanted.

27 Cupcakes:

Every birthday girl needs a party dress, and boy does After Party Dress deliver on the sparkle and shine. This is a black crelly filled to the brim with holographic, multicolor shimmer and sparkle. The first coat was a bit sheer, and two coats gave me pretty good coverage but I added a third for good measure. The formula was great and went on very smoothly. This actually dried fairly shiny, but I did add a top coat for my photos. This was kind of hard to photograph in my lighting conditions, but hopefully you can see the sparkle.

After Party Dress:

Another great subscription box! I think After Party Dress may be favorite just due to all the sparkle, but they are both fun and the names fit perfectly.

Next week, stay tuned for the October Neverending Fairytales box! (See, I'm almost caught up!)

Pink To Black manicure

Hi all! I have a slightly different post to share with you today. I usually don't use my blog as a soap box, because in general I consider nail polish and blogging to be my hobby and I tend to keep things happy and upbeat because this is one of my escapes. However, this is the month of October, which we are all aware is when we are inundated with advertisements and campaigns urging us to support breast cancer awareness, in addition to an overload of pink items. The sad fact is, though, that while we are all aware of breast cancer these days, there is still a lack of funding for real, hard research that finds ways to cure breast cancer (or any cancer, really, but October focuses on breast cancer).

I have a friend who is dying of metastatic breast cancer. She is 39 years old (only seven years older than I am!) and has two children and a husband she will leave behind when her disease inevitably kills her, unless a cure is found. And that cure comes from research, bench science, clinical trials-- not awareness campaigns. My friend founded an organization called METUP, which is an activism organization that is bringing attention to those living with metastatic breast cancer and to campaign for more funding to be directed to research for a cure. Today they are staging a die-in in Washington DC and I wanted to create a manicure in solidary. The METUP logo is the ubiquitous pink ribbon, but you come to the ends, the ribbon becomes tattered and fades to black.

This logo inspired my manicure idea-- to create a pink to black gradient on my nails. For this manicure I used Colors by Llarowe Engorgeous, Fancy Lacquer Come To The Dark Side, and Colors by Llarowe Luke, I am Your Father. I painted two coats of Engorgeous, and then I sponged on Come To The Dark Side and Luke, I am Your Father. The last one proved to be a bit sheer while I was trying to sponge it on, so I ended up painting a stripe of it on the free edge of my nail, then sponging more grey and black on top of it to create the the gradient effect.

Artificial light (flash):

I'm really happy with how this turned out and I definitely managed to to capture the idea I had in my mind. I think the grey helped ease the transition from the pink to black.

So, while I feel that whatever causes you choose to support are your own business and you should never feel coerced to give money where you don't want to, if you are motivated to give to a breast cancer charity this month, I would encourage you to donate to one of the charities listed here to give to groups that support breast cancer research, especially metastatic breast cancer instead of just awareness campaigns.

Note: I am in no affiliated with any of the organizations I have mentioned/linked in this post-- I am merely promoting a cause I feel deserves the attention.

May the Fourth Be With You Manicure!

Hey all! Today is May 4th, or in the pop culture lexicon: Star Wars Day! Star Wars is the second fandom I ever got into and I am still huge fan. When the newest teaser trailer for The Force Awakens was released, I spent all weekend watching it on loop. SO EXCITED!! Am I the only one thinking it would be cool if a polish brand decided to make a line of polishes based on the movie?!

Ahem, anyway.

When the pictures started coming out for the May edition of A Box, Indied and I found out that it had a Star Wars theme, I knew I had to have it. And luckily, I did manage to snag one! I will have a review up later, but I did used a couple of the polishes from the box for my manicure. I've been steadily collecting Star Wars themed polishes from various indie makers and trawled my stash to pick the perfect polishes! I settled on Lacquerlicious Path to the Dark Side, Glisten & Glow Saber This! and Different Dimension Saber That.

Path to the Dark Side is a glitter bomb with a dark blackened base with various silver, blue, and copper glitters of various sizes. I layered one coat of A England Camelot. Then, on one accent nail I used Saber This! which is shimmery blue glow in the dark polish with flakies, representing Luke's (and Obi-Wan's) light saber from the first two movies and on my other hand I used Saber That, which is a shimmery green representing Yoda's green light saber (Luke also had a green light saber in Return of the Jedi).

On my left hand, I used Glisten & Glow Saber This! as an accent nail. 

On my right hand (man, it sure is difficult to photograph your Cinderella hand), I used Different Dimension Saber That as an accent:

I had completely forgotten that Saber This and Saber That were glow in the dark so last night, when I turned off the lights and they started glowing, I was like a little kid. I even turned the light back on to charge them, haha. Now I can admire my nails in the dark! I love how this manicure turned out, with the two light saber colors standing out against the black of the Dark Side. Perfection! Glow in the dark for the two light saber polishes was definitely the right choice-- I love how they glow.

Hope everyone had a good Monday! Did you do anything to celebrate May 4th? Or any pop culture "holidays" throughout the year?

Two-fer Tuesday: Sally Hansen Deluxe and Velveteen

Alright, another Two-fer Tuesday post! This time I have two more polishes from the Sally Hansen Velvet Texture-- Deluxe and Velveteen. These polishes look very similar but are not actually the same. Really! Deluxe is a very dark inky blue that reads almost black. Velveteen is a deep black. These are both nicely pigmented-- in fact, I would say that you probably want to be careful of staining, especially with Deluxe, which is something that blue pigment sometimes likes to do. Here I used two coats-- they both applied well without any issues. The only thing I noticed was that the black, Velveteen, seemed to dry a little unevenly and I had some shiny patches (which you can see in the photos). That hasn't happened to me with any of the other polishes from this line, so I'm not quite sure what to make of that.

Deluxe:

And Velveteen:

These colors look similar, but they aren't quite the same! Can you tell? I wish Deluxe looked a little more blue instead of being quite so dark.

Colors by Llarowe Black Gold, Texas Tea

Today I have a Colors by Llarowe polish to share with you-- I think this is the first time I've posted one on the blog (well, for a full review)! I've actually had this polish for over a year, but only just got around to wearing it. I was craving something dark and thought this black holo would give me what I wanted. Black Gold, Texas Tea is a jet black linear holo. As I remember, the formula on this is pretty decent-- I think I only used two coats here. In case you didn't know, "black gold" and "Texas tea" are euphemisms for oil, which is of course drilled in Texas. (I knew about black gold, but had to google Texas tea! Thanks Wikipedia!)

I had a devil of a time photographing this polish. I mean, in the bottle, Black Gold, Texas Tea is a amazing:

But unfortunately, I feel like the holo got swallowed up in the base color on the nail. Maybe the black base is too black? I'm not sure if it had something to do with the top coat I was wearing (Cult Nails Wicked Fast) and that dulled the holo or what, but it definitely looked flat on the nail.

Artificial light (flash):

Natural light (sun):

I was hoping that the holographic qualities would be a lot stronger, given how this looks in the bottle. You can still see the holo, but it's not very strong. I was a bit disappointed overall, so maybe next time I will wear this I will either wear a different top coat or none at all. Maybe another coat would have helped? I'm not sure. I really do wish I had fallen in love this, but sadly I'm not. But never fear-- there are other polishes by CbL that I love! You'll see more of them soon (I hope).

Maybelline Clearly Spotted

Today I have a relatively new polish to share with you-- and one that I had actually been stalking the local drugstores for. This is Maybelline Clearly Spotted, which is part of Maybelline's Polka Dots collection, which is a collection of five black and white glitters in different bases. I really wanted Clearly Spotted because it was the one with a clear base (the others all have colored bases, which seem fairly easy to duplicate). It seems like a lot of mainstream brands are following the footsteps of indie brands and trying to make some more unique polishes-- there are a lot of black and white glitter polishes out there, but they're each a little different. It's nice to see the bigger brands doing something different. In any case, as I was stalking various drug stores, I saw a lot of miscellaneous bottles from the collection, but I had to wait until a brand new drugstore opened up two blocks from my work location before I managed to get this.

As I said, Clearly Spotted is a mix black and white glitter (large and small hexes) in a clear base, so you can wear it over anything. Here I have it layered over my Essence Cafe Ole and Cult Nails Mayhem manicure. Here I used one coat, and that was good enough to get plenty of glitter onto my nail. I found this polish to be generally easy to work with, though the larger pieces of glitter did want to migrate around on my nail so I had to be careful of that. This also was a little bit of a top coat eater-- I used one coat of Sally Hansen Insta-Dri and when it dried down it wasn't completely smooth-- but definitely not lumpy or textured enough to really bother me, so I only used one coat. This might not be an issue with other top coats, but just a head's up.

Artificial light - flash:

Natural light - shade:

Natural light - sun:

This is actually my first black and white polish, and I'm glad I finally managed to snag one. This probably won't be my last, either! I really like this over the neutral base color, and that some of the holo sparkle is still visible! Plus, it was a nice way to perk up my mani and make it last a few more days. What's really great about these black and white glitters is that they are extremely versatile, so I'm looking forward to trying this out over other colors.

a england Camelot

Taking a break from all the Valentine themed polishes (and glitter) and bringing you something completely different tonight-- straight up black! This is a polish I've had for awhile, a england Camelot. Named after the legendary kingdom of King Arthur, this polish is a deep black onyx polish that is super shiny.

Camelot, my goodness-- it's so shiny! All the pictures below are without a top coat. Look at how shiny it is! Overall, I had an easy time using this polish and the formula was great and very pigmented. If you're good, this is definitely a one-coater. I used two because I never feel good with just one coat. But I feel like this looks gorgeous on the nail and actually does look like black onyx stone.

Artificial light:

Natural light - sun:

This is a perfect black. A little on the pricey side, yes, but it's easy to use and the formula is great. I don't know wear just black very often, but I love how shiny this is and I'm glad I have a bottle in case I need it.