Showing posts with label lavender. Show all posts
Showing posts with label lavender. Show all posts

26 Apr 2014

Primark PS Polishes - swatches and review

Hello everyone! I ventured out shopping recently and popped into Primark. We don't have one near us and despite the fact that I rarely find anything I would actually want to wear in there, I had a fair bit of success with both PJs and nail polish. I'm guessing you're not that fussed about the PJs (although I am pleased to report that the "soft feel" is indeed very soft!), but I bought three colours that will remain nameless thanks to uninformative labelling (polish, not PJs) and have them swatched to show you today :)

The first is a lavender creme. It has a lot of blue grey tones and I was pleasantly surprised by the formula - no streaking and two coats for an opaque finish (topped with Seche Vite for the pics). But the smell  - ouch! There is something about cheap polish (apart from LA Colors - yes I'm singing their praises again!) that has my little ol' hypochondriac self worrying about chemical poisoning. Luckily we're coming into spring, so I could have all doors and windows open :)





The next up is a real blue's blue. Its a solid blue creme. Bright but mid, again opaque in two coats (and again smelt horrible). It had quite a dull finish almost like a neon, which it isn't, but it soon got all shiny after a coat of Seche Vite.





Finally we have the deep purple. This is a gorgeous rich purple, unadulterated with shimmers, glitters or anything like that and is a very "Cadbury" purple. Minor issue in that when I opened the sealed bottle that there was no brush and the bottle was half empty, but in the grand scheme of things I have spare brushes and the bottle was also half full (!), so I swatched away! It shows a little more blue in the photos than it looks on real life, but this is two coats with a coat of Seche Vite on top.






If I set aside the issue with the smell and the missing brush, this really did not feel like a budget polish (I should also add here that after emailing Primark they are sending me a gift card to make up for the missing brush, so all's well that ends well :D) . For £1 a bottle the formula is impressively easy to work with and the colours are gorgeous! I would be happy to wear them on their own and they will work really well for nail art too. I was really expecting to be disappointed (which is why I only bought three!), but am definitely planning a return trip for more polishes, PJs and a cut price floral (faux Kath Kidston) print gas mask ;)

Sam xx


28 Feb 2014

The NCC presents "Inspired by Summer" #4

Hello everyone! Today I have my final summer-inspired mani for the Nail Challenge Collaborative. Its has been a breath of fresh air painting some summery manis in amongst all this grey and wet weather and I have enjoyed this theme more than any other for a while.

For my last mani, I have had some beautiful floral stickers from Nailtopia that I've been wanting to try out for a while and this seemed like a great opportunity. I've been a big fan of their stickers for a while now. I originally bought a selection to help when I was asked to do nail art at a school fair a couple of years ago. I then tried them myself and have never looked back if I need a quick fix of something awesome!

I started with three coats of LA Colors Sand Storm and one coat of Seche Vite. I applied the stickers over four nails with tweezers and then added matching lavender rhinestones between the stickers, as well as all over the nail on my ring finger for some accent bling.




I think it has a vintage floral feel, but also a little something of summer? Maybe a bit of a stretch, but hey ho... I wish I had used the stickers over a creme base instead of a shimmer as its made the edges of the stickers show up a little more in the photos than they do in real life, but I don't think that it takes away from the design too much.

I purchased these stickers myself, although I have been sent two sets of a new range of nail stickers that Nailtopia will be carrying to review. That review will be going live later today, so see you again soon :)

Our theme for next month is "Untrieds". Given that I immediately use any polish I receive, this is going to mean a shopping trip - or as we have to do four manis, four shopping trips?! Hmmm... ;)

Sam xx