Didn't die

Hiya! Just so you'll know I didn't die on you, here are som re-instas.

From OPI Brazil: Where Did Suzi's Man-go? and Kiss Me I'm Brazilian.

Some Depend Mirage, probably 2055 Bronzy Breeze. very nice gold (!) foil.

Rimmel Torrid

Orly Androgynie

a-england Encore Margot

And if you wonder why I'm silent: I got too much to do. I rarely have any decent time off, that I don't use for absolutely nothing. I got a new temporary job, doing my political and union stuff, and on top of that I'm a single mom at somewhere around 95 % of the time. But I'll be better. I promise. At least I'm happy.

Re-re-re-insta!

These are the last ones - promise. Well, at least for now...

Finger Paints Twisted over Orly Glow.

Depend 387. Love this finish!

Kill it with fire, pt II: China Glaze Bend Over Backwards with the orange-yellow-green flakie gradient over (I've forgotten which one of all those I used this particular time).

Smitten Polish Electric Lime. Best (neon) green holo ever.

Last days of summer: Essie Boom Boom Room.

Beware of continuations to this type of posts in the future.

Give us some Luxe, please!

Sweden is now terribly dreary, so let's add some light, or some Luxe - I used the lovely Annahita's nails for this manicure with one of Orly's SmartGels.

Sparkly and nice, but went on a bit sheer - I have used three to four coats here. Gold that lasts!

Enjoy the silence

The silence has been so long, that I'm just going to leave this post here to announce that I'm still alive.

It's one of those posts where I'll just puke out a series of photos that didn't get their own posts, mostly due to lack of decent photos - sometimes only one good comes out of an entire session.

Hare Polish Ancient Affairs.

Polish Revolution Coffeeshop Politics over Kiko 336.

Orly Elation Generation - yes, that is actually holographic glitter.

Darling Diva Polish Pendragon over OPI Here Today... Aragon Tomorrow Suede. Pendragon is in turn mattified with such a topcoat.

Smitten Polish Pink Goes Good With Green!

Essence Princessorize.

Gina Tricot Python Green.

Hope you enjoyed. Promise to be back with somewhat decent posts soon-ish - I have plenty of material!

Swedish word of the day:
tystnad -noun silence
Lots of it lately.

High on pretty Hope

Let's have one of the classic brands, shall we? There were a few from Orly's spring collection Hope and Freedom Fest that looked intriguing, and after seeing swatches I ultimately decided I needed only one of them, and that was High on Hope.

I wish I had gotten better photos of it, because this is a real beauty. This is three coats of this midnight blue filled with multichrome pink to gold and every shade in between foil sorta shimmer particles. How is that not a winning concept? You're right, this is win in its purest form.

Needless to say, I loved this shade. I wore it for several days, which is very generous for being me. If you still haven't snatched it, you should.

This product was purchased with own funds.

Swedish word of the day:
hopp -noun I hope II jump
Swedish is fun like that.

A lasting Ruby

I got the opportunity to try out a couple of the Orly Smart Gels, and here is one of them: the classic vampy Ruby.

Sex in a bottle - sex that lasts. Perfect red color. But is it the perfect gel color..?

This is four to five thin coats. I do very thin coats when I do gel manicures, to make sure it cures evenly. I think someone less particular than me would do three or four coats. So, a little thinner than I'd like a gel, but in its defense, it is a jelly like color. Though, that doesn't really matter when you're by your lamp, just wishing the color would even out and be opaque enough just a little sooner. Half an hour or so - per hand (yes, I'm overly neat).

I have definitely had more pleasant gel color applications than with Ruby, but once I was done with it and had cured my bad mood, I was very content. After all, it is the red color I've been looking for among gels for quite some time. Considering gels are long wearing enough to get an OCD polishing person like myself utterly bored in a few days, a deep red is classic and fabulous enough to make you slightly less sick of it. The photo above was shot the day after application, but as I write this four days later, it's still wearing strong, and this, I will tell you, is not usual for my thin, soft nails. No lifting, no chipping just yet, which makes me come to the conclusion that the Orly Smart Gels colors work well with my base and top, Harmony Gelish Foundation and Top It Off.

Have you tried any of the Smart Gels? Are you into the gel manicure thing?

This product was sent for review.

Swedish word of the day:
rubin -noun ruby
Precious stone.

Such a Go-Diva!

The Swedish representative of Orly kindly surprised me by sending me one of the Flash Glam FX polishes for review. The one I received is called So Go-Diva, and is a bronze-y brown sorta glitter in a clear base. This is what I managed, in the cold and dark Swedish November.

So Go-Diva in one coat over Orly Rapture, from the Fired Up collection. Putting this glitter over the dark brown jellyish creme makes it blend in quite well, despite being on top.

However, what I really wanted to try was to put it in a jelly sandwich. I can't say I play well with either brown tones or most glitters dispensed in transparent bases, so to make it a little more in my taste and far more interesting, I put it in the midst of coats of OPI My Pointe Exactly, the pastel grey jelly from the New York City Ballet collection.

My Pointe Exactly is one of my favourites to use for  sandwiching purposes, and it almost relieves me of the discomfort of wearing brown, and eliminates the risk for disliking glitters floating on top of the manicure instead of being part of the overall color.

I encountered no issues applying So Go-Diva, although like most larger glitter particle polishes, it may require a different approach than the classic brushing from cuticle towards tip. Like I have mentioned in the past, my typical application technique for glitters like these is spreading the polish on like you would butter a sandwich. Or perhaps spread marmalade on top of it.

The Orly Flash Glam FX collection can be found in stores already.

All products were sent for review.

Swedish word of the day:
choklad -noun chocolate
Pretty much the only brown product I like.

Smokin' Smolder

Back with a full manicure of one of yesterday's Orlys. My first pick from the fall collection was Smolder. I love it - my camera hates it. Glowy shimmer like this freaks the autofocus out completely.

I think you're still able to see what this polish is all about, right? This is three coats - but I believe most of you will feel content at two. I mostly added the third layer because I wanted to see if the color would deepen, and I actually think it did. If you're into these vampy shimmers, you should try it out for yourself. Because this really is a fantastic red shimmer.

I don't know how these photos look on your screen, but the red color is on the cooler side, a little cooler than it looks on my monitor. And if you would like to know more precisely, we're now going to kill a few suspicions. Check below out.

About half of this collection seemed to be pretty much exactly what OPI is giving us simultaneously in their Germany collection, so I compared Smolder to the shimmery vampies Every Month Is Oktoberfest and German-icure by OPI. These shades still freak my camera out, but you can see that despite the fact that both Smolder and Oktoberfest have purple-ish bases, they are very different. German-icure by OPI is much more brown leaning than Smolder. All this will be very apparent in the next image:

Here you can clearly see that the bases are different. Oktoberfest is blurple, almost blue, Smolder have a red leaning plum purple base, and German-icure by OPI has a charcoal brownish base. If you magnify this paper swatch, it is also fairly obvious the shimmer is the same in all.

Of course this means I, personally, need them all. Kthanxbai.

Let's also take a brief look at some of the other suspected dupes. I'll be honest, these photos are not good. But hopefully you can pinpoint the differences.

First, Orly Flicker versus OPI Deutche You Want Me Baby. I thought these would be exact dupes. While they're close, they're not identical. The OPI is more red, a little deeper. I do believe the shimmer is the same, though.

Second, Orly Glow versus OPI Don't Pretzel My Buttons. I thought these would be exact dupes also, but as it turns out, they're not, either. The OPI is warmer, more flesh toned, Glow is more beige, grey tinged. I like Glow better.

I hope I could satisfy your curiosity some, and maybe I'll return with better comp photos of Flicker and Glow as I wear them.

Swedish word of the day:
pyra -verb smolder
The Swedish word is kinda cute.

Orly Fired Up fall 2012 - quick bottles and wheel

I don't know what it's like where you live, but here in the surroundings of Stockholm, Sweden, you can almost feel the fall lurking in the air. Coincidently, we're served fall collections. I'm starting to grab for 'em vampy bottles - do you?

The Swedish representatives of Orly kindly provided me with their fall collection Fired Up for review, and here are some hasty photos for a first look.

Six shades of sultry fall femininity. Wheel swatches below are all at three coats each.

From left to right: Glow (nude beige creme), Flare (gold metallic shimmer), Flicker (orange metallic shimmer).

Ignite (cool toned cherry red jelly), Smolder (red metallic shimmer in plum purple base), Rapture (blackened brown creme).

A little low on light already at 8 PM here in August, so let's have a flashlit wheel photo as well (you may magnify if you're daring):

There you have it. Six vampy and glamorous shades. Three metallic shimmers, three in the creme division - of which one is actually a jelly, our beloved maraschino cherry red, this time named Ignite. If you're missing one, picking this one up might be a great idea. As a lover of red, I have quite a few members in this color family, but I can't say the same for oranges or golds, and when it comes to those I have very little to compare qualities with. But a gold is a gold, right? Could be a good staple as well. Nudes and blackened browns we have also seen before, but these areopaque and nice. Actually, all of these are nicely pigmented. Stated above is I did three coats of all - but only two of them needed the third: Flare and Flicker. The others are good in two coats.

I left one color out in the above paragraph, didn't I? Of course, because it's the star of the show. We may call her Smolder. Had these pictures been any better, you would have been able to see her glory. But don't despair, I'm wearing her right now. That means decent full swatch photos any day now.

It seems most of our beloved big nail brands are digging down those thrift find pockets for classic, vampy shades this fall. I won't complain, I dig vampies. A lover of vampies can never have too many - or can (s)he? Maybe when the shades look familiar. And I'm not just nodding towards long forgotten eras, but also contemporary compeditors. However, while there are striking similarities between these shades and some offered by the other big brand that starts with an O, there are also differences. I will be returning to this subject sometime within this week.

And all in all, as a collection, these go well together and present a sophisticated and mature unit. If that's what you want, Fired Up is full of win.

Swedish word of the day:
mogen -adjective I ripe II mature
This fall may have both.

A Comp(ensation)

If you’ve already been browsing this post looking at the pictures and wondered what the hell happened to Feline’s camera and/or photo technique – don’t worry, Feline will be back with her fabulous pictures later on, this is the other (probably long forgotten) blogger writing. Since I had my second child in August last year I have hardly had time to do my nails and with their terrible state in mind and the constant challenge of caring for two children under two years, blogging has been out of the question. Recently the older child turned two and now I have all the time in the world – KIDDING, but there’s always time for a quick comparison right!?

I first got Faye and fell in love. Great formula, great base, great golden shimmer and great compliments – what’s not to love? But as all you collectors out there know, after you’ve worn a polish once (sadly, this can also be the case with untrieds) it quickly falls into oblivion and disappears among the myriads of polish… So I got It’s my Year. Once I had it, I remembered Faye and wrote them off as dupes without even looking at the bottles (I might have mistaken IMY with OPI Rally Pretty Pink). I must have forgotten about them both later on when I bought Ingenue AND Oui at the same time. When putting them all together I realized it was comparison time. On to the pictures...

From left to right: Orly Oui, OPI It’s my Year, Orly Ingenue and Zoya Faye.

From left to right: Orly Oui, OPI It’s my Year, Orly Ingenue and Zoya Faye.

So as you can see, Oui and IMY are pretty close but not dupes. They are both purples packed with golden shimmer but Oui is darker. Ingenue and Faye are mauves with purple and brown undertones and lots of golden shimmer. They are nearly dupes but Faye has more golden shimmer. As I understand it OPI Rally Pretty Pink is a dupe for Faye and IMO you only need one of these three.

Over and out
/Comparison Cammi

Swedish word of the day:

lördag -noun Saturday

Because it was when I wrote this...

OPI Serena Williams Glam Slam England - Your Royal Shine-Ness and Servin' Up Sparkle with comps

So I finally got around to swatch the last two polishes of the Glam Slam England set. First up is Your Royal Shine-Ness. Yet another silver foil was my first thought when I saw this collection this polish actually differ from my other silver foils. As you (hopefully, otherwise - click to enlarge the picture) can see in the comparison picture below, Your Royal Shine-Ness is darker and looks a little bit more "rough" - it's a blackened silver foil! The formula was great but I did three coats since I managed to scrape two nails before the second coat was dry.

From left to right: 1. Orly Dazzle, 2. Orly Shine, 3. ChG Cheers To You, 4. Zoya Trixie, 5. Creative Silver Anniversary, and no number OPI Your Royal Shine-Ness.

The last polish in the set, Servin' Up Sparkle, is a silver glitter with hexagonal shaped prismatic glitter. This is one coat over Your Royal Shine-Ness.

Since I thought Servin' Up Sparkle looked so much like OPI Disco Ball Sparkle, a comparison was necessary!

From left to right: OPI Servin' Up Sparkle, OPI Disco Ball Sparkle, ChG Shooting Stars.

Although Servin' Up Sparkle and Disco Ball Sparkle are very much alike, they are not exact dupes. Disco Ball Sparkle has silver glitter and more prismatic hexagonal shaped glitter than SUS and Servin' Up Sparkle has both prismatic hexagonal shaped glitter and small prismatic glitter. Shooting Stars is much lighter than the other two and has less hexagonal prismatic glitter.

Over and out!

Swedish word of the day:
läggdags -adverb bedtime
Because it is!

More Silver Shatter combinations

Since I love the new Silver Shatter from OPI, I had to try some more combinations. When Feline mentioned Silver Shatter and holo in the same sentence, I knew I had to try it! I thought that Silver Shatter would look good over a dark holo so I layered it over Revvvolution! This is the result:



I wish Revvvolution had a stronger holo effect... Nfu Oh 63 has a strong holo effect but something happened (or didn't happen) when I layered Silver Shatter over this pink holo - Silver Shatter barely crackled!? The effect was still pretty cool IMO:

I think Silver Shatter looks more grey than silver without topcoat so I wanted to see if I could enhance the "stone look" by layering it over a dark grey matte. This is Silver Shatter over Orly Iron Butterfly (I know the pictures are crappy but so was the weather):

I already knew I love the combination of Zoya Trixie (a great silver foil) and China Glaze Spellbound (a topcoat with silver and orange glitter) and wanted to see how Silver Shatter would look over this combination. Once again Silver Shatter didn't really crackle, don't ask me why. I think Trixie and Spellbound looks cooler without Silver Shatter (see ring finger in picture three).

Swedish word of the day:
molnigt -adjective cloudy
Not the best swatching weather!