Sinful Colors Vacation Time

Today I present you to, Sinful Colors Vacation Time! It's a beautiful mauve-y spiced tea colour that many have dubbed a "granny colour" but I love shades like these. They're so neutral and classy and great when you don't feel like wearing anything too bold or sweet.





I probably have at least 6 similar shades but none of them are exactly the same. The best thing about buying shades like that is that my mum loves them too so she won't nag at me for buying so many polishes! Instead, she'll be nice to me and ask if she can use them! Haha!

Formula wise, it was okay, I have nothing to complain about it. I used 2 coats here and the brush size was managable. Quite similar to China Glaze's brush size? It does fan out pretty well so it made painting a little easier! This was taken after 2 days of wear but I removed it on day 3 because I wanted to swatch on some of my newly acquired shades!

OPI Merry Midnight Swatch

I managed to get Merry Midnight a few months back at a manicure shop in FEP and it was almost used up and was going for $2. I knew I had to have it despite it being thick and gunky inside. I finally thinned it out today and swatched it on one nail (because that's how precious it is)!

Showed you this bottle shot the last time.



But here's a new one with a swatch!







Look at those flakes! GORGE! I have 2 coats of OPI Siberian Nights and one coat of OPI Merry Midnight on top.

It's a deep purple with tiny blue glitter particles with red flakes! Merry Midnight is from the Holiday Wishes Collection back from 2009 and ohhhhh, it's so Christmasy without being too Christmasy! Now I can't wait for Orly Fowl Play to hit our shores! (:

OPI Siberian Nights

Today, I'm showing you one of the three OPIs I got whne I went down to PNC after work one day with the other interns! This one is called Siberian Nights. It's a deep eggplant colour but it does tend to look like black in normal lighting. Only under strong lighting would you see its true colour. Kinda like Lincoln Park After Dark but not as bad.

Here is is under my table lamp. This is 2 coats with a coat of Poshe / Seche on top. I say Poshe / Seche because I really was using both on random fingers. I know I have lobster hands (overly red skintone) but it's because of my camera setting. The colour is pretty accurate here. Oh, and I have OPI Merry Midnight on top of Siberian Nights on my index finger! :D

The rest of the pictures were taken under natural sunlight.

I initially wanted Orly Wild Wisteria over Siberian Nights but since I saw Siberian Nights first, I got it. I'm kinda disappointed at how dark it is. Was wishing it's be a little lighter so the purple would be more obvious.

I'm thinking of doing a polish sale to sell the polishes I bought but feel doesn't suit me. Would any of you be interested in buying them? I'll probably be letting go of some Essies. I should probably sell some of my polishes to make room for more! (:

 

Kelly's Smoky Politics

Been lemming for Zoya Kelly for such a long time and I finally got down to getting it! Once I laid my eyes on it, a few potential dupes came to mind so I went to dig aroud my helmer and found Essie Smokin Hot and Misa Office Polish-tics.

From L-R: Essie Smokin Hot, Misa Office Polish-tics and Zoya Kelly



With 1 coat, you can already see their base colours and how different they are. Smokin Hot is purple, Office Polish-tics is blue while Kelly is grey.



Second coat on and they're all opaque!

Kelly is pretty close to Office Polish-tics (God, I LOVE the name, not too pun-y like how some OPI names can be) but they are different. I'm pretty sure my mum will be able to tell the difference and she's really my benchmark for dupes! Kelly's formula was a little thicker while Office Polish-tics had a more runny formula but they're both equally pigmented. All of them were easy to handle and note that I'm actually showing my right hand (which means I used my left hand to paint) so that should mean something!

Best thing? They're all office-friendly colours so you won't have to worry about people whispering about your crazy nail colour! They're all neutral enough for work but with a twist of edge!

(I apologize for not cleaning up my nails. I went ahead to clean these swatches off immediately after taking these photos as I didn't plan on having three different colours on my nails. Hence I didn't bother cleaning them up nicely!)

More Holographic Goodness

Dropped by Nailvibe after work today and I spotted OPI DS Sapphire! Grabbed it immediately and didn't let go. I've been on the look out for DS Original and DS Galmour but DS Sapphire will suffice for now! Honestly, I prefer holos to the whole crackle/shatter/fracture phenomenon. As much as I think the crackle look is cool, I'd choose holographic nails. I think I speak for all nail polish addicts when I say this: Dear OPI, China Glaze, Zoya, Orly, Color Club, etc, PLEASE MAKE MORE HOLO POLISHES. Especially you, China Glaze! You've made gorgeous holo collections like the OMG Collection and the Kaleidoscope Collection! What's with the whole Tronica Collection and the fake, unimpressive holo?

Okay, on to DS Sapphire, here's a bottle shot of it, along with the other holos I picked up recently! L-R: TFS BK901, OPI DS Sapphire, Make Up Shop Greta



I know Greta doesn't look very holographapic in the bottle but trust me, it's the most holographic out of the bunch. It's a VERY linear holo, whereas Sapphire and BK901 seems a little more scattered.

I have Greta on my index, DS Sapphire on my middle finger and TFS BK901 on my index. 2 coats each with no base or top coat. I'll just let the pictures do the talking! All these were taken under my table lamp (as it's friggin night time so I don't have the sun on my side) so I would say the holo effect would be more apparent under sunlight!















Took this last picture with flash and it really helps bring out the holographic effect in the polishes! And if you noticed, I experienced really crazy tip wear with Greta. I took this picture a day after the rest of the pictures above. Before I went to bed, Greta was still intact and when I woke up, MAJOR TIP WEAR! I don't understand how I could get such bad tip wear from sleeping. Clearly it wasn't me because the other 2 polishes were as good as new! And to think Greta was the most expensive out of the bunch!



Anyway, I noticed that Greta seems to dry matte while BK901 dries quite glossy! DS Sapphire is somewhere in the middle. You can go without a top coat but it'll definitely shine more with a top coat on. I've heard that normal top coats kinda kills the holo effect abit and OPI has a DS top coat but I'm not gonna bother buying special holo top coats or aqua bases!

Also, I swear, DS Sapphire is as holo as BK901 although it doesn't seem like it in my pictures! It's really full of sparkly holo goodness! (: Maybe it's just less obvious due to its silvery, light blue base colour?

I'm really hoping by some stroke of a miracle that China Glaze would relaunch their OMG Collection! I'm just dying for holos right now. Oh, and Nfu Oh has some great holos as well but at $40 a pop? No way am I paying that kind of money! It's even more expensive than Chanel! I have tweeted the sidewalks and requested for Nfu Oh flakies though, so if she manages to bring flakies over, holos should not be a problem right?

Anyway, hope you enjoyed the pictures! (:

Polish Wishlist

Here's my polish wishlist for now. The ones I'm eyeing before I ban myself for the rest of the year.

1) Zoya Dree

2) Zoya Cynthia

3) China Glaze Westside Warrior (here and here) I know Westside Warrior looks like Dree so I need to choose one!

4) OPI Uh Oh Roll Down the Window (here, here and here) I'm starting to see a pattern here, military green!

5) OPI Road House Blues (here, here and here)

6) Orly Fowl Play (here and here)

I'm totally gonna head down to Nailvibe to see all these before getting them! I can take a peek at them, compare their colors before buying! Totally love the sales assistant there too! She was so friendly and best of all, she knew her stuff! I was chatting with her about polishes and told her I'd love to work in a polish shop and she asked me to try applying for a part time job there to work on weekends! God, that would be fun! (:

Some holographic goodness

Firstly, I'd like to say hi to my followers, especially the new ones! Quite surprised to see my follower number has gone up to 27! Maybe it's due to the Cherub's Lips' contant promotion of my entries! HAHA!
Recently went on a super short trip to Malacca over a weekend and the only thing I bought for myself (polish wise) was this gorgeous TFS holographic polish! I've seen swatches of it online earlier this year but it hasn't hit our shores yet so when I saw it selling in Malaysia, I was like "HOLY CRAP, I NEED THIS NOW". It was RM25 which works out to be arounf SGD10. I was a little hesitant to pay $10 for a TFS polish but since it's a holo, I caved.

Bottle shots first. The holo rainbow in the bottle was the thing that initially drew me to the polish.





I was hoping the holo rainbow in the bottle would mean a holo rainbow on my nails and to a certain extent, I got what I hoped for. Here, I have (top to bottom) OPI My Private Jet (the sucky new non-holo version), TFS BK901 and Color Club Revvvolution on my nails!



Left to right: OPI My Private Jet, TFS BK901 and Color Club Revvvolution



Top to bottom: Color Club Revvvolution, TFS BK901 and OPI My Private Jet



I'd give TFS BK901 credit for being the most holo out of the bunch but  it comes no where close to the Make Up Store's Greta in terms of being a linear holo. It was very opaque though. I only needed 2 coats (compared to the 4 coats required for Greta) of TFS BK901. I also used 2 coats for MPJ and Revvvolution here.

That being said, I'm in love with TFS BK901 and I'd throw CC Revvvolution out the window in a heartbeat if I had no more space in my Helmer!

Vodka and Caviar

The interns decided to paint the town red with our nails so we agreed to wear red nails to work last week! I wore OPI Vodka and Caviar which I got from Smoochiezz's Expo Sale while the other intern wore From A to Zurich (which I love and definitely want to get soon)!

Here's Vodka and Caviar!

I think the last picture is pretty accurate. Vodka and Caviar is a bright red shade with a hint of orange. It's not your bright, in-yer-face red but it does attract a certain amount of attention. The good kind anyways! I also love how lush it looked on my nails so its name was really appropriate too!

This was two coats and it glided on so smoothly. I have a layer of Seche Vite on top of it though because I painted my nails well into the night and was waiting for it to dry so I could sleep!

I have a couple of reds in my Helmer but this is one of my favourites! And for the first time, I didn't feel cheena at all wearing red on my nails!

June's Haul

Welcome everyone to my monthly haul segment! I know I shouldn't be proud that I bombed so much on polish (and other related items) again and trust me, I'm not. Actually, this month, it really hit me how much I'm spending on polish so I'll be trying to cut the habit once OPI and China Glaze (fine, and maybe Zoya too) release their fall collections. Then it's cold turkey for me until the Winter collections come out. No more buying old colours. (Oh, and as I'm typing this, I've already bought a few polishes in July but they don't count as they're already a sunk cost.)

Moving on to the lighter side of things, peeeektures! Here's a group shot before I break it down for you!



First up, the polish related items:



Finally received my Bundle Monster plated from Cherub's Lips! Gonna try it out once my internship is over! I have one week between the end of my internship and the reopening of school and I'm jamming that week with mani sessions, nail swatching, jamming with my friend as well as sleeeeeeeeping! Right, I digress but going back, I also also got OPI's nail lacquer thinner. I chose OPI over Seche Restore because OPI's one is Big 3 free while Seche Restore isn't so I can add it to my Big 3 free polishes without ruining them! I also have a thinner from Sylvie (a cheapo brand) that isn't Big 3 free so I'll use that for my less precious polishes!
Next up, the shatters / crackles!



I got the Navy and Red Shatter from Smoochiezz's Expo Flea and China Glaze's Lightning Bolt from Estella! Just swatched Lightning Bolt on one nail and it seems pretty solid! I was a little apprehensive after I ordered it and worried I'd get post-purchase dissonance (HAHA! I can still remember my Marketing concepts, not bad!) but after trying it out, I must say I'm pleased! It isn't as sheer as I had feared it would be (I tried it over Essie In Stitches, which you will see later on in the post) and it cracks pretty okay for me!
Moving on to the dark blues / greys...



L-R: OPI Light My Sapphire, OPI Suzi Skis in the Pyrenees, Zoya Caitlin and Zoya Kelly. I've swatched OPI LMS and SSITP here so I won't elaborate on those two any further. As for the two Zoyas, I have swatched them and they apply like butter. Very smooth, very opaque, very easy to use! Definitely worth their price!

Now for the mauves / red / coral



L-R: Sinful Colors Vacation Time, Essie In Stitches, Milani Fashion Design and OPI Vodka and Caviar
Swatches of Vacation Time and Vodka and Caviar will be coming up soon so keep your eyes peeled for them! As for In Stitches, I just swatched it on one of my nails and it's damn opaque. Nearly a one-coater. It's one of those grandma colours and I love such shade and my mum does too so we share shades like these and she doesn't give me a hard time about buying polishes like these because she uses them! HAHA! I haven't swatched Milani's Fashion Design but I read it's close to Chanel Orange Fizz. I personally don't think it's that close cuz Milani has more pink to it!

And now, presenting the greens...



...we have OPI Stranger Tides (swatched here), Essie Absolutely Shore and Milani Dress Maker (the Chanle Jade dupe!!!)

I love Stranger Tides (and it's Essie sister Da Bush) if you don't already know by now. As for Absolutely Shore, I haven't swatched it yet but from the bottle and other swatches I've seen online, I can;t wait to test it out! Just hope it won't been a streaky mess! Dress Maker, what can I say about it? It's green, it's shimmery, it's damn pretty. Sadly, it does take 4 coats to be opaque but I cheat a little but painting a green polish (try OPI Mermaid Tears or Hey! Get in Lime) and then a layer of Dress Maker on top!

Last but certainly not least, I got myself the OPI Top Coat (also form Smoochiezz's Expo Flea).



I got sick of my Poshe / Seche topcoats chipping in huge chunks so I decided to try out OPI's Top Coat. It does dry rather slowly though. The first time I tried it, I managed to smear the surface of my nail polish despite already having painted my polish on 4 hours earlier. This polish is really not for the chor-lor (clumpsy, rough) people and it does take a little patience to get it to dry fully. Will revisit this top coat again after trying it out to see if it helps keep polish wearing longer!

Yay, I've finally reached the end of this Haul post. Hoepfully I'll be hauling much less in the near future. I think Estella will miss me (I'm such a regular customer she started throwing in freebies for me, like those rubber strips you cut and stick on your nails, OPI pouches and she even gave me an OPI swatch plate today) but she has so much more customers these days anyway! Hopefully you guys have been more succesful at controling your polish lemmings than I have!

Hi, My Name is Melissa and...

(credits)

Saw this on tumblr and I knew I had to post this!

Zoya's Fall Collection

(image credit: thepolishaholic)

 

I SUPER CANNOT WAIT FOR THIS COLLECTION TO LAUNCH! GOOOOODNESS, JUST LOOK AT THE COLOURS!

I'm already eyeing Jana, Cynthia, Dree and Marina!

Still in the darkened shimmery craze over here

As you probably know, I've been lusting for dark shimmery / metallic shades for quite a while now. I didn't know it at the time but I guess it probably started when I swatched on Chanel Steel quite a long time ago. And after that, it was Black Pearl and OPI Lucerne-tainly Look Marvelous which made my lemming more obvious.

So far, I've gotten quite a number of dark shimmers but when I saw these 2 colours at Smoochiezz flea the over day, my inner polish devil told me I had to get them! On the left, OPI Light My Sapphire (LMS) and on the right, OPI Suzi Skis in the Pyrenees (SSITP).

The colours here are pretty accurate but they both have shimmers which I'll show you in a bit. Colour-wise, LMS is a very dark blue shimmer while SSITP is a very smokey grey-blue with more subtle shimmer going on. It almost looks like a creme in fact! In low light, they both look like black but in the sunlight, that's when they really shine and they show their true beauty!

In indirect sunlight, they kinda look the same and they still don't show their true potential!

Oh, I forgot to mention that I have LMS on my index and ring fingers, and SSITP on my middle finger and pinkie. Under sunlight, you can see the shimmer in LMS especially on my ring finger! Also, LMS is cooler than the other navys I have so I really don't have a dupe for it! It's so cool it sometimes come across as a little purplish. As for SSITP, you can see how smoky it is! It's a good mixture of grey and blue and maybe even a drop of green!

With flash!

I know it's summer now but hey, fall is coming soon and these are so perfect for fall (ahem, even though we are in a perpetual summer here in Singapore)! Can't wait to rock them! :D