A blog about a girl, her nail polish, and some delicious noms.
Posts tagged layered
Layering Experiment No. 10 – Sea Dreamscape From The Vault Of Yesteryear
13 days ago
by Rie
in Layering Experiment
* (The product(s) in this post were purchased by me.)
Hey Everyone!
I’ve had this layering experiment lounging in my draft purgatory for TWO YEARS!! I initially had been saving it for a guest blog post or a rainy day, and neither happened so I decided to finally let this mani see the light of day after languishing away for so long, haha! Bear with me, this was from way back when. I don’t even think my blog was even a year old at the time and my photography/nail shaping skills were still a work in progress. But this manicure… Is just so damn pretty!
I hope you all enjoy this trip back in time to 2011. 
Pure Ice Heartbreaker + Rescue Beauty Lounge Più Mosso + NYX Girls Dreamy Glitter
I started out with two coats of Rescue Beauty Lounge Più Mosso by itself, a deep blackened blue filled with copper shimmer. I love this color so much. 
Then I added two layers of Dreamy Glitter by NYX Girls. The name of this one fits it perfectly. It has a clear/pink base filled with prismatic hex, star, and micro-glitter. I topped everything off with a light layer of Heartbreaker by Pure Ice. People, this polish is a layering dynamo! Just do a google search for it and your heart will stop. If you can find Heartbreaker I highly suggest you snatch it up.
I really REALLY love the outcome of this layering combination! It reminds me of a dreamy underwater seascape.
Lastly, here’s a close-up so you can see all the wonderful things happening on my nail. If I could keep this manicure forever I probably would.
And here’s random bottle shots of the individual nail polishes that I used. I really need to utilize the NYX and Pure Ice polishes more often. SOOOO many possibilities! ^_^
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This post brings back so much nostalgia from the start of my blog, complete with microscopic watermarks and nubby nails haha! But it also reminds me of how much I enjoy layering to see what I can come up with depending on various nail polish combinations. Methinks I’ll have to do more layering experiments a lot more often.
* (The product(s) in this post were purchased by me.)
NOTD: Layering With A England Heavenly Quotes And The Moonbeams and She Walks In Beauty
14 days ago
* The product(s) in this post were sent to me for unbiased review consideration.
For more information, check out my Disclosure Policy.
Morning Lovelies!
Adina sent me these lovely nail polishes a while back, and I finally had the chance to play around with them. Today I’ll be showing you two polishes from the A England Heavenly Quotes collection, And the Moonbeams… and A England She Walks In Beauty. Both can be worn on their own as well as layered over another nail polish. ^_^
A England And The Moonbeams… and She Walks In Beauty
A England She Walks In Beauty + And The Moonbeams…
A England She Walks In Beauty + And The Moonbeams…
A England’s She Walks In Beauty is an intricate mix of large and small rose-colored hexagonal glitter in a shimmering pale golden base that color shifts depending on the lighting and movement of your fingers. It’s so pretty! I used 3 coats for this manicure and you can just barely make out my VNL in photos, it doesn’t show at all in person. And The Moonbeams… is a sheer yellow-golden shimmery base filled with irregularly shaped gold glass flecks and glitter. I used it on my accent nail (ring finger) in this manicure and it was opaque enough for me after 3 coats.
A England She Walks In Beauty + And The Moonbeams…
A England She Walks In Beauty + And The Moonbeams…
This manicure has a supremely delicate and feminine look that I absolutely love! I immediately sent pictures of it to my pal Anna who is getting married next month and told her that this would be GORGEOUS for incorporating into her wedding mani (being done by yours truly )! She agreed.
A England And The Moonbeams…
A England She Walks In Beauty
And here are macro shots of both And The Moonbeams… and She Walks In Beauty. ^_^
A England And The Moonbeams… with A England Sleeping Palace
A England And The Moonbeams… layered over A England Sleeping Palace
A England And The Moonbeams… layered over A England Sleeping Palace
A England And The Moonbeams… layered over A England Sleeping Palace
I showed you A England’s Sleeping Palace on its own yesterday, and here it is again with just 1 coat of And The Moonbeams… layered over top. I LOVE how these two look together! I didn’t think to take a photo with flash to see if the holographic nature of Sleeping Palace would shine through, but even without flash this layering is a stunner.
A England She Walks In Beauty + And The Moonbeams…
And for no real reason other than “I have a picture of it”, here’s the bottle shots for And The Moonbeams… and She Walks In Beauty. ^_^
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That’s in for today everyone! The layering possibilities for And The Moonbeams and She Walks In Beauty are pretty limitless. I didn’t try layering She Walks In Beauty this time, but it’s definitely on my To-Do list for future layering projects!
* The product(s) in this post were sent to me for unbiased review consideration.
For more information, check out my Disclosure Policy.
Review: Pretty and Polished S’no Mans Land!
1Allo Everyone!
Welcome to Day 2 of my Pretty and Polished Extravaganza, haha! I’ve got another holiday collection polish to share with you all today. This time we’re gonna check out Pretty and Polished S’no Mans Land. Let’s get straight to it, shall we? ^_^
Pretty and Polished – S’no Mans Land
S’no Mans Land is a frosty white polish filled with satin white hex glitter and small iridescent glitter. At first I was incredibly frustrated with this polish. It looked so pretty in the bottle and when I tried to wear it alone it was a frosty-streak filled disaster for me. 
What I quickly learned about S’no Mans Land is that you need patience to get it to work for you and not against you. What you also need to do is layer this sucker, unless you don’t mind the frosty finish when worn alone.
What you see above is 1 THIN coat of S’no Mans Land layered over OPI My Boyfriend Scales Walls. This turned out to be my favorite combo for this polish. This turned out quite pretty when done this way. But make sure your coats are thiiiiinnn, I made the coat on my pointer finger just a little too thick and it started looking pearly again. 
The hex glitter is sparse but fishing wasn’t necessary, and I would not recommend fishing for this polish because it’ll just make your nails look like a mess, hah!
And here is a shot of 2 coats of S’no Mans Land on its own. I only did my pinky before I gave up on it to go with my layering combo instead. I mean, it’s certainly not the worst thing I’ve ever seen. But it was just too frosty on its own for me.
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Final Thoughts:
While not my favorite polish of the holiday collection that I’ve tried, S’no Mans Land can be saved! ^_^ If you layer it over white it has quite the ethereal look thanks to the hex and iridescent glitter. Once I learned how to work with S’no Mans Land I really did love how it looked layered!
But bear in mind that it can be tricky to work with. And if frosty finish nail polishes are the bane of your existence, or you don’t like to layer your polishes then this may not be the polish you are looking for.
Purchase Info:
Pretty and Polished S’no Mans Land can be purchased from Chels Marie’s new shop, www.shopprettyandpolished.com. It retails at $5.00 for the mini and $9 for the full sized bottle. You can also still find Pretty and Polished on her Etsy Shop.
For updates and previews of new collections, follow Pretty and Polished on Facebook and Twitter!
* The product(s) in this post were sent to me for unbiased review consideration.
For more information, check out my Disclosure Policy.
Review: Kolt Dual Chrome Swatches and Review
7
Morning Everyone!
I’m sorry for falling off the face of the polish earth. I’ve been around, just not around on the blog so much. I’m quite a few days behind on the 31 Day Challenge but I will work on getting caught up. Thanksgiving had me SUPER busy (if you follow me on Twitter or Instagram you know how much I had to cook!), and afterward I’ve just been going through a blah phase I think. I actually hadn’t repainted my nails after Day 22, and my Gangnam style nails didn’t get removed until 2 days ago!
But anyway, I’m getting back into it because I’m WAY behind on things I need to show you guys. Today I’ve got a Brazilian brand that’s completely new to me, Kolt Dual Chromes! When I received these from Harlow & Co. I decided right away that I was going to layer them. I used A England Camelot (my faaaaaaaavorite black nail polish) as my base for each polish.
This post is SUPER picture heavy so I’m putting it behind a cut. I used 2 coats of each polish over one coat of black. I’ll go over application and formula in my final thoughts since it was similar for all 7 polishes.
HARE Polish Bisbee Is Finally Mine!!
13Morning Lovelies!
I hope you all had a great weekend! First I want to say that a winner of my Cirque All Hallow’s Eve Collection Giveaway has been chosen and the winner has been contacted via email. They have 48 hours to respond before I choose another potential winner from the list of entries. 
Today I’ve got a polish to share with you all that had been a HUGE lemming on my wishlist for over a year, HARE Polish Bisbee!! I missed my opportunity to own this lovely polish last year when HARE Polish went MIA for a long time. But now that it’s back again this polish was finally made available for purchase through Llarowe a few weeks ago. I got super lucky and was able to snag one during the first mini-restock of Bisbee. It literally sold out in less than 3 minutes! 
But don’t worry, if you missed it during that restock it will be back some time this week (maybe Wednesday I think?).
HARE Polish Bisbee
HARE Polish Bisbee is a gorgeous turquoise-teal jelly that is filled with gold hex glitter in varying sizes. It was named after the turquoise and copper mines in Bisbee, Arizona. It looked pretty sheer so I decided to layer 1 thick coat of Bisbee over 2 coats of Pixel Aqua-Escence (not a typo, it’s actually spelled that way…).
Next time I wear Bisbee I think I’ll do 2 thin coats over a base polish or see how it looks on its own. I want MOAR of those gold hex glitters all over my nails. It wasn’t hard to apply though and I did not have to use the dabbing method.
Here’s a macro bottle shot. I can’t get over how much I LOVE Bisbee. I am totally going to add a matte topcoat next time too!
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Final Thoughts:
I am so so SO happy that I was finally able to get my hands on Bisbee! I may or may not have squealed at my Llarowe package when this arrived at my door last week. HARE Polish was one of my first Indie polish loves and I’m so happy that she is back and making new collections as well as slowly releasing some of her older polishes that I missed the first time around.
Purchase Info:
HARE Polish Bisbee is available through Llarowe for the time being for $11.00/ea, but I’m sure that it will be on the HARE Polish Etsy Shop in the future.
You can stay updated on news and restocking dates by following Llarowe and HARE Polish on Facebook, or by signing up for the Llarowe email updates via her website.
Review: Cagedbird Nail Lacquer
13
Morning Everyone!
I have two nail polishes to show you from Cagedbird Nail Lacquer today. Cagedbird is an indie brand that is new to me. From her Etsy page she described Cagedbird Nail Lacquer as “a variety of both handmade from scratch nail lacquers and custom blended nail lacquers using craft and cosmetic grade glitters with existing polishes.”
Sarah (the lady behind Cagedbird) sent me two of her polishes for review, Antoinette and Rose Gold. Let’s move on to the swatches!
Antoinette
Antoinette is a very sheer cream nail lacquer containing gold, rose pink, pastel blue holo and pink holo glitter, fine iridescent glitter and silver glitter. Antoinette is also my middle name (yes… my name is Marie Antoinette, for real. ) so I’m already partial to this polish! I ended up trying out Antoinette on its own this time around and I used 4 coats here. You can still see a bit of VNL but it doesn’t bother me. Next time I’ll layer it over a pale blue, jelly white or pink and see what it looks like.
I love love LOVE the mix of glitters in Antoinette. It’s such a delicate polish and it makes me crave french macarons. Application was pretty good, it has a thicker formula but it was still easy to apply. Dry time was a little slower than usual but I also had on 4 coats of polish.
Rose Golden
Rose Golden is a mix of metallic glitter in both medium yellow gold hexes and rose pink in various sizes. I loooooove this one! This is just 1 coat of Rose Golden over L’Oreal Cockatoo’s Mystery. Rose Golden has such a heavy glitter ratio you could probably reach opacity with it alone after 2-3 coats.
This one was an absolute breeze to apply and I didn’t have any issues with glitter placement (no ‘dabbing’ is necessary).
Here’s a swatch of L’Oreal Cockatoo’s Mystery by itself. It’s a pretty muted taupe/greige from their LE Project Runway collection (borrowed from my fellow lacquerhead/knitting/crochet machine roomie ).
And here’s one more bottle shot of Antoinette and Rose Golden for you. I love the mini bottle shapes and the cute ribbons!
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Final Thoughts:
I really enjoyed both of these polishes. Both Antoinette and Rose Golden had great formulas, good brushes and I really have no complaints. I also like the fact that they provide the full list of ingredients for their polishes on each product link. Cagedbird Nail Lacquer is on my radar now. So I’ll have to browse her Etsy shop to see what other goodies Sarah has to offer from now on. ^_^
Purchase Info:
Rose Golden and Antoinette can be purchased from the Cagedbird Nail Lacquer Etsy Shop. They retail at $5.00/ea for the 5ml bottles and $10.00/ea for the 15ml bottles. The shop looks a little bare-bones right now but you can follow Cagedbird on their Facebook Fanpage to stay updated on restocks and any other news. ^_^
* The product(s) in this post were sent to me for unbiased review consideration.
For more information, check out my Disclosure Policy.
Review: Lilacquer Polishes Fifth Element Collection Swatches!!
9
Allo Everyone!
I’ve got a swatches from an Indie polish brand that’s new to me to share with you all today. We’ll be taking a look at the Lilacquer Polishes Fifth Element collection! When I was first contacted by Lilacquer Polishes and asked if I wanted to review her Fifth Element collection I friggen JUMPED at the chance to get my hands on these babies! For one, I’m a gigantic nerd. And two, The Fifth Element is one of my absolute favorite movies of all time!
So basically if it’s a nail polish and it’s named after a fandom I love, imma need that polish son.
Cathleen, the owner of Lilacquer Polishes, specializes in duochrome polish and top coats. This was another reason I was quite interested in her collection. The Indie/Independent polish world is absolutely flooded with glitter polishes, so I love discovering Indie brands with something different to offer.
The Fifth Element collection is a set of 8 sheer and jelly (!!!) topcoat polishes that can be worn on their own or layered over another polish to enhance the duochrome effect. I’ll be showing you each nail polish on its own and layered over A England Camelot (a black creme).
For the full swatches and review, click the link below. I used Cult Nails Get It On and Wicked Fast base/top coat today.
OPI Spotted Is Mine!!! And There’s No Such Thing As To Many Layers…
13Hey Everyone!
Just a quick post today sharing an instagram from last night with you all. I received a wonderful package in the mail from my lovely Sam of Fashion Polish. Not only was I thrilled to have OPI Spotted staring back at me for this glorious bubble lined mailer, but to my surprise she tucked in a bottle of yet another coveted polish I thought I’d never own: Kiko 270!! I think at that moment I made a noise only dogs can hear, haha!
I also finally received my Zoya trio promo polishes and I wanted to try a gradient with those like the ones that Mimi shared on her blog, Makeup Withdrawal. She is the reason I absolutely NEEDED Zoya Arizona, Wednesday and Tracie.
Sooooo, I may have gotten over-excited and layered everything except for Zoya Arizona on my nails.
OPI Spotted With Zoya and Kiko Friends
I first started with 2 coats of Zoya Tracie, then I sponged on Zoya Wednesday. After that I added on a coat of OPI Spotted. And then finished it all off with a coat of Kiko 270. You can’t see the Kiko polish in this photo but I assure you that it’s there.
I’m still learning how best to use OPI Spotted, and I think adding Kiko 270 over the top of everything may have been overkill…. But ah well. Ya live and ya learn.
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That’s it for today, just a tiny over-zealous NOTD for you all to take a gander at.
You’ll be seeing a lot more of OPI Spotted and some more swatches of the Zoya Beach & Surf Collection in the near future. ^_^
Zoya Blogger Collection by Birchbox Swatches and Review
10
Morning Lovelies!
Today I’ve got the Zoya Blogger Collection by Birchbox to share with you fine people. This collection snuck up on me, the first I’d ever heard of it was randomly seeing swatches of it from another blogger on Twitter!
This collaboration between Birchbox and Zoya was created by three different bloggers and voted on by fans. I don’t know where the heck I was during this whole process because I only heard of it after it was already on sale at the Birchbox website, hah!
Anyway, as soon as I saw the collection of bright summer jellies I just knew it had to be mine! Let’s take a look at these beauties. ^_^
I used Models Own 3-In-1 topcoat/basecoat for all my swatches today unless otherwise stated.
Zoya Belle
Zoya Belle is described as a coppery pink with flecks of iridescent glitter. I love the pinkish-golden glitter that is present in this one! I used 3 coats.
Zoya Kate
Zoya Kate makes me feel like I’m taking crazy pills. On the Birchbox site this polish is described as being a grapefruit pink coral. This polish is totally leaning on the orange side of coral for me. O_O Every other swatch I’d seen for this one shows it as being more pink, but every single other swatch I’ve seen has also been on someone with a much cooler skin tone than mine. Maybe it’s my monitor? I don’t effing know, lmao.
So I guess Kate is just orange-ish pink on me. It’s still gorgeous, just not really all that pink on me. I used 3 coats here, no topcoat and it’s still super glossy! You can see what Kate looks like on a cooler skin tone on Scrangie’s blog.
Coraline
Zoya Coraline is hands down my favorite in the trio. Coraline is a bright tangerine orange and we’re in love. I used 4 coats here, and the VNL isn’t super visible in person. Again no topcoat here.
Zoya Kate + Zoya Belle
This is 1 coat of Zoya Belle over Zoya Kate. I love this combination and how Belle just pops when layered on top of Kate. This combination brings out a little more of the pink coral hue in Kate that I normally don’t see when it’s by itself on my nails.
Zoya Coraline + Zoya Belle
And here is 1 coat of Zoya Belle over Zoya Coraline! This layering just glows! I think I’ll have to try this combination for my next pedicure. All I need it for the dang sun to come out for more than 20 minutes and I’ll hit the beach running.
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Final Thoughts:
I’m really quite happy with this little trio of polishes! I’m a sucker for jellies, so add coral and orange to the mix and it was pretty much a given that the Zoya Blogger Collection had to be mine. The formulas for the jellies were medium thick, but easy to apply and quite buildable. You’ll want to wait a few minutes between coats to prevent cuticle drag though. I think it would be fun to do a jelly gradient with these three polishes, so I’ll have to keep that in mind for a future project.
Purchase Info:
The Zoya Blogger Collection is a limited edition trio that can be purchased exclusively from Birchbox. It retails at $22.00 for the set of three.
Layering Experiment No. 9 – ANNY The Answer Is Love With Max Factor Fantasy Fire
101 year ago
by Rie
in Layering Experiment
Allo Everyone!
It’s been a few months since I’ve done a layering experiment post, and this one that I’ll be showing you today is possibly one of my new favorites. This was the base polish combo I was wearing underneath my X-Out Nail Project mani from the other day.
I’m a bit sleep deprived and groggy so I’ll just get on with the photos! You’re gonna want to maximize every single one of this pictures.
ANNY The Answer Is Love + Max Factor Fantasy Fire
I started out with ANNY The Answer Is Love, my new favorite vampy polish of all time. ^_^ Then I added 2 coats of Max Factor Fantasy Fire. The infamy of this polish being a close dupe to the beloved Clarins 230 (aka “Unicorn Pee”) is all over nail blogs around the world. My lovely Esther was amazing enough to snag a bottle of Fantasy Fire for me and I’ve been in love with its layering possibilities ever since. ♥
The combo of Fantasy Fire and The Answer Is Love is pretty much the most amazing thing I’ve ever seen! I love how the multi-chromatic shimmer dances from orange to copper to green, and I got SO many compliments from clients at the salon about this layering in the past few days. Imma need a back-up bottle for both.
Here’s a macro shot. Just take a moment to bathe in all of its beauty.
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That’s it for today lovelies! Do any of you have Fantasy Fire in your lives? If so, what have you tried layering it with? I’d love to hear your suggestions!
