OPI Gold Shatter

I was pretty excited to stumble upon this, since I thought it was supposed to come out with the Muppets holiday release. I refrained from buying any of the gold China Glaze metallic crackles because I wanted this one. And it's a great gold. Not too pale, not too yellow. Shiny and bright. And I was super-duper excited to try it over my Orly Stone Cold manicure from the previous day.

But then this happened:

Again, I apologize for the way my camera goes haywire with shimmer. If I am soon employed, a new camera is surely on my list of things to get.

The first nail shattered nicely, the next one less so, the next one even less so... and so on, basically ending up in a major fail. As you can see, my index finger, while blurry, barely shattered at all. My right hand is just awful. And I only did thick enough coats to ensure the gold was opaque, but nothing crazy. Damn you, Gold Shatter,  I want to love you so!! You are super blingy and gorgeous but you don't shatter all the way! It didn't appear to need to be thinned (but I may try this), but I guess my next go will have to be trying it over wet-ish polish rather than dry, as I know some mentioned having more success with certain OPI Shatters this way. But for now, the jury's out on this one.

OPI Pink Shatter

OPI's Pink Shatter is being released in conjunction (if not a little early) with October being Breast Cancer Awareness month. As per the tag, it's the "Pink of Hearts 2011" color, as they release a pink every year for the cause. The shatter idea is fun (if not overdone at this point), but this pink is kinda lackluster. I ended up seeing it at a random salon, and grabbed it for the heck of it. While OPI Shatter polishes are my favorite of the lot so far, this pink suffers from being way too ordinary. It's a medium pink, not terribly bright, shimmery (but the type of shimmer we'd consider frost if it weren't a shatter polish), and not very eye catching. It shattered just fine over dry polish.

This picture makes it look brighter than it actually is. This is one coat over 3 coats of Borghese Almondine, which was my job interview polish (someone even complimented me on it). I took this under a desk lamp (sorry), so I apologize in advance for the glare.

If this pink had been a bit brighter, perhaps even neon, I might have liked it better. I have to say that this is my least favorite OPI Shatter so far, but there's nothing *wrong* with it per se, it's just not that remarkable. Will you pick up Pink Shatter if you find it? For those of you that have found it--what do you think?

The OPI Serena Williams Grand Slam Duos: A Retrospective

Starting early this year, OPI teamed up with Serena Williams to release sets of polishes called Grand Slam! duos to be released in conjunction with the major tennis matches this year. As you probably know, Serena is also a nail tech/polish enthusiast, so this is a pretty cool idea in theory. This month, the final duo of this series was released. I got most of these duos during my blogging hiatus, so I decided to finally swatch them all for this retrospective post. Swatches of all of them in one place! I loved this series. It was obviously a smart collaboration with someone who loves polish. It was a little heavy on the Shatter polishes, but with the exception of one set, I liked the pairings. Here we go!

First, around March and to coincide with the Australian Open, came the first set: Simply Smash-ing! and Black Shatter.

Simply Smashing, 3 coats. A pretty tennis-ball yellow-green. I like it much more on the nail than in the bottle.

Excuse my application of Black Shatter here, the pinky went well, but the other 4 fingers did weird things. I had just thinned it, so maybe that's why. No top coat here.

Then, later this spring, came the France duos for the French Open, which consisted of 2 different sets: Rally Pretty Pink with Red Shatter and Spark de Triomphe with White Shatter.

Rally Pretty Pink, 3 coats. 

RPP with Red Shatter on top. The shatter look strange because there's no top coat. I apologize. This is the one pairing that I'm not crazy about.

Spark de Triompe, 3 coats. Silver and gold glitter. I love this and I bought a backup.

SdT with White Shatter on top. This one does not crack a lot, but it looks pretty neat with the gorgeous glittery veins peeking through. Again, no topcoat so ignore the texture.

Next, we have the England sets, which were released at the beginning of the summer to coincide with Wimbledon. There were also two sets in this release: Grape...Set...Match! with Servin' Up Sparkle and Your Royal Shine-ness with Servin' Up Sparkle.

Grape... Set... Match! 2 coats. This polish is much, much prettier in person. So shimmery, with lots of red and blue flecks happening. 

GSM with Servin' Up Sparkle on top. Very pretty, though the large hex glitter is pretty sparse. Sorry, my camera is a glitter-phobe lately.

Your Royal Shine-ness, 2 coats. I feel like this one is totally underrated. I totally completely disagree with anyone that says this is just a silver foil. It reminds me of pencil lead (but with much finer shimmer than Chanel Graphite). It's silver but got some brown/gold/pewter tones. Very, very pretty.

YRS with Servin' Up Sparkle. It was kind of a dumb idea on OPI's part to release two duos for the England sets with the same layering polish. I think most people bought one or the other, but not both. This could have easily been paired with Navy Shatter (looks gorgeous) or another darker glitter. SUS looks really cool on top, don't get me wrong, I just don't think it was great marketing.

And finally, in August, the US Open duo: Love is a Racket and Pros & Bronze. I know y'all saw these recently, but deal with it! Here they are again. 

Love is a Racket, 3 coats.

Pros & Bronze, 3 coats.

I don't feel like it's been mentioned much, but on the back of this set, OPI recommends layering these two polishes. Since that was the purpose of all the other duos, I guess it makes sense, but Pros & Bronze doesn't much strike me as a layering polish. It goes a bit haywire over Love is a Racket, but they definitely go together and create quite a blingy look (the kind my camera hates). If you want more in depth reviews of these colors you can check here and here.

So, let's break it down. You can create a lot of looks with these polishes. On the whole, they're unique and gorgeous, there's a variety of finishes, and pretty much something for everyone. Like I said before, clearly imagined up with someone who enjoys polish. However: most of the shimmer are very similar to that Orly Cosmic FX-Zoya Sparkle finish we've been seeing a lot of, and there's a lot of Shatters going on, which the market is also over-saturated with. And, as I mentioned, there are two duos with the same layering polish, which is pretty lame. A smarter idea would have been to create a trio for the England set, with both polishes and the glitter.

My favorite polishes in the sets: Spark de Triomphe, Simply Smash-ing, Your Royal Shine-ness and Grape Set Match. My favorite overall set is the Spark de Triomphe/White Shatter duo, and my least favorite is the Rally Pretty Pink/Red Shatter duo. In all honesty, a lot of these polishes are available individually on eBay, so it may be your best bet to pick and choose what you love and just grab those (I did this with Simply Smash-ing because I already had Black Shatter from the Katy Perry release, and I should have done it with Your Royal Shine-ness so I didn't end up with two Servin' Up Sparkles). 

All in all: this was a great job, I thought. What did you think? Did you grab any and/or all of these? 

OPI Get in the Expresso Lane with Dare To Wear Strobe Lights

This manicure was actually kind of ugly in the end, but I wore it for two days (laziness). After the glitterbomb that was Date To Wear Social Butterfly, I went in a totally different direction with Get in the Expresso Lane from OPI's Touring America collection. I've found that this collection isn't getting a lot of love, but my love of OPI creme polishes and drab colors made me lust for a couple of them. I'm waiting on Roadhouse Blues, I Eat Maine-ly Lobster, and Uh-Oh Roll Down the Window (which makes me giggle), which are en route from the States (Aveyou shipping to Canada is too expensive so I send them to my Momma!). Anyway, I don't know much brown polish. I'm not even sure I own another brown that couldn't also be considered taupe. What I like about this color is that it's not a straight up choco-poop brown, it's very grey-ed. I think it if was warmer and more yellow-toned, it would be a no-go both for my sensibilities and skin tone. This, however, works. It had a great formula, and two coats was perfect glossy coverage.

Now, I didn't get a picture of Get in the Expresso Lane on its own, which is a shame. Because the devil in me needed glitter. So I put Dare To Wear's Strobe Lights on top... a super shiny holographic gold glitter with large & small hex and bar glitter. It's crazy nutso, except the base is also slightly gold-ish. Which yellow-ed up my brown polish, rendering it semi-choco-poop-like. And... I dunno. This is just one instance (and I don't often say this) where I feel like glitter just didn't work. Should've left it alone.

Here it is:

Yuck, right? Sorta fun but... yuck.

China Glaze White Cap over Essie Marshmallow

A couple posts back I mentioned that I had recently decided I needed a couple polishes from China Glaze Anchor's Away, a collection I had passed on (with the exception of Ahoy!) more times than I can count since it debuted. One of the polishes I decided I needed was White Cap, and here it is.

White Cap is pretty ridiculous, it's this softspun white with crazy golden shimmer that is ever so slightly opalescent. You could probably make it opaque with numerous coats but instead I wore it over my favorite white, Essie Marshmallow. For the record, Sally Hansen Hidden Treasure over Essie Marshmallow is one of my favorite manicures of all time. It's like having opals on your nails. Marshmallow is a jelly white, and its formula is kinda bitchy, but I love it anyway. It's the perfect blue toned squishy white.

This is 3 coats Marshmallow, 1 coat White Cap.

I wore it to an interview, and kept it on. So pretty. I may even try it over other colors. I don't know if I've ever publicly proclaimed this on my blog, but I kinda hate layering. I'm not very original about it, I often pass up polishes if they necessitate layering. This may stop I guess, because I find myself gravitating towards them again and again lately.

OPI Turquoise Shatter over OPI Guy Meets Gal-veston

Both of these polishes are kinda old news by now. After trying crackle/shatter polishes from Cover Girl, IsaDora, China Glaze, La Rosa, etc etc, I think I like OPI's the best. The shimmers are a bit difficult, they need to be thinned and are a bit finicky about how wet/dry the polish underneath needs to be. The creme/jelly ones: Black, Navy, Red, White, all seem to work pretty well. But keep thinner on hand, it really is your friend as these little brats get chunky in a hurry. Similarly, the OPI Texas collection came out quite a while ago, and originally, I bought nothing. And then... a bug bit. I ended up with three of the "sorbets": Guy Meets Gal-veston, Houston We Have a Purple, and Too Hot Pink to Hold 'Em. I also bought It's Totally Fort-worth It, but I hate it. So pretty in the bottle, but awful on the nail. The sorbets, however, are wicked nice. Great formula and super shiny.

I wasn't really sure what to pair with Turquoise Shatter, which is a beautiful, glowy, shimmery turquoise. I first thought gold, but then decided to try it with Guy Meets Gal-veston, a juicy coral, underneath. The result is kinda tropical, and I love it. I think a chartreuse would also look cool under it. Neon yellow too.

3 coats of GMG, and Turquoise on top:

I'm basically in love with this, I'm wearing it for the long weekend here (a civic holiday, yay Canada!). Spending time with the in-laws and nephews. Enjoy your weekend!

Kleancolor Chunky Holo Black

Just popping in quick to share my update to Essie Smokin' Hot. I added 2 coats of Kleancolor Chunky Holo Black on top, and the effect was pretty awesome. These pictures do something weird. The flash turns it much more purple; in real life, you can't see the base color of Smokin' Hot, it just turned that murky brown-black that is Chunky Holo Black. Also, the duochrome on this glitter is a complete rainbow. It's amazing and gorgeous. None of this, unfortunately, seemed to pick up in my photos.

Here's a couple of crappy pictures. I may try this again over black to capture it better:

It has a lot of depth and is actually very fall-like in tone. So pretty.

OPI Big Apple Red & Kleancolor Chunky Holo Scarlet

I've been job hunting, which is, needless to say, a demoralizing process. My background is in writing, English, film, with a bit of arts education thrown in. I've worked with non-profit and for-profit theatres, music venues and arts education programs. And honestly, the semi-lame salary that often comes with being an arts person (whose value to society is not quantitative and therefore under-appreciated, in my opinion) is so worth it. My dad is an actor, so I grew up in a theatre (which was state funded until late last year, and was shut down by New York State because, again, the arts have no quantitative benefit to society... can you tell I'm bitter much??) But try finding a job. It's awful. It's starting to look more and more like I'm just going to be a cubicle rat, doing Administrative stuff for "the man." Shoot me. For crap pay (despite my Masters), at least let me do something rewarding, not staring at Excel sheets for 8 hours.

Anyway, anyway! I shouldn't let all this out here. It's supposed to be a happy place. Here's a recent NOTD: OPI Big Apple Red with Kleancolor Chunky Holo Scarlet on top. Pics are OK, but still not quite up to snuff...

Big Apple Red is pretty amazing. It's so vibrant, and my favorite tone of red. Slightly warm, I think. Scarlet compliments it well, and the warm red glitter, which is slightly duochromey, look so pretty on top. BAR had a great formula, but Scarlet was a bit weird. It was pretty thick, and took a bit to dry down... and smelled like chemical awesomeness, as Kleancolor has a reputation for.

These chunky holos are kind of awesome, and I'm not much of a layer-er when it comes to polish (though is pretty much my jam when it comes to fashion, kind of a bag lady chic thing I've got going on here). They're quite pretty, and I can't wait to try out Black! Gorgeous. But... not really black? I digress.

Hope you all are well and thanks for looking in! :0)

It's been a long, long time!

I didn't want to abandon my little blog here, but life has just been crazy for the last six months. I moved at the beginning of May to Canada (my hubby's homeland), after finally celebrating our marriage (9 months after the fact). Moving was nuts. So much paperwork and physical work and waiting, oh, and driving 1700 miles. My nails got trashed, and I kept them short. Also, my lack of work has curbed the polish acquiring (a bit!!). I also, unfortunately, ended up leaving about half my stash (over a Helmer's worth) at home in NY. I went through and just weeded out everything that I didn't feel I *had* to bring, boxed it up and stored it in my closet there. It was a lot of drugstore/dollar store impulse purchases and vintage stuff I'm keeping out of sentimentality. but I also left all my backups. I plan to go through it at a later date. So far I haven't found myself missing too much of anything.

Living in Canada is strange for me. It's so like home and yet so... not! Though my lack of a job has curbed my polish buying, another thing has helped: lack of CVS/Rite Aid/Walgreens! Oh my drugstores, how I miss thee! Drugstore stuff here is just hella expensive and hard to find exclusives (here's hoping Milani knocks off their awesome collections for a while). Anyway, it helps not being tempted. That said, I have an American Apparel a block away (uh oh, amazing polish), and OPI's are not exorbitant (~$8.95-9.95, though lots of places are 2 for $16). I made the mistake of buying one at a random beauty supply without asking, and it was $12.99 (Spark D'Triomphe backup), and uh no, never again. My husband, Chris and I are going to North Dakota this weekend and I CANNOT WAIT to go to CVS! Haha.

Enough rambling, here are a very few select NOTDs from the past few months:

China Glaze Crushed Candy over American Apparel Manila. Loved this combo.

Essie Mochachino. Didn't love the way this taupe looked on my skintone, but it was so pretty.

These are both OPI I Lily Love You over China Glaze Ahoy. I'm unfortunately not able to take outdoor pictures, and my lighting situation isn't ideal. So the first one is no flash, and you can sort of make out the detail. The second one is more color accurate, but the flash washes out the flakes and glitter. Not sure I love this one. It's pretty but...

These Sally Hansen nail strips are basically amazing. So pretty and fun. The only set I had any trouble with was the Frock Star glitter ones. They were a bitch to put on and stayed "tacky" and didn't seem to set. Oh well.

Orly Here Comes Trouble. I couldn't find Bubbly Bombshell, but this one is awesome. Love the different shapes of glitter and the color! Perfect spring green.

Love & Beauty. Stupidly labeled as "Blue." This polish is ridiculously amazing. It's probably got an LA Girls equivalent but I'm lazy and don't feel like looking it up. But seriously. Beautiful. Shimmer. Perfect application.

Super crappy iPhone4 pic! OPI Your Royal Shine-ness. Gorgeous, underrated. A warm, almost pewter silver foil. Seriously blingy. Love love.

Ohmygod. This is Sally Hansen Turquoise Opal over American Apparel Hassid. So, you'll all want to punch me after I tell you this, but I've had Turquoise Opal for years. I bought it and tons of other Prisms in 2 packs at Dollar Tree probably 3 years ago. Maybe longer. And I've never worn a single. one. WTF was I thinking?? Anyway. I got so many compliments on this. A sweet lady at the dollar store actually grabbed my hand. It wasn't creepy... yeah maybe a little. But seriously, I don't blame her.

And finally, a few crapalicious pics of today's nails... (I've seriously gotta figure out a new lighting situation. Basement apartment=not good.)

Kleancolor Holo Chrome with Chunky Holo Bluebelle on top. I'm also holding Bluebelle. Um, yay Kleancolor for amazing polishes. I don't hate the smell. It smells like chemical awesome. And Beautyjoint.com ships to Canada super reasonably. I'm gonna order more. Anyway, Holo Chrome had kind of a bitchy thick formula. Three coats. I shoulda thinned it. It's so beautiful. What you see above is mostly Holo Chrome. The Bluebelle you can't see in my lighting but in certain lights you can also see the effect in the bottle on my nails. The base color also sorta matches Holo Chrome.

More true to color.

Sparkle!

In the last few months, I have also grabbed the Serena Wimbeldon & French duos, hauled KleanColor's like crazy mad, got 2 Dare2Wear collections, all the OPI shatters, a couple Nice Stems, and got 3/4 of the Miss Universe collection. Also some Essies. My only leftover lemmings (until Christmas, fall isn't really doing it for me... maybe a couple China Glazes) are Chanel Graphite and Peridot, but I doubt my budget will be accommodating, at least to both. Maybe though :-)

What have you all been hauling/loving/doing lately? How's summer?

Also!! If any of you are on Pinterest, follow me! I post NOTD's and other things too.

http://pinterest.com/sarahrobo/ I'd love to follow you back :-)

Deborah Lippmann Ruby Red Slippers

Another oldie today. Almost out of old ones, phew. But in the advent of all the new Nordstrom exclusive Lippmann glitters, here's the one that seemed to start it all: Ruby Red Slippers. I've worn this polish before, but never blogged about it, so I slapped it on for a few new pictures. I like to layer this over a coat of an opaque black. For these photos, I used KnockOut's Flatte Black, a matte polish. I like to use it for layering because it's opaque and dries super fast, due to its matte properties. I love the effect of this polish. Like crushed jewels. I got so many compliments when I wore this.

This is one coat Flatte Black, and 2 coats of Ruby Red Slippers:

I mean, there's really not much more to say about this, is there? It's brilliant. It means I probably should've ordered the new polishes (but I didn't). Oh well, hopefully they'll be released separately later. Anyone order any of the new ones?? Bad Romance and Across the Universe are calling to me...! Thanks for reading :D

OPI Ogre-The-Top Blue

More Shrek! I am thisclose to caving on buying the remaining three from this collection, even though I know Funkey Dunkey and Rumples Wiggin' are dupes for colors I already have. Oh well... I also sort of feel like a poseur because I've only ever seen the first Shrek movie, though, I did, as a child, own the original Shrek book by William Stieg (betcha didn't know Shrek was a book! Well it was, I remember because my dog ate the library's copy and we had to buy it from them. And if you did know... then extra brownie points for you!)

Anyway anyway: This polish, whose name is obnoxious to type out, is really nice. Gorgeous blue, bright and saturated. It is not a twin of No Room For The Blues, which is much lighter. It's not as dusty as Suzi Says Feng Shui. I even just asked my brother, who is a 22-year-old male with (almost) zero interest in polish if Ogre-The-Top-Blue and No Room For the Blues were the same color. I quote, "No, one is obviously lighter than the other." So no, you do not need to have expert eyes to spot the difference. (Disclaimer: My brother's girlfriend loves OPI. So much so that when I wore Fiercely Fiona, he looked at me and went, "Are you wearing Shrek?" It scared me a little.)

I'll shut up. Pictures:

Because I'm feeling nice, some comparisons between OTTB & NRFTB:

Left to Right: Ogre-The-Top Blue, No Room For The Blues.

Swatched on tape: OTTB, NRFTB. The difference is most noticeable here.

Lovely, no? I'm resisting the urge to put Hidden Treasure over it, because it's really just so nice on its own. Mmm, how I love OPI. I don't buy from them all that often (I don't own any Espana and only one Hong Kong), but when I do, I'm rarely disappointed. They just wear so well on me.

Bonus pic from the next day with Sally Hansen Hidden Treasure over it:

I'm chatty today. Forgive me. Thanks for reading :-)