China Glaze Hologlam Collection- (1/2)

I was so thrilled to see that China Glaze was releasing a holographic collection this year. I first heard the buzz last fall and my anxiety just grew from there. Will it be like the Kaleidoscope that was such a disappointment, or more like the revered OMG Collection that is basically the Holy Grail of holographic polishes? Thankfully it is more related to the OMG line!!! YAY! Think of these as the darker, more brooding cousins of OMG. If these polishes were clubs/bars, OMG would be the upbeat dance and techno clubs while the Hologlam would be your more low key bar or jazz club. No, they are not as linear and intense as the "original," but they are still really good. I had no real application issues with any of the colors I purchased. I only bought half of the collection since I am trying to be a little more conservative with my polish spending habits (Sorry Hubby!) There was nothing wrong with the other colors not purchased, it's just that I wanted these more. I purchased Infra-Red, When Stars Collide, Sci-Fly By, Take A Trek, Strap On Your Moonboots, and Galactic Gray. Eeeekkkk! Without further ado, I give you half of the Hologlam Collection!!

Infra-Red

Infra-Red

Infra-Red

Infra-Red is a bright magenta that I just adore! It went on easily in 2 coats. It is definitely one of the most opaque of the colors I bought.

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When Stars Collide

When Stars Collide

When Stars Collide

When Stars Collide is a warm toned burgundy that leans on the purple side. I like how it is a more dusty color that has still kept its holographicness. (Is that a word?) This went on in 2 coats. This color was a little on the thick side but nothing really gloopy or difficult to work with.

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Sci-Fly By

Sci-Fly By

Sci-Fly By

Sci-Fly By is a great looking light icy blue. It makes me think of the cold arctic ice. This went on without problems in 2 coats.   

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Take A Trek

Take A Trek

Take A Trek

Take A Trek is a denim blue that is just perfect. This was one of my favorites! As with the others, this went on problem free in 2 coats. This polish was thicker in consistency  a lot like When Starts Collides formula, but it did not prove to be difficult to use.

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Strap On Your Moonboots

Strap On Your Moonboots

Strap On Your Moonboots

Strap On Your Moonboots is a dark smokey blue. The night sky comes to mind when I look at this polish. Just beautiful! This was applied in 2 coats with ease.

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Galactic Gray

Galactic Gray

Galactic Gray 

 Galactic Gray

 Galactic Gray is a graphite or gunmetal gray that in certain lighting it has a brown undertone to it. It is gorgeous! This did go on in 2 coats without difficulty, despite being the thinnest of the polishes that I got. You know, it looks like this might be a good substitute for the gray version of OPI My Private Jet. Unfortunately, I have the newer brown version, so I can't compare it for you. Looking online at pictures, it seems very comparable. Definitely something to look into. 

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Well, those are the holo beauties I have to show you today. I am too thrilled that China Glaze revisited the holographic polish. I can only hope they do more, hint, hint. You will be able to purchase these in April if not now at Sally Beauty, Ulta, and other locations for around $8.99. Good luck holo-hunting these beauties!

Halloween Blood Spatter! I say it's an A+ (bah ha ha ha)

Happy Halloween!!!! I just had a great Halloween with my family. Good food, fun watching my four year old get thrilled every time he got candy just by saying trick-or-treat, and having one of the goriest/creepiest/most awesome manicures I have had yet! I have been seeing the blood spatter manicures going around and I could not help myself. First, since I am a nurse at a hospital, I knew I could freak out a few co-workers with my "bloody nails." Second, It just looks BAD A$$! This was so much fun to do. I see myself using this technique over and over again. A quick tip that I should have followed, but I was hasty last night trying to get it done. Tape around your nails before spattering! It will help with clean up immensely. You can see in the pictures that I still have red all around my nails despite diligent clean up. Oh well, I think it adds to the effect. I used Sally Hansen White Out for my base, and Essie Blood Curdling, Orly Ma Cherie, and China Glaze Prey Tell for the blood. The "spatter effect" was created by using a coffee stirrer "straw" dipped in polish, then blown onto the nail. All of that bloody goodness was topped off with on coat of Out The Door. What do you think of this crime scene of a manicure? Have you tried spattering/splattering yet?

 Oh yeah, the mysteriously absent right hand makes an appearance!

 I was going for a Psycho pose here.

All I can think of is CSI when I look at this.

Girly Girl Nail Art Challenge: Inspired by the Runway

This weeks challenge calls for us to be inspired by the runway. So, I hit the internet searching the latest fashion for the "IT" things for the season. I fell in love with the color oxblood. It is a deep red/burgundy that can look almost black. The other trend that caught my eye was all of the uses of leather and reptile prints/embossing. It looks so chic and edgy. Combined, I think I have found the coolest manicure to date. I feel like one bad mam'a jamm'a. I used the beautiful Prey Tell from China Glaze as my base color. I feel dark and mysterious with it on. Next, I used my ManGlaze Matte Is Murder for the matte black, reptile stamping detail. I think this looks too cool. I had two little problems doing this manicure. First, clean up of Prey Tell left evidence. By "evidence," I mean bloody looking cuticles. No matter what I did, they looked red and irritated. The other problem I had was stamping the matte polish quick enough before it dried on the stamper. Matte polishes dry quickly in general. Having such a thin layer for stamping meant I had to move like the Flash. I think the effect I captured was worth the effort.

Ignore my poor index finger. The nail was involved in a small lawnmower starting accident. It will be missed.

Try not to notice the bloody looking cuticle. :(

Looks so dramatic.

One more for the road.

Prey Tell : This was a little tricky to apply. It was fully opaque in two coats, but it was a little "gloopy" in consistency. Even with it being thicker than I prefer, I will definitely wear this color again. Look at that shine!

 

Color Inspiration: Oxblood            Designer: Peter Som 

Picture obtained at Harpers Bazaar

Texture/Stamp Inspiration : Reptile/Leather        Designer: DKNY 

Picture obtained at Harpers Bazaar

My Favorite Things Nail Art Challenge Day 8: Hearts/Love

Sorry for the posting delay. My little man was really sick yesterday, so I had to wait on doing the manicure. We are now at day 8 of the nail art challenge by Ooh La La Polish. Wow, we are almost done. I must say I am glad I chose this as my first challenge. I have had so much fun doing this, and I am going to hate to see it end. Today's focus is on hearts and/or love. I decided to do a fun and bright combination of the two themes. I am just not in a "pink love" mood right now. I need fun and playful and I think this was just what the doctor ordered! I used China Glaze Lemon Fizz as the base color. It took three careful coats to obtain a streak free and full covered nail.  As much as I love that color, it is a bit of a pain in the arse to apply! For the word and hearts I used my acrylic paints. I topped it with my beloved Seche Vite for a beautiful shine! What do you think?

My Favorite Things Nail Art Challenge Day 3: My Favorite Animal

Day 3 of the challenge by Ooh La La Polish asks what is your favorite animal. I don't really have a favorite animal (Are we noticing an indecisive trend yet?), but growing up, I always wanted to be an elephant trainer. Why you ask? Well not because I was in love with the elephants, I wanted to wear the trainers pretty/sparkly costumes!! Now of course, I really do love elephants. I think they are amazing creatures, but to a five year old, the sequined costume looks better. Apparently I have always had a love for the more sparkly things in life! I used  China Glaze Elephant Walk for my base color. Appropriate name for the polish, right?  I used Wet n Wild Black Creme for the black detailing, White On by Sally Hansen for the toe nails and tusks, and I Believe in Amour by Color Club for the pink nose. Then, I topped the whole shebang off with Seche Vite. I must say, I really love Elephant Walk, It is a medium grey with a very subtle shimmer to it. I can see a full manicure with this color alone in my future! I had full coverage with two coats with normal drying time. I really like how this turned out. I might redo this one day before going to the zoo!

Do you like my elephant feet?

I was scared to paint anything else and ruin it.

Red Comparison

When I was picking out my red base color for my Hello Kitty manicure, I realized I have a few "similar" reds. Isn't it amazing when you are at the store trying to pick out a new color and you just know you don't have that at home. Unfortunately, when you do get home, you have 5 different versions of it. Well damn it all if that isn't what happened. Sadly, I did have more reds that were similar to these colors, but these were the closest looking while still in the bottle. The reds I am showing you are similar, but divided into two different groups : Cherry Red and True Red. The cherry reds lean on the almost orangy, but not quite orange side. They are very bright and cheerful colors. The true reds lean neither towards the blue or orange side of the red spectrum, it sits right smack dab in the middle. I notice every single one of these polishes had amazing coverage with just two coats. I probably could have gotten away with one thick coat, but I try not to do that so I get a more accurate manicure. Does that make sense? I did not use a topcoat in the picture, but the base coat I did end up using was my Posh Quick Dry Base Coat. I had no nail staining using that with the Zoya Sooki. Now, on to the comparison!

Wet n Wild I Red a Good Book , Zoya Sooki, China Glaze Hey Sailor , OPI, O'Hare & Nails Look Great, and Color Club Cadillac Red

Thumb Wet n Wild, Index Zoya, Middle China Glaze, Ring OPI, Pinkie Color Club

Cherry Reds: Zoya Sooki, China Glaze Hey Sailor
True Reds: Wet n Wild I Red a Good Book, OPI O'Hare & Nails Look Great, Color Club Red Cadillac

What do you think of the difference? Do group your reds based on what color they lean towards or is it just red like my husband would say?

On a random side note, look how shiny they all are. I can see a reflection of me in them!!

China Glaze Capitol Colors Part 3: Harvest Moon, Riveting, and Luxe and Lush

Here are my final three polishes from the Capitol Colors Collection for the Hunger Games. If you hadn't noticed, I was trying to group them by color family :) I left the "fiery" colors for last. To say I had a hard time capturing Luxe and Lush on my camera is like saying I had a hard time stopping the elephant from running me over. I did another attempt today and got much better results. (YEA!!!) Anyways, I love all of these colors. Harvest Moon would make a beautiful fall manicure, Riveting is a great, bright, fiery color, and Luxe and Lush adds glitz to just about anything! These colors just have no faults in my book. It was two coats to get full coverage for both Harvest Moon and Riveting, but no topcoat. I used one "dabbed" coat of Luxe and Lush over one coat Wet n Wild Black Creme. I also used one coat of Gelous over Luxe and Lush for a better looking finish. Enjoy the pictures.

Harvest Moon is a beautiful copper colored metallic. It is definitely on the warm side of the color scheme, beautiful finish.
District 9 - Grain

Riveting is a show stopping orange jelly with gold glitter suspended in it. This color literally GLOWS!!  If you don't want attention to your manicure, definitely do not wear this.
District 3 - Technology

Doesn't it look like Riveting?? 

Luxe and Lush is a great shredded looking flakie that flashes mainly orange, yellow, and green, but blue and pink can sometimes be seen.
District 1 - Luxury

This is what the actual shredded flakes look like. This polish will definitely need several topcoats to smooth out the finish.

If you are looking to make a manicure statement, these are the colors for you from the Capitol Colors collection. My favorite out of these three is Riveting, because it is a show stopper and I have absolutely nothing like it in my collection. Which do you like most?

China Glaze Capitol Colors Part 2: Agro, Stone Cold, Smoke and Ashes

Like my previous post, all three colors are from the China Glaze Capitol Colors Collection from this past March. All three were consistent in application as my previous review, perfect. All I needed was two coats for full coverage. No top coat was used on Agro or Smoke and Ashes. I will say I had the worst time photographing Smoke and Ashes. It drove me crazy!! It either looked pitch black/inky or really hazy! Some of the problem was my camera. Since my son had a little "fun" with my normal camera, I have been using my Rebel XTi, which does not have a macro lens (aka very close up shots). I got some cheater lens covers for the mean time that "act" like a macro lens, but there is a learning curve which I am still learning. So, I apologize ahead of time for the fuzzy/awkward photos. I usually am pretty consistent with how my pic's look, but these will have to do. I just hate using pictures I am not 100% happy with, but oh well. Here they are.

Agro is a beautiful dark olive green metallic shimmer. I really like this color. It has a glow to it. Be careful of brush strokes when applying.
District 11 - Agriculture

Stone cold is a gunmetal grey matte polish. I really LOVE this color. I am a huge fan of matte polishes and this is just too cool! It really looks like a hammered metal/stone finish. It even looks great with a topcoat.
District 2-Masonry

I used Seche Vite for a glossy top coat. It definitely changed the color of the polish to a dark granite color. It reminds me of counter tops.

See what I mean!

Smoke and Ashes is a inky dark midnight blue with green and blue shimmer. It is a really pretty color, but a pain in the arse to photograph. I am still not quite happy with these, but I had to make do with what I had.
District 12 - Mining

Here is a better look at the blue and green shimmer in it. Just lovely.  

Obviously my favorite out of these three is Stone Cold, but Agro is a close second. There is a special place in my heart for dark, vampy colors! Which did you like?