Layering 101: Essie – Kisses and Bises

A few weeks ago, I scored a beautiful new Essie polish from Shoppers Drug Mart for $2.99! Keep an eye out for SDM’s clearance racks, as sometimes there are gems lurking.

The shade I snagged is Essie’s Kisses and Bises, from the Spring 2011 collection French Affair. I was actually considering buying this at full price, because the shimmers in it are beautiful. I can’t pinpoint what colour exactly, but I would describe it as pink and gold, maybe a dash of copper? The shimmer is extremely fine and suspended in a milky off-white base colour.

On its on, Kisses and Bises won’t add much colour to your nails, but it is a brilliant layering polish. I’ve shown it layered over OPI Do You Think I’m Tex-y?. As you can see, it adds such a beautiful dimension to the jelly colour underneath. There are some visible brush strokes, but it’s not noticeable at all.

I’ve also tried Kisses and Bises over a black polish, and it looks even more phenomenal. The wicked pink/gold shimmer really alters the base black colour into something very unique indeed. I will post this combination when I get a chance!

OPI – Do You Think I’m Tex-y?

Just wanted to let everyone know first that I will be updating this blog less frequently over the next month, as I will be on exchange in Europe! No worries, I still have posts scheduled when I’m gone, but I’ve been busy packing and getting my stuff organized, so I haven’t had much time to write many posts in advance. Oh well. Here goes nothing!

OPI’s Do You Think I’m Tex-y?(CRINGE) is a “sorbet” finish polish from the Texas collection, just like the previously-blogged Guy Meets Gal-veston. What that means is that it’s a sheer, jelly-like polish. At one coat, it looks like a watery film of pink, with lots of your natural nail visible underneath. At three coats, it increases in opacity but still appears to look squishy…almost like a juicy berry. You don’t need a top coat with this one to achieve a high-gloss finish (yay!).

I actually quite like these new sorbet finish polishes from OPI, even though they’re not revolutionary in any way (no matter how hard OPI tries to convince me otherwise). Application was great, and they’re actually pretty opaque for jelly polishes. Three coats will be enough to get rid of a very noticeable nail line.

Canucks Nails!

In case I have readers who don’t know, I’m based in Vancouver, and the Canucks are in the Stanley Cup finals! Canucks fever is absolutely palpable in the atmosphere, and I’m loving every second of it. My celebratory walk frolic down Granville Street after our Game 1 win was exciting and nostalgic – brings back memories of the 2010 Winter Olympics. For my friends who are fans and are out of the country right now, I’m sorry that I’m rubbing it in your face a little bit. Miss you, and wish you were here to celebrate with the rest of us!

I’ve been planning to do a Canucks manicure for a while, and even tried out a few things but failed MISERABLY. I ended up simplifying the design down to just blocks of colour and stripes, like the bottom of the jersey. Simple enough? It’s really nothing spectacular. But it still took me forever. And you don’t even want to see what my right hand looks like (horrific, the white lines are not straight at all). BUT WHATEVER. At least it looks Canucks-esque.

I’ve blogged about the blue and green before – Orly La Playa and OPI Jade is the New Black, respectively. The white stripes were done with the Sally Hansen Nail Art Pen. It looks like a felt pen with a narrow tip and dispenses a rather watery liquid. I call it a liquid and not lacquer because it behaves a little differently than typical nail polish. When I use the pen over top coat (which is completely dry), I am able to scratch off the white stripes without disturbing the polish underneath. This is brilliant for nail art because you can fix mistakes very easily. Obviously, you’ll want to seal in the pen’s design with a layer of top coat afterwards.

If I was patient enough, or my hand steady enough (probably both), I would have drawn in the little white hockey stick…but the stripes were hard enough as it is. I guess I’m just not cut out for nail art! But for my team, I will at least try :)

WOOOOOO CANUCKS! ONLY THREE MORE WINS! BRING IT HOME!

OPI Pirates of the Caribbean – Stranger Tides

I saw the display for the OPI Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides collection ages ago, and thought the collection was a bit…strange. If you do a quick Google of it, you’ll notice that it consists of several pastel shades and another shatter polish (Silver Shatter–I actually really want this, as it looks amazing over the pastel shades). Doesn’t really scream Pirates of the Caribbean to me. Then again, I always thought the collaborations with movie franchises somewhat odd. But no matter. I purchase nail polishes for the colour and not so much its affiliation with a movie or celebrity (coughJustinBiebercough. More on this later :p).

I ended up getting OPI Stranger Tides, which is a muted, pale grayish-green creme. It looks sort of ugly in the bottle, but I love it on the nails. Quite a unique green colour if I do say so myself. I don’t own anything like it. The closest colour I can think of is Essie’s Sew Psyched, which is several shades darker with subtle white shimmer running throughout. I love that, despite being an uncommon polish colour, Stranger Tides is still very wearable.

This colour also had a great formula and needed only two coats to reach full opacity. No issues with streaking here. And it goes without saying, but I love OPI ProWide brushes. Makes applying nail polish such a breeze, seriously.

OPI – Guy Meets Gal-veston

SUMMER. PLEASE. It’s gotten to the point where I hope that typing in all-caps will make it true. Sigh. In the spirit of ineffectively making the weather cooperate, here’s another “summer” shade!

OPI Guy Meets Gal-veston, from the Texas collection, is one of their “sorbet” finish polishes. OPI’s really pushing this as a new, ingenious finish, but come on now. It’s really just a glorified jelly that’s been around for years; that is, a very sheer, watery polish. The above photo shows three coats.

Why would you even want a sheer, watery polish, you ask? Well, I love jelly/”sorbet” polishes because they build up to look like yummy squishy jellybeans. They look so clean and fun! Guy Meets Gal-veston is an adorable, punchy red-orange-coral that would look gloriously summery on toes in toe-baring sandals. One can only dream of wearing such footwear in this weather…

I’ll leave you to your own fantasies of summer for now, and wish all the students out there good luck with their final exams! :)

OPI Katy Perry – The One That Got Away

Totally kicking myself for not getting this one the first day I saw it.

Yup, it’s OPI’s The One That Got Away, from the Katy Perry collection. A mid-to-dark berry purple/dark pink colour with this wicked shimmer. The shimmer has the same quality as OPI’s Tease-y Does It – I think this is called “glass-fleck”? Well either way, I LOVE IT. A friend I bumped into a few days ago commented that it looks like it would be gritty to the touch (I agree; probably because it looks like the shimmer floats on the surface), but it feels absolutely smooth. It glitters gloriously in the sunlight. The above photo, taken under incandescent light, captures this somewhat.

Another photo of it under a fluorescent light; see how the shimmer looks sort of like it’s packed on the surface?

Strangely this one doesn’t look very impressive in photos. I can assure you, though, in person…it is gorgeous! Oh yes, and since it was part of the Katy Perry collection, which I’m sure you remember to have contained Black Shatter, this colour is also meant to be worn under the shatter polish. I don’t know though, I don’t really feel like covering up the amazing shimmer with some black shards of goop. *shrug*

OPI – Tickle My France-y

Hmm, nudes. I’m not a huge fan of “mannequin” hands – a few months ago I was sort of enamored with the idea of having nails that were exactly the colour of your skin. I’ve learned since then that it’s a hard look to wear, because it requires your nails to be in tiptop condition – every minor cuticle issue just becomes so apparent!

I’ve tried a couple of nudes, and I find that the ones that somewhat blend into the skin, but still offer some contrast, are ideal. Does this one live up to my expectations? Well…

OPI Tickle My France-y, another gem from their 2008 France collection (at this rate I’m going to own every polish in that collection…). I really like it! The shade is just a bit darker than my skin, and the colour is definitely pinker than my skin – the most muted taupe-y pink/lavender you’ll find. It looks elegant and clean, non-fussy but still pretty.

I think the problem I generally have with nudes is that they have a tendency to make you look jaundiced or give you lobster hands. And with a cream nude especially, formula is important – a lot of them can be super streaky and difficult to apply. This one was fine though, two coats and the streaks sort of meld into each other and become smooth again. And of course, you know how much I love the OPI ProWide brush!

Thanks to my friend Justina for letting me know about this colour! I remember asking her several times last term about her nail polish when she had this colour on. I love it! :)

OPI – Just A Little Rösti At This

Can’t believe it’s been a whole week since I’ve posted! I’ve been incredibly busy, sorry about that. And can you believe it, I actually kept the last nail polish on for a whole week…that absolutely never happens for me. I’m happy to report that Essie Chinchilly is super resistant – a full week and not one chip. Even tip wear wasn’t that noticeable! I was kind of sad to remove it – I wasn’t even bored of it yet – but seeing as how I’m going to be really busy this week too, I don’t think I could live with the same polish for 2 straight weeks. So, change it is!

OPI Just A Little Rösti At This, from their Swiss collection last fall, is a surprise favourite of mine. I bought it because of rave reviews I’ve read on other blogs, but thought it was kind of a boring colour. It’s certainly not the most original colour in the world, but it’s just so versatile! It’s just the perfect deep cranberry creme that looks especially red under direct light, but a little brown under weaker lights. Goes with every outfit, and it’s a bit vampy without going overboard (i.e. looking like a black polish from far away). It’s just such a sophisticated colour  - I LOVE it on short nails.

Let me also say that I’m really picky about pink/red/coral polishes. For some reason, I absolutely hate medium bright neutral red cremes. I feel like I’m either kind of slutty or stuck in the 50′s as a pin-up girl – the colour oozes old-fashioned to me, and I try to stick with modern shades for nail polish (another example: I hate frosty nail polish with a FLAMING PASSION). Also, bright pinks. They don’t look bad, they’re just not colours I would ever choose to wear if presented my entire nail polish collection. But somehow Just A Little Rösti At This strikes a perfect balance – this will probably be the closest I’ll get to a red that I truly love.

When I’m stuck in a nail polish rut and absolutely NOTHING from my collection jumps out at me, not even the new ones I just bought, I usually revert back to a few old favourites, and OPI Just A Little Rösti At This is one of them. I always knew I liked this colour, but I guess its status as “all-time favourite” managed to creep up on me! Ah, love. What a strange and wonderful thing.

(Holy crap, how many OPI’s do I own? WAY too many, I’m sure. It doesn’t help that the closest mall to my house happens to sell them for the cheapest price I’ve seen out of every e-tailer and physical store!)

OPI – Louvre Me, Louvre Me Not

Hope you’re having an awesome Wednesday! And not sick like me :( Ended up skipping two classes and went home instead. Sigh.

This polish though, is exquisite.

OPI’s Louvre Me, Louvre Me Not from their Fall 2008 France collection, has quickly made its way into my favourite purple polishes, if not my favourite of all time. Right now as I’m looking down at my nails, it looks like quite a dark neutral purple. But under more bright lights, the polish looks more like a mid-toned very red-tinged purple with tiny blue (or purple?) and pink shimmers. I love these kinds of polishes the most – they’re not so shimmery that they border on frosty and leave behind brush strokes. In low light they almost look like cremes, but in sunlight KA-POW, the shimmer really jumps out. The best way I can describe the look is “glowy” – like the shimmers are lit within. A bit hard to see in the above photo, but trust me on this one! :)

Two coats were needed – application was easy-peasy. And of course, topped off with a top coat.

Ah! I just love this so much! I’ve used Louvre Me, Louvre Me Not so much that you can actually see what level the polish is at – I know that sounds trivial but it’s super rare for me to use up a coloured polish that fast. It’s my go-to purple polish and I always get so many compliments on it. I think it’s because it’s very noticeably purple (not like the inky near-black purples), but muted at the same time. A perfect combination!

Successful Skittle Shatter!

Whoa, I finally got OPI Black Shatter to look, well, like advertised.

I’ve been itching to try this mani ever since I’ve gotten Black Shatter, if only to see if I can pull off the cool-looking, if slightly juvenile “skittles” manicure. Skittles meaning using different (usually bright) colours on each finger. I’ve tried variations on it before (my favourite being the gradation manicure – shall post one of those another day), but have been too scared to actually rock the look. The hope with Black Shatter was to make the look more edgy and “disguise” some of the bright colour while keeping visual interest. Well, we’ll see about that…

First, skittles! Cute, right? Should have probably used a more pastel yellow but alas, I do not own one (can’t help but think American Apparel Butter would be a perfect substitute!). Let’s go through the colours:

• Thumb: OPI Lucky Lucky Lavender
• Index: American Apparel Manila
• Middle: Revlon Top Speed Jaded
• Ring: Orly Gumdrop
• Pinky: Revlon Gum Drop (yes, I used two polishes named gum drop. It was a coincidence, I swear! Also the pinky one happens to be scented. Sickly sweet…don’t think I could do a full mani with it, barf)

Time to shatter it up!

Looks like the juvenile skittles got introduced to some recreational drugs and are now looking significantly more edgy! Definitely something that I could wear without feeling self-conscious. Though I got plenty of weird looks from people today anyway (one girl especially who stared at my nails the whole time I was washing my hands in the restroom). Regardless, Shatter takes out the saccharine quality from the bright pastel colours and makes the whole look more wearable. Awesome!

Oh also, compare this to how the shatter looked over the GOSH Holographic polish I wrote about a few days ago. See how the shatters actually look fully formed rather than…weird tree branches? I don’t know if before I used layers that were too thin, didn’t let Holographic dry enough, or just the weird nature of holographic polishes in general. Just know that if you own OPI Black Shatter, here are some helpful tips:

• Let the base colour dry completely.
• If you want the shatters to be far apart, apply a thicker layer.
• Be sure to apply a shiny top coat to protect the shatter layer, as well as smooth out the wonky brush strokes.

:) Have fun!