Philly Loves Lacquer - Summer Down The Shore Collection

Hello everyone! Today I have a fab new collection from Philly Loves Lacquer to show you (the polishes were sent to me for review). I had been waiting patiently for these to arrive only to find out that they had been held up in Customs (grrrrr!). But they finally arrived at the weekend so I could get swatching! 

Starting with the glitter bomb that is Meet Me At Morey's. This has so many different kinds of glitter in it I wouldn't know where to start. Its shown here as two coats over Love Those Wildwood Days (more on that one later!) and with one coat of top coat.

Next we have the colour I used for the base above, Love Those Wildwood Days. Its a beautiful light sky blue scattered holo. I loooove the tone of this blue. Its poictured here with two coats and no top coat.

Wildwoods By The Sea is next and I love this sea green, teal-esque (yay, new word!) scattered holo. I rarely find polishes that I'd be happy to wear on their own without nail art, but this is one of them. The pictures show two coats and no top coat.

Next up is the champagne frosty goodness of Island Beach, another fab scattered holo. This one needed three coats, but the finish was excellent.

This next polish, On The Way To Cape May, is my favourite of the bunch (along with Wildwoods By The Sea). This surprises me as I'm not usually a huge fan of reds. But this red is full of strawberry-toned, juicy awesomeness and comes with a side of red and silver shimmer. This again was three coats and no top coat.

Last but not least from my selection, we have Watch The Tram Car Please. A fun yellow crelly with blue and green glitters. Shown here is three coats and one coat of top coat. I usually get annoyed applying this kind of polish, but this one was surprisingly easy.

Overall I love the collection, and the only reason I wouldn't wear the crelly is that yellow is not a fan of my skin tone! The stand out shades for me are On The Way To Cape May and Wildwoods By The Sea, plus there is another colour in the collection called Under The Boardwalk that I think would probably have been my absolute favourite (a charcoal grey with a purple shimmer). I'll be stalking the shop until the collection is released for that one!

The Summer Down the Shore collection will be available from 1st June at the Philly Loves Lacquer shop. Full size bottles will retail at $11-12. The entire collection will be available at $85 for full size bottles or $42.50 for the mini size bottles. You can also buy a "4 pack" (your choice of any four from the collection) for $42.50 for full size, or $21.25 for minis.

Sam xx

FingerFood's Theme Buffet Week 2 - Shapes/Geometric

Hello everyone! Today I have a Theme Week mani for you - for those of you that follow, I'm a little late posting this week but I hope its worth the wait.

I decided to test my patience as far as possible with many fiddly bits of tape (I think I'm now done with tape for the year and its only January!), because I thought squares would be cute.

I started with a French White base and allowed it to dry. Next I added three pieces of tape vertically down the nail and six pieces horizontally This was a tad time consuming - and not at all good for my OCD. Next was the fun part - I added (from tip to base) Barry M Gelly Blackberry, LA Colors Edgy, Electra and Wisteria and finished with Barry M Gelly Prickly Pear. I then carefully removed the tape and finished with Seche Vite.

Despite the fact that they took forever and it makes me angry and impatient just to look at them - I do like the way these turned out. They remind me of paint colour charts and I'm happy with the gradient effect of the colours.

Our theme for next week is Weather, time for something wild maybe? :) In the meantime, follow the links below to see the fabulous geometric creations by the other ladies in the group. And if you would like to join us, click here for all the details :)

Sam xx 

GOT Polish Challenge - Stripes

Hello everyone! Scarlett is finally back at school but now I'm ill! Really can't catch a break at the moment :( However, on the upside my laptop problems have been solved with an early birthday present of a Chromebook! I'm a total Google/Android geek so saying that I'm excited is probably a little bit of an understatement, and playing with all the apps is keeping me occupied until I'm back on form!

Anyway, back to the nails :) My polish hoarding started with my Jessica collection in 2009. Up to that point I constantly wore acrylics and my natural nails were ruined. A friend suggested Phenomen Oil and Restoration base coat and I never looked back. I probably have about 60 or 70 Jessica polishes even though I haven't bought any (apart from replacements) in over a year, but I love them all.

I picked some bright neon colours as I've decided I've had enough of winter several months early - Purple Burst, Blue Blast and Diva On The Dunes. I taped wide stripes over a white base and then added the brights. The formula has suffered a bit with age on the blue and pinky purple but I got there without too much trouble and finished with Seche Vite.

This mani was a little trip down memory lane for me - not the best time of my life but I'm happy to say that things are lot better now. If nothing else I can see that I've always had good taste in polish!

Sam xx

Belle Glamour Polish Review

Hello everyone! Today I have something a little different for you! As stated in my list of New Year intentions (note that I didn't say resolutions!), I promised more swatches and to look at some indie polishes. I'm pleased to say that it starts now!

Today I am reviewing four polishes from Belle Glamour. They all arrived after fantastic service from the lovely Catriona, all individually wrapped and labelled in bubble wrap and tissue paper. I ordered four 5ml bottles to start with and selected a variety of colours and finishes.

I'm going to start with Chocolate Kiss, a light pastel brown with a purple-ish tinge, but it is like looking at chocolate milk on your nails and I loved the colour, so rich and luxurious. The formula is thick enough that it is opaque after one coat (although I painted two because I'm like that), but still easy to work with. I can definitely see myself using this polish in nail art, but its also a great stand alone colour.

Next up, we have the Limited Edition polish, Bluebelle. This is an eye catching deep blue with a sprinkling of holo hex glitter that helps create an instant jelly sandwich effect. I found the formula on this one a little harder to work with, and it took four coats to get it opaque, but the glitter was easy to manipulate in the thinner formula and it was worth perservering for the finished result as you can see from the photos:

The third polish is called Splatter Bomb - no prizes for guessing why! There is so much multi coloured glitter packed into this creamy white polish that it is almost opaque and fully glitter bombed with just one coat! Again, I went for two, but it didn't need a base colour and there aren't many glitter polishes that you can say that about! Considering how much glitter there is crammed into it, the polish went on surprisingly smoothly (the brushes are a great help with this) and the finish evened out beautifully with a layer of top coat.

 Last but not least is my favourite of the four, a blue holo polish called Wave. Omg I love this! The holo effect is subtle but is definitely there, and the colour is a beautiful marine blue that has a very subtle green tone. Very rock and roll mermaid! Two coats to get it fully opaque, although I probably could've got away with one and it was so easy to work with. I can't find a bad word to say about this one at all - its fab.

So, I was very happy with all my selections from Belle Glamour, but I have to say that Wave (the holo) was my standout colour, closely followed by Chocolate Kiss. I loved the colour and formula on those two, so I can safely say that I will be going back for more pastels and holos :)

So there you have my first Indie review - who else do you think I should check out? Let me know :)

Sam xx