layering | Vegan Claws

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

Posts tagged ‘layering’

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:

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:

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:

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:

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.

Index to ring: 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.

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!!

Category:

Color Club, Cult Nails, NYX

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Kleancolor Holo Pink and Holo Orange over Milani Retro

Kleancolor has a half dozen of these holo glitter polishes in different colours; I decided to layer the pink and the orange over 2 coats of Milani Retro, which is a pastel coral creme with subtle shimmer (and a nice formula!).

These are holo glitters, not smooth holo particles, so they do dry rough. They also don’t dry all that quickly, but don’t take as long as the Kleancolor layering glitters which can sometimes be really bad! Shown are two coats of each glitter, with top coat. On their own, they may need 3 coats for opacity; I’m not sure.

In the sun:

The pink and orange are both pastels; they appear darker and more pink/coral here because of the coral polish underneath.

In the shade:

I didn’t really care for the pink all that much on my skintone, but I really like the orange and plan to try it on its own as well as over other bases. Also looking forward to trying Holo Yellow!

Category:

Kleancolor, Milani

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Orly Bus Stop Crimson

I have a couple of longer fall-collection-related posts I’ve been meaning to get around to, but have been so busy lately it doesn’t seem to be happening, so I thought I’d go ahead with some shorter posts in the meantime. This is Orly Bus Stop Crimson, a really great red! Not too bright but not too dark, warm toned, with a semi-jelly creme finish. It’s part of Orly’s core collection, I believe. This is two coats with top coat. Please excuse the small scratches on the surface and the tip wear; I had already been wearing this for a day when I took the photos. On the ring finger is one coat of Bus Stop Crimson topped with two coats of Nicole by OPI Glitter in my Stocking from their new holiday glitters (and again, with top coat). Also a great polish, sparkly warm gold glitter with sparse red glitter and I think even some silver glitter in there. It dries a little rough but an extra layer of top coat would fix that. Love both of these polishes!

Category:

Nicole by OPI, Orly

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Wet n Wild On the Prowl (partial) collection

On Halloween I posted Wet n Wild’s Cougar Attack (an awesome brown jelly with orangey-copper glitter, shown again above) from their limited edition and annoyingly hard to find On the Prowl Halloween collection; here are the other polishes I got from the same collection.

Buy Me a Drink

A gorgeous glowy shimmery plum burgundy. This is my favourite from the collection after Cougar Attack. Shown is three coats, no top coat (none of these photos have top coat).

Ready to Pounce

This is a blue-based purple with red-purple shimmer. It’s also nice and glowy, though less so than Buy Me a Drink. This was two coats, but it could have used three because of the crappy brush (more about that later). The colour is off in the last photo, but it shows off the shimmer really well if you click on it for the larger version.

Jungle Fever

A light grass green shimmer with metallic shimmer particles. This was three coats.

Tangled in My Web

Medium-sized, opaque black hex glitter in a clear base. This is one thick coat over Jungle Fever, sort of dabbed on more than just brushed on, which is how I usually apply polishes like this. I really like this one too.

I decided to turn the Jungle Fever – Tangled in My Web layering into a jelly sandwich by adding a coat of Barry M Lime overtop. Here it is in natural light and then under a lamp.

I did have application problems with the shimmers from this collection. I don’t know if I was just unlucky, but the brushes were awful. Uneven bristles that leave big drag marks all down the nail. The formula of the polish is thick and not very self-leveling too, which certainly doesn’t help with the drag marks! Cougar Attack had a better brush than the shimmers, or perhaps I just didn’t notice anything since it’s a glitter polish so I expected it to end up a bit bumpy. I didn’t notice any issues with the brush on Tangled in My Web, but then since it’s a clear layering glitter, again, it’s quite possible that I just didn’t notice since it applies so much differently.

Anyway, this collection has some great shades, brush problem notwithstanding! My favourites are Cougar Attack, Buy Me a Drink, and Tangled in My Web. The other two shades in the collection that I didn’t end up getting are Behind Closed Doors (I have NYX Girls Dorothy which from what I can tell online is a dupe with a much better formula) and Correction Tape, a multi-coloured layering hex glitter.

Category:

Barry M, Wet n Wild

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Cult Nails Fall 2011

Since Cult Nails’ winter collection is already up for pre-sale on their website (until November 11th), I realized that it’s well past time for me to post my swatches of their fall collection!

I originally bought these polishes in the last pre-sale and received and swatched them in August, but wasn’t happy with some of the photos (hmmm, seems like I’ve said that before…) so I recently redid the swatches for Awakening and Enigmatic. So if my nails and the conditions of the photos look different, it’s because they are!

Awakening

This is a muted teal creme; I love this kind of colour. The formula is thin and it’s sheer and a little streaky on the first coat, but with three coats as shown here, it evens out to a smooth creme finish.

Enigmatic

This is a vampy raisin coloured polish; it has a sheer brownish base with plum coloured shimmer that has flashes of reddish and bluish shimmer particles when the light hits it. An interesting complex colour, but like Awakwning, the formula is very thin and sheer, and it was streaky at one and two coats. This is three coats in the photos, and to be honest I think it might have benefited from a fourth.

In a Trance

This is an army green with gold shimmer. I love this!! This one had a great formula, the best of the collection. It was smooth, self-leveling, and easy to apply. This is three coats.

I also wanted to see how this compared to OPI At Your Quebec and Call and a few other olive green polishes I have. From the bottle comparison it was clear that they aren’t dupes, but they are similar.

Here is the comparison photo, from thumb to pinkie: Obsessive Compulsive Cosmetics Swamp Thing ( a creme, but I wanted to see how the base colour compared), Zoya Yara, In a Trance, OPI At Your Quebec and Call, and China Glaze Cat’s Eye. All are three coats, all have good application. As usual, you can click on the photo (and any of the other photos) to see more detail.

The base colour of Swamp Thing is indeed close to In a Trance’s base colour, although Swamp Thing is a bit darker. Zoya Yara has more of a blue-grey tone to it so it’s not close at all. At Your Quebec and Call is the closest to In a Trance, but the OPI is slightly more sheer, has a denser shimmer/slight frostiness. The reflection from the denser shimmer makes it look a tad lighter overall. China Glaze Cat’s Eye is lighter and more yellow than In a Trance, and is frostier than the OPI.

Hypnotize Me

This is a pretty unique polish! Sheer aqua blue-green with duochrome aqua/violet glitter (although these photos didn’t capture the violet, it’s quite obvious on the nail when seen at an angle). It’s got a jelly finish, but it dries fairly matte. For the photos I used Nubar Diamont as top coat, but it also makes a great accent nail as-is for any satiny-matte polish. Without topcoat, when dry, it’s not completely smooth but it’s not bumpy either; more like a very fine sandpaper. With topcoat it becomes smooth. The polish has a kind of weird goopy texture, but the application isn’t problematic at all. It’s meant to be a layering polish but I like it by itself too. This is three coats in the pictures.

And here it is layered (one coat) over the other polishes in the collection: from top, In a Trance, Enigmatic, Awakening. It looks great over all three of them!

Overall this is a great collection; I really love the colour choices! I’m looking forward to their winter collection…

Category:

Cult Nails

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A few Halloween manicures

A few Halloween NOTDs (nails of the day) from the past couple of weeks! (Although, really, I would wear these anytime!)

Milani Flashy Orange with Wet n Wild Ebony Hates Chris stamped on (I’m not very good at stamping yet…)

The other hand, with scurrying spiders!

A candy manicure: China Glaze Liquid Leather with Nubar V for Men matte topcoat, in an attempt to make nails that look like Panda Licorice!

Wet n Wild Cougar Attack (I broke down and bought this on ebay… I doubt they even release these limited edition collections here in Canada…)

The next day I added some nail art using the orange and black striping polishes from the Orly Instant Artist “Flights of Fancy” collection. The collection also included a dotting tool which is what I used to create the web-like design.

China Glaze It’s Alive from their recent Halloween release:

It’s Alive with OPI’s glow-in-the-dark Zom-body to Love as slimy tips:

My attempt at capturing it glowing in the dark:

Happy Halloween everyone! 🙂

Category:

China Glaze, Konad (stamping plates), Milani, Nubar, OPI, Wet n Wild

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New Glitter Gal holos

Today I have the three recently released Glitter Gal holos for you. Glitter Gal is an Australian brand known for their line of holographic polishes. These came out in August and I first swatched them then, but wasn’t very happy with some of the photos so I recently redid the ones for Light as a Feather and Frappé. For these photos I used either Nubar Foundation or Zoya Get Even for base coat, as noted on the individual shades, and no top coat. I found that they dried fairly glossy even without top coat. The photos are all taken in sunlight in my solarium. You can click on any of the photos to see more detail in the larger versions.

Lizard Belly

This one is really awesome! A blackened green with a strong holo effect. I only needed two coats for this one. Love it!!! Formula was a bit little bit thick, but not hard to work with. For these photos I had a base coat of Nubar Foundation. It is quite a blackened green, and in some lighting pretty much looks black. I’m thinking of trying it over a kelly-green creme next time…

Light as a Feather

A very pale grey holo. I had the hardest time photographing this one, so I’m including several pictures to give a better idea of the polish, including a couple of blurry ones that show off the holo in the bottle.

Glitter Gal Light as a Feather

Out of the three, the holo effect is least strong on this one. This one also gave me the most trouble with application. I swatched it here with Zoya Get Even as base coat, since my nails are a bit stained and Get Even has a white tint to help prevent that from showing through. This is three coats (it’s a little sheer, and a bit streaky on the first coat). I found the formula thick and hard to work with. I added several (about 6 or 8?) drops of thinner (Zoya Renew) and that helped. I got some bubbling, but I think that was mainly due to not waiting long enough between coats and the interaction between the basecoat and the polish. I think my Zoya Get Even could use a little more thinner in it too…

Frappé

Pink-toned lavender with a noticeable linear holo effect. This one was also fairly sheer (and so, I used Zoya Get Even as basecoat here) and needed three coats. The formula was also slightly thick but much better than Light as a Feather. I added 2 drops of thinner when I swatched this for these photos. Very pretty and feminine colour.

Some general notes on the bottles. The bottles are small as anyone who’s seen GG holos in person knows; they hold 9ml. The brush itself isn’t mini though, it’s a normal length brush (actually longer than some brands like Zoya or Color Club) attached to the small brush handle.

Since the lighter coloured ones were pretty sheer, I also swatched the three polishes over cremes. Here are the base colour I used: Zoya Perrie, Milani One of a Kind, and a grey franken I made from Color Club French Tip and SOPI What’s a tire jack? As you can see in the photo my franken is kind of thick and chalky (due to Color Club French Tip which is one of those whites that is kind of chalky) which doesn’t give the greatest effect when combined with the ridges on that nail, but anyway… The base colours were all two coats except Perrie which was one.

"Underwear" for the holos

One coat over bases

These photos show one coat of the Glitter Gal holos over their corresponding base colour(s). I like how they turned out, definitely a good way to extend the life of the small GG bottles.

Bottom line: despite the thick formula, these new holos are pretty awesome (especially Lizard Belly!!). Light as a Feather is quite subtle as a holo, but is pretty in its own right. You’ll definitely want some thinner on hand with that one, though! Needing to add thinner to these isn’t such a bad thing in my opinion, that along with using them over a creme will help extend the life of the small 9ml bottles!

Category:

Glitter Gal

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Vegan Claws

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

Posts tagged ‘layering’

Cult Nails Super Powers Collection

Kleancolor Holo Pink and Holo Orange over Milani Retro

Orly Bus Stop Crimson

Wet n Wild On the Prowl (partial) collection

Cult Nails Fall 2011

A few Halloween manicures

New Glitter Gal holos

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