From the Vault... SPAM

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These photos have been sitting in my edited file for a few months now, so I decided I had to post them now or say bye-bye...

Enjoy!

 Pahlish Twelve Drummers Drumming

 Twelve Drummers Drumming - I can't remember if this was 2 or 3 coats... Probably 3 since it's sheer. It's got a creamy nude base with gold/orange micro-flakes, iridescent and copper glitter. Beautiful!

L'Oreal 811 

 811 - do these mini sized L'Oreals actually have names or is the boring number all we get? Gorgeous blue with green shimmer though! This was 2 coats.

Sation Delete Your Junk Male

 Delete Your Junk Male was part of the Miss Antoinette Collection, but I couldn't get it to photograph true to life so I never posted it. In person, this is a dark pink jelly with subtle white sparks, just like Love Is In The Heir! Sadly it just looks super coral/orange/red in photos... Maybe it's got some neon to it? Anyway, this was at least 3 coats because she's pretty sheer.

 OPI Every Month Is Oktoberfest

Every Month Is Oktoberfest is a deep aubergine loaded with rich rusty shimmer. Two thin, easy to apply coats and you're good to go. Faboush!

Red Carpet Lacquer Glades over BYS Black & Gold

 Glades is a glitter colour-shifting top coat. The glitter is translucent and when layered you see a shift from green-yellow-orange. I applied two coats over a back base with gold shimmer flakes.

Elevation Polish Grotte et Cascade

 Grotte et Cascade is a rich, deep brown with blue, purple, pink and red micro-flake shimmer. It's opaque in 2 coats and sooooooooooooooo gorgeous! I've been rocking it a little this winter already.

Lilacquer Leeloo Multipass

 Leeloo Multipass - who didn't love The Fifth Element?! It's quite possibly the only Mila Jovovich film I've ever seen :) And Brucey is AWESOME as per usual. LM is another shade that would not cooperate with the camera. It's a warmer orange with pink shimmer, but it looks terribly yellow toned in these shots :( This one was a streaky sucker; I might have ended up with 4 coats because I was trying to even it all out! I think 2-3 coats was opaque.

Daring Digits Love Dragon over Pahlish Eight Maids A Milking

 Love Dragon is a pink to purple shimmery micro-flake top coat. I added two coats to a pink and purple Pahlish glitter and it looked so sparkly! The name is fantastic too!!!!!

Dollish Polish Mermaid Scales v2.0 with stamping and gems

I tried my hand at a mermaid tail themed manicure and all was swell until I put top coat over the rhinestones. It went all bubbly and nasty :( I learnt not to top coat these gems though... I used BM 209 and China Glaze Millennium for the stamping.

China Glaze Full Spectrum

 Full Spectrum is a pink/silver duo-chrome choc-a-block full of rainbow hexes. I've since sold this because I'm not that in to the rainbow glitter, but the base is pretty. This was two thin coats.

Femme Fatale Quivering Heart over Hits Unconventional

 I've posted Quivering Heart before, but this is it layered over a darker base. I love how the moody red-purple duo-chrome sets off the gold sparks in QH.

Candeo Colors Sweet Sierra over Essie Madison Ave-Hue

Sweet Sierra is a lavender and rose pink holo glitter top coat. It's squarey-hex and sparkles like mad! I'm wearing 1 coat over a pink from Essie.


Yes, that got rid of so much backlog! Now I need to go study and edit some newer snaps!!!!!


xxx
NPA

Comparisons: Dollish Polish Toxic Avenger - original vs reformulation

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I hope you don't all hate me because Toxic Avenger is no longer available! I semi-debated posting this comparison, but it's such an awesome polish, I just had to.

Toxic Avenger was one of Dolly's most sort after creations. It was also one of her very first releases. I bought a mini bottle back in October of 2011. Fun fact: Dollish Polish was the very first indie polish I tried!

TA constantly sold out and then sadly Dolly could no longer get an ingredient necessary to make TA. But due to the popularity of TA Dolly spent a good deal of time trying to create as close a match to TA as possible.

I managed to get my hands of the newer version in late 2012 when Dolly announced her holos had to be discontinued due to new spectraflair regulations. I'm so lucky to have both versions and I want to share them with you now.

Dollish Polish Toxic Avenger bottle comparison

L-R: Reformulation, Original

They look pretty much the same to me. I don't see as much or as dark of a pink pigment in the original, but I'm not sure if that is because it's in a smaller and cylindrical bottle as opposed to the larger, square one... Same goes for the amount of orange/gold and green/blue colour shift. It is less visible in the newer bottle.

Sunlight

Reformulation: index & ring; Original: middle and pinkie

In these sunlight photos the difference is really obvious! The original is more of a silver with pink shimmer and looks to be a stronger linear holo. Whereas, the reformulated version looks like a maroon-ish/burgundy pink with a slightly weaker linear holo effect. You can see the colour shift around the edges of the nails in both formulas, but the newer one looks more orange/golden. The reformulation is also way darker than the original. The colour shift looks like sunset in the third photo!!

Natural Light/Shade

In the shade the difference is obvious - the newer version has way more duo chrome shimmer in it, but they still look similar. The original has quite a green/blue (the type which copper piping turns) tinge to it.

Lightbox

Wow, in the second photo the newer TA looks so dark and plum/pink purple with orange/red/green colour shift to the sides of each nail. The holo pigment is very much visible on the nails painted with the original TA and the base looks to be greyish. In the close-up you can tell the duo-chrome shimmer flakes are more dense in the reformulated version.

Macro

Top- bottom: reformulated version, original
Left-right: sunlight, lightbox, shade

Wowza!!!! Look how gorgeous that is!!!! You can see the difference in them very clearly. 

In sunlight they actually appear closest in colour but the original TA is a super strong linear holo.

In the lightbox the original is way more silver and the multi-chrome effect is visible but not concentrated.

In the shade the amount of duo/multi-chrome pigment in the reformulation is sooooo dense that you barely notice the base is a greenish grey/silver.

Formula and Application:

The original TA is good to go after one coat! I did apply two for the purposes of this comparison though.

The newer TA was best with two coats.

They both applied like butter, no complaints here!!!

Which one would I rather?

I have to go with the reformulated TA!!!! I just love the intense multi-chrome it's working and that dominant dark maroon/burgundy/pink is sooooooooooooooooo beautiful, it's right up my alley. Plus it suits my skin tone more than the silvery original.

Which would you stash and which would you sell?

xxx

NPA

My New Dollish Polishes Swatches & Review

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Ok, I have a bumper post for y'all here!

I asked my Facebook followers if they wanted to see my newest Dollish Polish's in one post or one a day over the week and 'all at once' won, so prepare yourselves for seven days of awesomeness in one photo heavy post!

Candy Lacquer LE Valentine's Day Polish Swatches

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I did it guys! I worked really hard over the last couple of days to get my Candy Lacquers swatched. You have no idea how hard it was to remove each one! I wanted to leave them on for weeks!!!!
But I wanted to show you them sooner rather than later, because a few of her LE V-day polishes are still in stock (though I don't think any of the ones I purchased are, sorry!).

This post is photo heavy so click the Read More button to see the swatches and review

KKCentreHK Water Decal Review

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This review is hideously late!!
Almost a year late!
I do feel horrible about that and just want to say that it's the only product review I've let fall through the cracks! I'm very sorry. I have reviewed 2 other sets of decals from KK HERE & HERE

But the upside? It's Easter themed nail decals (which were too late to post last year) and this gives you plenty of time to think about what nail art you might want to do for Easter manis this year.

KKCenterHK is an e-tailer that sells a variety of beauty products including nail polish and nail art supplies.
They have an especially large range of water decals including heaps of Special Occasion or Holiday decals.

Source: KK Centre HK

I wanted to review these ones http://www.kkcenterhk.com/Nail-Water-Decals-Festival/c106_145/p6190/N.NAIL-Easter-Rabbit-Easter-Eggs-Water-Decals-Nail-Art-WDHHK154/product_info.html because I love all the nail art where the heads of animals are painted on the tips of girls nails and I wanted a quicker way to achieve the look.

The advantage of water decals is that you can't really screw them up! You can fiddle with their placement as much as you like without damaging your nail polish or the decal. Just add a few drops of water and the decal can be moved again.
Once you are happy with how it looks (and you give it a minute for all the water to evaporate) just apply a layer or two of top coat to seal it and you're good to go!

Dollish Polish Hip Hop Hippity Hop with WDHHK154 water decals

The colour is quite washed out because the lighting set up was less than ideal, but the photos are still true to life of the decals.
I didn't have any issues applying the decals. I managed to fold a few into themselves (because I was applying them a bit barbarically!!!!)  but all I had to do was put them back in water and they looked as good as new.
I used two coats of Revlon Color Stay Top Coat to seal the decals and they wore really well.

NB: This was the original Hip Hop Hippity Hop that Dolly reformulated and replaced when the glitter sort of melted a little and curled at the very edges. I still like this version as long as I have a thick top coat, but I really need to get my mitts on the current formula before Easter this year!

KKCenterHK's decals cost between around  $2.82 -6.39. Each pack generally contains 20 decals.

If you like the look of these ones do have a look at their website.
The Coupon Code NPA10 which KK provided for my readers last year is active until the 31 January so get in quick!  is now active until 31 January 2014. It entitles you to 10% your order and it is located on my left hand sidebar.


xxx
NPA

Christmas with Dollish Polish

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I couldn't resist picking up a couple of Dolly's Christmas collection this year. Last year she released 3 top coats that I wasn't too keen on at the time, but this year she tinkered with them and added a gorgeous red and green base to the A Christmas Story inspired set and "I was in like Flynn"!

I picked up the green, red and the snowflake glitter top coat because I really couldn't pass it by, even though I knew the snowflakes would be too big for my nails!!!

 

Dollish Polish I Can't Put My Arms Down!

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I Can't Put My Arms Down! is a scarlet/vermillion red with fine orange looking glitter. The glitter could well be red too but it glows like orange embers to my eye! I'm head over heels for it! I feel like orange toned reds suit me more than blue reds and Christmas is usually all about the cooler ones, so I'm loving the firey warmth ICPMAD has! I'm wearing 3 coats with 1 layer of SV in these pics, but 2 coats gave good coverage. The formula was a lot thinner than what I'm used to with Dollish Polish lacquers and I welcome it whole heartedly!!! Application was easy peasy.

Dollish Polish Be Sure To Drink Your Ovaltine

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Be Sure To Drink Your Ovaltine is an emerald green shimmer with matching flakies. The polish came out a bit bluer than it is in person, but the micro shimmer intimates the golden green tones that are also present. It's not the kind of green I associate with Christmas, but it turned out to be pretty gorgeous! You're looking at 2 coats with 1 layer of SV. It had a pretty thin formula and I had to watch how much polish was on the brush or I was at risk of cuticle pooling, but once I had that down it applied effortlessly.
I can see this being a great base for mermaid-esque manis too, thanks to the sea green look it has.

Dollish Polish You'll Shoot Yer' Eye Out Kid over Be Sure To Drink Your Ovaltine

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You'll Shoot Your Eye Out Kid is full of iridescent glitters in various shapes and sizes and most excitingly white snowflakes!!! I layered it over BSTDYO, so you don't get as strong an effect from the iridescent glitters (they'd stand out better over a darker base) but the blue and green shades they take on are very complimentary. Before you ask; the snowflakes were a bitch of a bitch to fish out! I think this was mainly because there were so few in the bottle. That was a little disappointing to be honest, it wouldn't take more than maybe 2 manis with a snowflake on every finger to use them all up. I think there should be plenty in there, even if they sink so that you can fish them out if you so desire. I hope I can find more of these confetti snowflakes to add to my bottle. The formula is quick thick (like plain suspension base) and you get a good concentration of iridescent glitters in 1 coat. My nails are narrow so the snowflakes don't sit flat and I used a couple of layers of Glitter Gloss and SV on the problems spots to try and remedy the sticky-outy-ness :) 

Looks pretty awesome right?
Dollish Polish is available here, Overall Beauty and Llarowe

Merry Christmas everyone, I can't wait to open presents in the morning!!!!


xxx
NPA