Black Dahlia Lacquer Lace Aloe
Black Dahlia Lacquer Lace Aloe is a beautiful turquoise linear holo with blue glass flecks. Two coats plus top coat. With flash:
In shade:
Under Ott lite:
Posts tagged ‘aqua’
Black Dahlia Lacquer Teal Hydrangea and comparison
Teal Hydrangea is a gorgeous turquoise/teal creme polish. I used two coats plus top coat; the formula was great.
Here’s a comparison with a couple of other turquoises: left to right/top to bottom are BDL Teal Hydrangea, China Glaze Aquadelic (2 coats plus top coat), China Glaze Too Yacht to Handle (3coats plus top coat).
Zoya Zuza, Wednesday, and comparisons
I should have posted this ages ago, but then I lost the photos of the nail wheel comparisons… or maybe I forgot to take the photos, I don’t know! So I took new ones recently, but they aren’t exactly colour-accurate… Ah well, I’m posting them anyway! 😀
Here is Zoya Zuza, a beautiful shimmery turquoise. Two coats, and the formula was a little thick, according to my notes. I love Zuza.
Zoya Wednesday, a slightly dusty turquoise/minty/tiffany blue creme. Two coats, three on my ridgey ring finger. The formula on this one was a little thin.
And here are the comparisons! The photos are not colour accurate; they photographed a bit too green and dark, which you can see by comparing Wednesday (3:00 position on the left wheel) to the swatch photos above. So keeping that in mind, the pic can give an idea of how similar they are to other polishes in the same colour family. Zuza is directly next to Wednesday on the other wheel, at the 9:00 position on that wheel. Should have numbered the polishes on the wheels, sorry about that…
(Not colour accurate, leans slightly too green.) Left wheel, clockwise from 3:00 position: Zoya Wednesday, Color Club New Bohemian, Orly Gumdrop, Nubar Mod Agua, Cult Nails Manipulative, Kleancolor Pastel Teal, Soulstice Kona, Sephora by OPI Natural Environ-mint, NYX Girls Pistachio, Essence You Belong To Me, China Glaze Aquadelic, Color Club Blue-Ming, NYX Salon Formula Surf, Barry M Mint Green, Orly Ancient Jade, Fingerpaints Choco Mint, NCLA Santa Monica Shore Thing, Fingerpaints Tiffany Impostor.
Right wheel, clockwise from 9:00: Zoya Zuza, Nicole by OPI Diva Into the Pool, Manglaze ILF, Milani Golden Sea, LA Girl Delirious, China Glaze Custom Kicks, Kleancolor Teal Envy, Kleancolor Mystic Grass, Sparitual Rhythm of Life, Butter London Thames, Gosh Ocean, LA Girl Obsess, Kleancolor Teal Marble, Kleancolor Metallic Aqua, Fingerpaints Winter Sky, NYX Juliette, LA Girl Chromium Green, Kleancolor Metallic Jungle.
Maya Cosmetics Nefarious Aquarius
I have an indie polish to show you today, from the brand Maya Cosmetics which I was excited to learn states on their website that their polishes are vegan friendly!
This is Nefarious Aquarius, a teal/turquoise holo polish! Photo above is with flash, and the following ones are under Ott Lite.
Two coats, no complaints about the formula! It’s all around just a great polish!
And finally, not the greatest photo, but here is how it looked outdoors in the sunlight:
Manglaze Lesbihonest and ILF
Quick post of a mani from last year!
This is Manglaze Lesbihonest (I’ll be honest, I mostly bought it for the name and the bottle artwork!), a rich fucshia matte polish with shimmer, alternating with ILF, a similar matte shimmer in an aqua/turquoise shade. Two coats each, nice quick drying formula. All photos are under my Ott light, and the last one shows them with topcoat.
Color Club Blue-ming
This beauty is Color Club Blue-ming, from last spring’s Blossoming collection. I love this almost-neon-bright pastel turquoise! But I wasn’t quite able to capture its unique shade in the photos, unfortunately… Picture it slightly greener and brighter!
It’s kind of streaky, not surprising for a pastel like this. These first photos in the sun show three coats of polish.
Before the last two photos, I added a fourth coat due to smudging a couple of nails! I also added a layer of top coat. In the shade:
Indoors with flash:
Despite its streaky formula, this is one of my favourite polishes because of its unique colour! Love the almost-neon pastels!
Comparison: Color Club’s Pure Energy and Wicked Sweet
As mentioned in my previous post, here is my comparison of Color Club’s two neon blue polishes with turquoise shimmer, Pure Energy and Wicked Sweet. These photos were taken several months ago, during a week when I had my nails filed into little claws. I’ve done this a couple of times, but it usually only lasts about a week before the points start breaking off and I file them down.
The photos show three coats of each polish. On my index and ring is Pure Energy from the Electro Candy collection; on my middle and pinkie is Wicked Sweet from the Wicked Sweet collection.
The formula was good on both of them, thin and smooth. They’re a little sheer, hence the three coats.
Wicked Sweet is a scented polish; it smells like blueberry candy.
Aside from the scent these two polishes are practically identical. The main difference is that Wicked Sweet dries a little glossier before topcoat. There’s no topcoat in the pictures, and in this last picture you can kind of see how Wicked Sweet is a little more reflective which brings out the shimmer a bit more. Being neons, neither of them is especially glossy before topcoat, though. I wonder if it’s the scented additive that also adds that slight bit of extra shine…
Misa Skinny Dipping and Comparison
Skinny Dipping is the second of two polishes I got from Misa’s Hot Summer collection for summer 2012. It’s a gorgeous neon aqua shade with blue shimmer!
The polish was fairly sheer; I think the sheerness helps add depth with the shimmer though. I used three coats here.
The consistency was a little thin on the first coat, but seemed less so by the third coat (that’s probably the effect of the humidity that day…).
The polish dries to a satin finish due to the neon pigment in it. I didn’t use any top coat for these photos, so as you can see it’s definitely not totally matte.
I really love the blue shimmer in this! In the shade:
This polish is quite unique, at least in my collection. I did a comparison to the most similar polish I have, Color Club Wicked Sweet (which itself is basically a dupe of Color Club Pure Energy; that reminds me I have some old posts still waiting in the archives that I should really get around to posting some day!). Left to right, Wicked Sweet, Skinny Dipping, Wicked Sweet, Skinny Dipping:
These two polishes are kind of like opposites – Wicked Sweet is blue with turquoise shimmer, and Skinny Dipping is turquoise with blue shimmer!
I also used three coats of Wicked Sweet, although it wasn’t quite as sheer as Skinny Dipping. This next photo really shows off the difference in the base colours:
Another big difference between the two is that Wicked Sweet is scented; it has a blueberry-candy scent to it.
I like how these two complement one another!
LA Girl Chromium Green
Today I have a polish from the LA Girl Metals collection to show you. This is Chromium Green, a greenish turquoise foil polish. These overcast photos make it look bluer than it really is, although only a little – I don’t think I would have named it “Green” myself, it’s really more of a turquoise or aqua.
The formula on this is beautiful, easy to apply. Shown are two coats in overcast natural light.
The only hassle with this is that on removal you tend to get little silvery foil bits stuck to your fingers, the usual hazard of foil polishes! But washing hands after removal will generally take care of them. 🙂
OPI Fly and comparisons
At the risk of making it seem like all I post is OPI, here’s yet another one! This is OPI Fly from their recently released Nicki Minaj collection. I wasn’t going to get any polishes from this collection but when I saw them in store I couldn’t resist getting Fly. I’m powerless against turquoise!
I didn’t have any good light for swatching but I figured I’d just do it anyway. This is two coats of Fly, no top coat, in natural overcast light.
With Flash:
Since I’m a total sucker for this kind of colour, I (of course) already had a polish that is very, very close to Fly, that polish being Milani’s Fresh Teal, which is one of their neons. I also added Kleancolor Catch Me to my comparison, since it’s fairly similar as well.
These are all two coats, no top coat – index and ring: OPI Fly, middle and pinky: Milani Fresh Teal, thumb: Kleancolor Catch Me.
In overcast natural light:
With flash:
Milani Fresh Teal is just a tiny smidgen brighter and greener than Fly. I found the Milani more opaque than the OPI at one coat (it could probably be a one-coater if you use a thick coat). Both applied really well and were self-leveling.
The Kleancolor is similar to Fresh Teal in terms of hue but is a few shades lighter (and is the most opaque of these three polishes, easily a one-coater, like a lot of Kleancolor cremes are); I just thought I’d add it for comparison’s sake.
I should probably redo this comparison when there’s sun to do a better job of showing the differences, as the flash tends to wash things out…
My preference/recommendation between Fly and Fresh Teal is Fresh Teal. Not only is it less expensive it’s also a bit more opaque and brighter.
Vegan Claws 
You must be logged in to post a comment.