La Fee Verte by Ellagee

Funny story about this polish. I saw the word ‘thermal’ in the description and basically noticed nothing else beyond that. So I had no idea that it glowed in the dark, and completely freaked myself out at 1 in the morning when I woke up after a crazy dream to see something glowing in my bed.

I mean, you’d be spooked too if you weren’t expecting it!

My first reaction was – honestly – to freeze and say ‘Holy crabcakes!’ to myself. So apparently when faced with unexpected glowing things, my reaction is to call upon crabcakes for help. I don’t even like crabcakes.

A while after that, my husband woke me up by exclaiming, “You’re radioactive!” in response to my still-glowing nails. So if you’re looking for a peaceful night’s sleep, La Fee Verte may not be for you. It’s pretty phantasmagoric.

It’s also pretty awesome in the daytime, too.

This product was provided for an honest review.

Ellagee is officially on my ‘nod of approval’ list. I’ve tried three polishes, and they’ve all been big time winners. La Fee Verte – the green fairy – is no exception. In its warm state, it’s a cool silver. When cold, it’s a subdued green. Tiny holographic glitters are speckled sparsely throughout, and there’s a delicate shimmer to the polish overall, giving it an ethereal feel.

La Fee Verte in transition, low light

Ellagee recommends using a top coat for this polish, but heck if I ain’t a rebel and went without. And I actually really love it on its own. It dries with a slightly textured finish, and a muted – not quite matte or satin – shine. It also dries remarkably fast.

Two coats, direct sunlight

So, we’ve got another triple whammy from Ellagee here: thermal, textured, and glow in the dark. Whoaaa nellie. Watch out for this Ellagee gal, people. She’s clearly a lacquer genius – who knows what she can accomplish with such powerful polish skills?

Ellagee polish can be found at her site, http://www.ellagee.com/!

This product was provided for an honest review.

I Love Vampires – Esmaltes da Kelly

Yes, the name is a bit silly – but the polish is awesome. Textured, shimmery, vampy goodness from Esmaltes de Kelly – here is I Love Vampires:

Two coats, direct sunlight

There is a lot of complexity in this polish. Deep, blood-red jelly base that is packed so heavily with dark micro glitters that it actually darkens the overall look of the polish. And then you have brighter, sparkling micro glitters, and there’s also  very small iridescent bars in the mix.

It sounds like it would make for chaos, but the end affect is vampy and glamorous.

It reaches opacity in two thick coats. Because it’s a jelly base, the dry time is slow. But I would recommend using I Love Vampires on its own before you slap on a top coat.

The first time I used it, I threw HK Girl on top to have it dry faster, and it completely changed the polish. The iridescent glitters disappeared completely. The overall look was more muted and flat. It wasn’t bad, but it was like a completely different polish.

Close up of texture

So put it on, and then watch a movie or something (or a couple episodes of Lost Girl, like I did. It’s like a soap opera, but with fae. So much mystical drama!), and wait for it to dry.

In low-lighting

Esmaltes da Kelly is a Brasilian brand, and I think this is her site. I’m also not certain you can buy her polishes there – I tried to have Chrome translate the page from Portuguese to English to help me figure it all out, but it wasn’t a super informative experience.

However, I know for certain that you can find Esmaltas de Kelly at Llarowe and Color4Nails. I haven’t used Color4Nails before so I can’t vouch for them personally, but they have been around for a little while now and I haven’t heard anything negative yet.

And that’s it for now! Happy Wednesday to you all. 🙂

Just Lucky – Liquid Sky Lacquer

Saturday night, listening to Bowie and writing about nail polish – try not to be intimidated by my wild and glamorous life!

That being said, I actually am very excited because I broke 1K today over on my facebook blog – things are happening, people!

1K LIKES – I CAN’T EVEN

I’VE NEVER EVEN COUNTED TO A THOUSAND

Okay wow, I got really sidetracked here. I’m just still so amped by all of the generosity, kindness and support I’ve encountered from the nail polish and blogging community! There’s some really amazing people around here. And you’re probably one of them, whoever you are reading this! Thanks for stopping by. 🙂

Okay, so nail polish. Let me get back on track. Today I’ve got another thermal for you – I am on a HUGE thermal kick lately.

So last week, Liquid Sky Lacquer restocked her thermal Just Lucky – I ordered it and received it by the end of the week! Check it out:

Direct sunlight

Soooo faaaabbb.

4 thin coats, HK Girl on top

Just Lucky is a shimmery nude-gold in its warm state, and a vibrant, punchy red in cold state. When it’s gold, it is a little sheer, so I used four coats here – next time I would probably use an opaque base to save polish.

It is a sensitive thermal – it switches remarkably quickly between gold and red. I had just put my hands under cold water for the photo above, and by the time I took the twenty steps from my kitchen to outdoors, it was already shifting back to its warm gold state (you can see it starting to shift on my ring finger near the base).

And this might turn some people off, but I thought it was pretty cool – when I put on lotion, the polish got this creepy streaky effect that looked totally horrorshow.

Spooky scary thermal effect

I mean, throw on a leather jacket, some black eyeliner, and this polish, and you’ve got a don’t-mess-with-me look going on that would be perfect for, say, fight clubs or girls night outs or whatever.

So obviously, once I noticed the spooky mood this polish could give off, I had to take a picture with a skull.

This is what everybody does on Saturday nights, right? Right?

Right. So, Liquid Sky Lacquer can be found here: http://liquidskylacquer.bigcartel.com/

Also, check out her facebook for upcoming colors, restocks, and international stockists: https://www.facebook.com/LiquidSkyLacquer

And now I have to go have a David Bowie dance party in my living room. Happy weekend everyone, hope you have a great one!

La Catrina – Polished By KPT

Okay, I think I have a thermal problem. I am obsessed with them, and most especially with Polished By KPT’s thermals, which always have unique color combinations and are excellent quality. If she ever comes out with a glow-in-the-dark thermal my head might explode.

Until that day comes, we have La Catrina:

Three coats La Catrina with HK Girl on top – direct sunlight

Okay, I have to be honest with you. I have no idea what I was thinking when I took these pictures. I didn’t get a bottle shot, and apparently I was feeling very nature-y because all I have is pictures of my nails on grass, wood, etc. I think I thought I was being artsy? Sigh. Anyways, they’re the only pictures I have of La Catrina and they still do a fairly good job of showing the awesomeness of this polish, so try and bear with me, I’m sorry.

Direct sunlight.

Okay. La Catrina. How can I describe this polish? I have nothing else like it in my stash, and have come across nothing else like it out there.

In its warm state, it’s a gorgeous, shimmery taupe, shifting very slightly between tan and purple-tan when you tilt your hands. It has a gorgeous glow to it, a pink golden shimmer that burst into life in sunlight.

In its cold state, it transforms into a vibrant green. It’s a unique shade of green; sort of jade, sort of fern…hard to describe. The pink-purple shimmer pops out against the green background.

I love thermals because they make it look like I put more effort into my nails than I really did. The edges of my nails tend be colder, where the base of my nails stay warm, so I often end up with this awesome gradient effect. I have no idea how to do a gradient, but it looks like I do!

All thermals are different – some are more sensitive to cold and heat, some shift more quickly or slowly. But Polished By KPT consistently makes thermals that shift perfectly on my nails, so I often end up with this gradient look. With a lot of thermals, the polish usually just remains in the cold or warm state for me, and I have to ‘force’ the thermal affect. Maybe Polished By KPT thermals just work really well with my body temperature, I don’t know. But they are my favorite thermals I have come across so far.

I didn’t really capture the shimmer in these redonkulous photos I took (seriously, no idea), but trust me, it’s gorgeous. Really breathes life into this polish. And the polish applies beautifully – super smooth, no issues at all.

You can find Polished By KPT polishes at her BigCartel shop. Her shop is currently closed to restock and work on new colors, so check out her facebook page for updates on when it will be opening again!

 

 

Nightcrawler – Polished By KPT

It’s a thermal. It’s a duochrome. It’s Nightcrawler by Polished By KPT and it’s seriously awesome.

I’m not even going to blab on like I usually do because you guys just need to see this.

Nightcrawler in transition; two coats + seche vite.

This is one of those times where I wish I knew how to swatch like other nail bloggers do because I can’t do this polish justice with my pictures. You can get an idea of how awesome it is, but it sparkles and shifts so much more beautifully in person.

Nightcrawler in warm state.

In its warm state, Nightcrawler is a delicate, sheer blue that shifts purple at certain angles. It’s soft and ethereal and almost seems to glow.

Cold state.

In its cold state, it becomes a rich, deep blue with light blue shimmer, and still maintains the duochromatic shift to purple. The duochrome effect is subtle and well-balanced. Sometimes you want to have a lot of duochrome, but with this polish it would distract from all the other gorgeousness going on.

Nightcrawler is currently sold out, but you can follow Polished By KPT on her instagram or facebook for restock updates. Also, you can check out other Polished By KPT colors at her website. In addition to Nightcrawler, I own Country Road (which is still in stock, by the way), and I would totally recommend both. Come to think of it, I believe they’ve become the two most top worn polishes in my stash, that’s how much I like them.

Polished By KPT website – http://polishedbykpt.bigcartel.com/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/KPTranPolish

Instagram: http://instagram.com/polishedbykpt

Gunfighter – Colors by Llarowe

Sigh. This polish totally bummed me out.

‘Gunfighter’ is the first Colors by Llarowe I’ve ever tried. Her polishes sell crazy fast, and I had been lemming after this one for a while ever since I first came across it on Llarowe, but it was sold out for a long while and I couldn’t find blogger swatches of it anywhere. But it looked amazing in the listing picture – a rich, deep green jelly with sparkles of red shining through the dark depths. I hadn’t seen a combo like it before, so when the next restock finally came around I picked it up and couldn’t wait for it to arrive in the mail.

Maybe I built it up in my head, but when I finally got the package and unwrapped it, it was a total ‘meh’ experience seeing it in person. It didn’t look very similar to the swatch picture I had seen on her website, but I had hope it might look different once I finally tried it on.

This is the picture of Gunfighter on Llarowe’s listing:

This is Gunfigher as worn by me, in indoor lighting with no flash:

Two coats Gunfighter with one coat Seche Vite on top.

Oh. Well, maybe I just needed to go into direct sunlight to get the intense shimmer as described and pictured in the listing.

Direct sunlight, no flash.

Um…kind of?

On the bright side, one cool thing about Gunfighter was that at certain angles it would flash a brilliant green, like this:

But again, that wasn’t described in the listing and it wasn’t what I was expecting.

I mean, it’s a pretty polish. But the shimmer, while a pretty burnt orange color, is not as bold in real life, and in low lighting it gets completely swallowed by the deep green. And the formula was rather difficult to work with – it was thick, a little gloopy, and the first coat applied streaky in some places. Jellies in general can be a little more difficult to work with, but it was the cherry on top of my initial disappointment.

I think if my expectations for this polish had been different, I might have enjoyed Gunfighter overall.  I don’t think Llarowe was trying to be misleading with the listing (I have done business with her company several times and she always has amazing customer service), but I think the polish does appear different in person than it does in the current listing, and ultimately I felt a little like Hercules:

only less dramatic and without the goatee.

So, I don’t think I would recommend Gunfighter. However, I DO have a couple more Colors by Llarowe coming my way and I have high hopes for them, as they are holos instead of jelly and I’ve heard that’s where Llarowe really shines. Gunfighter didn’t do much for me, but I am still impressed with Llarowe’s dedication and creativity in general, and have heard her holos are some of the best around.

View Colors by Llarowe on her website. They sell out quickly; follow her on facebook for restock updates.