#SGSwatchFest: World Water Day and Earth Hour

Hello my dear polish lovers! Earth Hour is tonight and in celebration of this special event, together with World Water Day (which was yesterday), I thought I'd do a special mani!

My mani was inspired by blues and greens - the beautiful colours of our Earth. From left to right: China Glaze Meteor Shower, Nfu Oh #40 over black, Gloss 'n Sparkle Edge of the World and a saran wrap nail with OPI Mermaid Tears topped off with NOPI Khloe Had a Little Lam Lam.







Time for some close ups!

This is two coats of China Glaze Meteor Shower. I think that it's important for us to just enjoy the simple things in life like watching the night sky and I'm hoping that during the hour when the lights get turned off, maybe we can all just look up to the sky and appreciate the beautiful stars.



This is one coat of Nfu Oh #40 over black. #40 is a colour shifting flakie which shits from green to cyan to blue and it just reminds me of the ocean.



This is three coats of Glass 'n Sparkle Edge of the World. It's a pretty teal jelly with blue and green hex glitters, together with some finer holo glitters. Very suitable for Earth Day eh? :)



This is a saran wrap done with OPI Mermaid Tears topped with NOPI Khloe Had a Little Lam Lam. I loved the saran wrap mani with the sepia tones and I wanted to do it again with more water / ocean-inspired colours.



If you have some time to spare, do take a look at the UN World Water and Earth Hour websites! Till next time! :)

Nfu Oh #51 - Substitute Unicorn's Pee?

I'm sure most of you have heard of and seen Clarins 230, a polish that's been dubbed as Unicorn's Pee by many polish lovers due to its ability to morph from a green shimmer, to gold and even to red! But because it's so rare and people are selling it on ebay at crazy sky high prices, I don't think I'll every own 230. That's where Nfu Oh #51 comes in. Many people have compared it to 230 in terms of how it can morph in colour as well, except that 230 only has shimmer particles while #51 has both shimmer particles and flakies. Hey, extra flakies thrown in? I don't mind!

When I received #51 in the mail, I had to swatch it to find out if it's really a close substitute for 230!
(Warning: Photo spam ahead! Click on the images to enlarge them!)





Can you see the flakies?!



Here's where the colour morphing begins! From red...



to amber...



to bronzey-gold



and lastly to green!

I have on one coat of #51, over two coats of VIII plant (which is a franken I created that is simply China Glaze VIII with some clear polish added in) in all the pictures. No top coat.

WOWZAH! #51 is such a versatile beauty! I couldn't stop looking at my nail the whole time I had it on! Yes, nail, I only painted my thumb nail as my other 4 fingers were coated with the Chanel Les Jeans polishes. I actually went to school and gave a presentation with 3 colours on my left hand (and none on my right)!
If you can get your painted paws on #51, please get it! You won't regret getting it!

China Glaze Sea Spray (with Nubar 2010)

I bought Sea Spray soooooo long ago and I haven't worn it before (I've only swatched when I first got it just to see what it'd look like on my nails, and then I took it off) so I decided to give it a test run. I was so in love when it when I first saw it on ALU and I just had to have it!

I had quite a rough time trying to photograph its colour accurately. It was either too blue or too grey and this was the best I could do!







I hope you can see the secret shimmer in Sea Spray in these pictures! Click to enlarge them!
I wore Sea Spray for 2 days just on its own ad then I got a little bored and decided to spice things up with Nubar 2010!





Here's how Nubar 2010 looks on top of Sea Spray, straight on. Mostly purple and blue flakes. I've been trying to get 2010 to looks purple on a lot of polishes as base but it never does. It always looks orange and green only so imagine my delight when I saw purple flakes on Sea Spray! Oh, but the magic had just begun!



When I placed my nails at an angle. I could see purple, orange and green flakes!

AND THEN THIS HAPPENED! You NEED to click on the pictures to enlarge them and get a better view of the flakes! The colours are so much more vibrant when the pictures are bigger.







This was my favourite picture of the bunch!



I must say, I almost took off Sea Spray altogether because I was getting a bit bored with the colour and I'm so glad I decided to layer on 2010 instead! I'm gonna try layering 2010 on top of lighter shades from now on to try and get the different colours of the flakes to shine. They appear mostly orange and green on most darker shades and I want to see more blue and purple coming out!

In other news, I just managed to snag China Glaze DV8 and 2nite from a fellow nail enthusiast! She had spare (unused) bottles and were selling them and I immediately jumped on this opportunity to own part of the China Glaze OMG collection! Now, it's not OMG but at least they're both still very pretty! Can't wait for them to arrive!!

Matte About You

Oh yes, I'm officially mad about Essie Matte About You! Matte About You is a matte top coat that can turn any glossy polish into a matte finish and from what I've seen online, it's best to turn glitter polishes matte so I decided to take a stab at it and try turning some of my glitters matte!









Here are the polishes I have on my nails for the above pictures:
Thumb: TFS BL604 and one coat of Nubar 2010 on top
Index: TFS BL607 with one coat of China Glaze Fairy Dust on top
Middle: LA Girl Color Addict Idol with one coat of OPI I Lily Love You on top
Ring: Essie Lapis of Luxury with one coat of OPI DS Sapphire on top
Pinkie: LA Girl Color Addict Idol with one coat of China Glaze Meteor Shower on top

And of course one coat of Essie Matte About You on top of them all!



For this nail, I've got LA Girl Color Addict Idol and one coat of OPI Sparkle-icious on top and then mattified with Essie Matte About You.

Don't you think Matte About You made the glitters shine even more (such a paradox I know)! I did notice that with holographic colours (DS Sapphire and Fairy Dust), Matte About You made them rather flat so I wouldn't recomment mattifying any holo shades/glitters. Other glitters where the particles are of different colours (but not holographic) will because even more beautiful! Matte About You brought out the pink, blue and green particles in I Lily Love You as well as the red, blue and green particles in Meteor Shower. I particularly love these two shades being mattified because they reminded me of the night sky! I also can't wait for my Nfu Oh flakies to arrive so I can mattify them too! (:

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! (:

Orly Fowl Play

Remember how a couple of posts back I was talking about how Orly's Fowl Play looks like Merry Midnight? Now, I have proof, courtesy of Gilded Nails!



This is what she wrote:

"To my eyes, Merry Midnight's base is a touch brighter and redder. And the finish of Merry Midnight seems more glossy than Fowl Play but a good top coat would fix this.  However, these differences are quite negligible and when looking at my nails in natural and artificial light, I honestly couldn't tell the difference between the two."

OH MY GOD I AM ALREADY SPAZZING WITH EXCITEMENT! I can't wait to get my hands on Fowl Play once it launches! Too bad 8ty8beauty stopped bringing in new Orlys so I'd probably have to get this baby from nailvibe when they can get a hold on some! Oh man, flakies have got me by the chokehold!
Also, I'm so glad to see so many onsugarettes discovering Nubar 2010! Looks like we all bought our bottles from the sidewalks and I'm so happy that the flakies excitement is slowly spreading! (:

Mavala Flakies

Finally got down to swatching the Mavala Flakies I went all the way to AMK twice to get. First time I went, the shop was closed for some event so I dropped by again after school. I actually took the red line from Jurong East till AMK (which took what, 40 mintues?) just for 3 bottles of flakies, see how bad my polish addiction is!

Right, so time for peektures!

L-R: Nubar 2010, Mavala Canopus, Vega and Orion (without flash) The Mavala bottles are really small, 5ml compared to the standard 15ml bottles that OPI and ChG uses. But I like the tiny bottle cuz once I'm done with them, I can clean them up and use them to franken polishes!



(With flash)



Canopus is a warm, off-white clear polish with shimmer and flakies.



Vega is cooler and has a slight-grey-blue tone to it. Of course when painted on, it's almost identical to Canopus unless you paint 3 coats and more.



Orion is clearly an orange-red polish and it's more opaque than the previous two. You'll see later.



Another group shot! I have no idea why Canopus has so much less polish in the bottle because it was sealed so it's not like anyone used it! But it was the last bottle at Pink Beauty so I grabbed it anyway.



One coat of each, (L-R) 2010, Canopus, Vega and Orion









With 2010, Canopus and Vega, you can barely see them on the nail with one coat. Orion on the other hand, already gave a red hue upon its first coat. Also, with the 3 Mavala polishes, the shimmer was more dominant than the flakies so most of the time, you can only see the shimmer.

Time for a second coat.




With flash, you can see that Vega is a little more opaque than Canopus and that Vega is starting to appear cooler than Canopus, which is warmer.



With the second coat on, the flakes in 2010 are more prominent and the shimmer in Canopus and Vaga are starting to show as well. The flakes are there but they're just harder to capture. With Orion, I noticed that it was hard to differentiate the flakes from the shimmer cuz they were the same colour!

On to coat number 3.







I really didn't want to waste my flakies so I stopped at coat 3. At this rate, it would probably take 5 coats to be totally opaque for Canopus and Vaga. 2010 will never be opaque because it was a clear base without any shimmer, just flakes. Orion was the only polish that got opaque so quickly but I'm not totally happy with its colour. It reminds me too much of CNY and I felt very cheena and obiang when I wore it!

Close ups:

2010



Canopus



Vega



Orion



So, that concludes my flakies posts! You've seen all 4 flakies I own and I hope you're now into flakies as I am! (: