A vegan nail polish blog. A celebration of colour and light, as well as of justice for nonhuman animals.

Posts tagged ‘charcoal’

A England Cathy and Jane Morris

Today I have A England Cathy and Jane Morris to show you. Cathy is a pale grey with a lavender tone, subtle holo, and blue shimmer flecks. Jane Morris is a charcoal grey holo with blue-to-purple glass fleck shimmer. 

aengland_cathy_janemorris6

I used two coats each plus top coat. Jane Morris is almost a one-coater. Both have great formulas! I stamped a crane on Cathy using Jane Morris and Hehe plate Hehe-048. 

aengland_cathy_janemorris5

aengland_cathy_janemorris4

aengland_cathy_janemorris3

aengland_cathy_janemorris2

aengland_cathy_janemorris

Partial shade:

aengland_cathy_janemorris_shade

Under halogen light, to bring out the purple side of the shimmer in Jane Morris:

aengland_cathy_janemorris_ott

With flash:

aengland_cathy_janemorris_flash2

aengland_cathy_janemorris_flash

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Some Cult Nails Swatches

How about a few random Cult Nails swatches?

Spontaneous, a dusty purple creme with small purple glitter. The formula was a little thinner and runnier than I expected; I used three coats for coverage and to even it out. Shown with Wicked Fast topcoat.

Cult Nails Spontaneous

Cult Nails Spontaneous

Cult Nails Spontaneous

Before topcoat, it dries a little matte and slightly textured:

Cult Nails Spontaneous

Blackout. It isn’t black, but a dark charcoal grey. If you look at it from up close in real life, you can see that it’s actually got a sheer jellyish base packed full of tiny little specks of pigment giving it a soft, smoky finish. It does look pretty much black in some lighting situations, although not quite as much as it does here in my photos.

Cult Nails Blackout

I used two coats although it was still just slightly patchy with its jelly base so I could have used a third.

Cult Nails Blackout

This photo is more true to colour, where you can tell that it’s grey and not black:

Cult Nails Blackout

Comparison with a couple of medium-dark greys to show how much darker it is: Kleancolor Concrete (1 thick coat), Blackout (2 coats), Misa Office Polish-tics (3 coats, it was a bit thin). I should have also compared it to a true black, ah well…

Cult Nails Blackout, Kleancolor Black, Kleancolor Concrete

Top to bottom: Kleancolor Concrete, Cult Nails Blackout, Misa Office Polish-tics

Evil Queen, a pink-toned red semi-jelly. I don’t usually like cool toned reds on me, but I really like this one!

Cult Nails Evil Queen

It was almost a one-coater, but I did two coats for the photos.

Cult Nails Evil Queen

Great formula, shiny and smooth!

Cult Nails Evil Queen

Cult Nails Evil Queen

Feelin’ Froggy, a cool/neutral green with green shimmer. This one is sheer to let the shimmer shine through and I needed three coats. It’s a little cooler toned in real life; I’d say the first photo is the most colour accurate.

Cult Nails Feelin' Froggy

Cult Nails Feelin' Froggy

Cult Nails Feelin' Froggy

Soulstice Spa Troy

I have another Soulstice Spa polish to show you today! This one is called Troy.

Soulstice Spa Troy

It’s a charcoal shimmery polish with a weak scattered holo effect.

Soulstice Spa Troy

It has a quick-drying formula that applies best with a light touch, using somewhat thick coats and not going over the same spot more than once. Using that technique, I didn’t really have any problems with the application (although the photos are showing a bit of a bald spot on the side of my index that I didn’t notice in real life!).

Soulstice Spa Troy

The photos show two coats of Troy. These are true holo particles, not glitter, so it’s smooth even without topcoat.

Soulstice Spa Troy

The next two photos are in the shade.

Soulstice Spa Troy

Soulstice Spa Troy

And this last photo is under the Ott light. Subtle in terms of holo, but a really nice quick-drying charcoal!

Soulstice Spa Troy

Edit: Prompted by the comment from Derya, here’s a comparison of Troy to OPI My Private Jet (most recent version that is still available in stores) and Color Club Revvvolution. 🙂 (Photos taken under my Ott light this morning.)

Color Club Revvvolution, Soulstice Troy, OPI My Private Jet (scattered holo with reddish-brown flash version)

Color Club Revvvolution, Soulstice Troy, OPI My Private Jet (scattered holo with reddish-brown flash version)

As you can see My Private Jet, the brownish-charcoal scattered holo version, that is, is darker than Troy and has a reddish-brown shimmer flash to it. Revvvolution is more of a true grey charcoal with none of the brown that the other two have.

Color Club Revvvolution, Soulstice Troy, OPI My Private Jet (scattered holo with reddish-brown flash version)

Color Club Revvvolution, Soulstice Troy, OPI My Private Jet (scattered holo with reddish-brown flash version)

These swatches have two coats of each polish. In addition to being the lightest in colour, Troy was also the sheerest of the three. Revvvolution is the most opaque; it’s nearly a one-coater. It’s also different in that its holo is more linear rather than scattered. My Private Jet’s scattered holo is a bit more apparent than Troy’s.

Color Club Revvvolution, Soulstice Troy, OPI My Private Jet (scattered holo with reddish-brown flash version)

Color Club Revvvolution, Soulstice Troy, OPI My Private Jet (scattered holo with reddish-brown flash version)

Gosh Fossil Grey and SpaRitual Conglomerate

Today I have a rock-like mani to show you: Gosh Fossil Grey with an accent nail of Sparitual Conglomerate.

Gosh Fossil Grey and SpaRitual Conglomerate

This is two coats of Fossil Grey, which had a slightly thick but good formula. It’s a warm/yellow leaning grey pearl base with silvery shimmer that gives an almost speckled effect.

Gosh Fossil Grey and SpaRitual Conglomerate

On the ring finger I applied one generous coat of Sparitual Conglomerate, from their recent fall collection, over Fossil Grey. It also had a nice formula, and it wasn’t too difficult to get a good density of the black and white hex glitters on the nail.

Gosh Fossil Grey and SpaRitual Conglomerate

I love Conglomerate; it’s quite unique with its deep charcoal grey base, its dense, fine gold shimmer throughout, and its scattered black and white hexes!

Gosh Fossil Grey and SpaRitual Conglomerate

On its own, Conglomerate is opaque in two coats. Glad I picked this one up, it’s really interesting and the gold shimmer makes it very wearable for me!

Gosh Fossil Grey and SpaRitual Conglomerate

Cult Nails Super Powers Collection

Today I have for you Cult Nails’ Super Powers Collection, released for Winter 2011-2012. This contains the flakie polish Clairvoyant, which was formerly a limited edition called Unicorn Puke. I was lucky that I bought the collection during its pre-sale, because Clairvoyant is now sold out and they’re not sure if they’re going to be able to make more, since one of the flakie ingredients was discontinued by the manufacturer. Hopefully they’ll find a new source!!

Clairvoyant:
Cult Nails Clairvoyant

Cult Nails Clairvoyant

Cult Nails Clairvoyant

This is three coats of Clairvoyant (no top coat), a medium purple jelly with multicoloured iridescent flakes. The flakies are pretty similar in colour to the new Fingerpaints Twisted flakie, but with the obvious difference of the purple base. Love this polish, hope it isn’t gone for good!

Power Thief:
Cult Nails Power Thief

Cult Nails Power Thief

Cult Nails Power Thief

Power Thief, a neutral medium chocolatey brown with silvery shimmer flecks that sort of reflect different colours in the light. This was two coats (no top coat) and the formula was thick but smooth. Another favourite from this collection.

Time Traveler:
Cult Nails Time Traveler

Cult Nails Time Traveler

Cult Nails Time Traveler
Tardis-blue jelly! This was the thickest of the collection. One thick coat might even be enough, but I did two regular coats. No top coat here; look at that shine! Deep yet bright blue, love it!

Mind Control:
Cult Nails Mind Control

Cult Nails Mind Control

Cult Nails Mind Control

Sheer charcoal with duochrome purple shimmer flakes that shift to greenish-gold in the light. This one had the thinnest formula of the collection; this is three coats (no top coat), and it did need the third. It wasn’t especially difficult to apply, though. I decided to do a comparison with two other polishes I have.

NYX Deep Space, Cult Nails Mind Control, Color Club Alias

NYX Deep Space, Cult Nails Mind Control, Color Club Alias

Index to ring: NYX Deep Space, Cult Nails Mind Control, Color Club Alias

NYX Deep Space, Cult Nails Mind Control, Color Club Alias

NYX Deep Space, Cult Nails Mind Control, Color Club Alias

These all have fairly thin formulas (in fact I’d say Mind Control has the thickest of the three), and all are shown with three coats. The NYX has larger, but more sparse shimmer flakes than Mind Control does. Color Club Alias has a noticeably more purple base (as the second photo shows) and has denser sparkle than the others. Alias is my favourite of the three, but I haven’t really been into these sorts of charcoal/purple shades lately. They’re all very nice polishes with decent formulas, though.

Finally, I have some photos of Clairvoyant layered over the other three polishes in the collection! Index is two coats of Power Thief, middle 3 coats of Mind Control, and ring one coat of Time Traveler. All have one coat of Clairvoyant over top. The sun was starting to set here so that affected the colouring of the photos a bit.

Cult Nails Clairvoyant over Time Traveler, Mind Control, and Power Thief

Cult Nails Clairvoyant over Time Traveler, Mind Control, and Power Thief

Cult Nails Clairvoyant over Time Traveler, Mind Control, and Power Thief

Cult Nails Clairvoyant over Time Traveler, Mind Control, and Power Thief

Overall, a great collection! The polishes range in consistency but all were easy to work with. Looking forward to their next collection. Which coincidentally has just been announced today on Maria’s blog (Maria is the creator of Cult Nails). It’s called Let’s Get Nekkid and features four nude shades with golden shimmer and a (sadly, limited edition due to the ingredient issue) aqua-green flakie! Looking forward to it!!