Sparkles by Julie - Coco, Lost in Space & Milky Way

Just after Christmas I received a little package from Honolulu based indie brand - Sparkles by Julie.  Julie offered to send me some more of her shades to try out and asked me to select some from her collection.  The tree polishes I chose were Coco, Lost in Space and Milky Way.

Coco - I'm a big fan of glitter polishes that have a nicely tinted base so they are opaque on their own, yet still transparent enough to show off all the glitters.  So many commercial brand glitters are glitters in a clear base, and while I love a layering polish, I do prefer a polish that can be worn on it's own.

Coco is just what you would expect from a polish with this name.  There are gold and copper glitters of various sizes in a brown base with a little bit of brown shimmer (but not too much so as to make it frosty and cover the glitter - I hate that!)  There is also holo hexes and fine holo dust.  This was two coats of Coco with two coats of top coat to smooth out any bumps.

Lost in Space - this has a few sizes of silver holo glitters as well as aqua blue glitters suspended in a black jelly base.  I did two coats of Lost in Space here, and for the photos I should probably have done three, but in real life it looked great.  I did put on two layers of top coat to smooth this one out as well, but that's mainly because now I'm really OCD about having a very shiny high gloss finish (that's what trying out soak off gel nails does for you!) 

Milky Way - this one is my favourite from this bunch, which is ironic given my comment at the beginning about preferring a full coverage polish to a layering one.  This is a really gorgeous combo of glitters which I can't actually tell if they are individual colours, or if they are iridescent duochrome shifting ones (it's probably a combination of both). I layered one coat of Milky Way of Cult Nails Time Traveller.  This was the smoothest of the bunch requiring only one layer of Seche Vite for that glassy finish.

I think the labels on these bottles are clever.  Generally I prefer a clear label so you can see through to the polish in the bottle, but what Julie has done is print what the polish looks like on the label, which really is the next best thing for me.  Therefore every polish has its own custom label.

The formula on all these was very good and there were no signs of any curling glitter (either reflective or otherwise).

Sparkles by Julie are available from her Esty store for $8 for a 15ml (she also has minis).

Polishes provided for review.

Pretty Serious - Mummy Mush

I'm feeling a tired and lazy tonight after spending the my first day back in the office today after the Christmas/New Year break, therefore I've just got one swatch to share with you.  I wore this before Christmas, which is when I fell in love with it and it made my top polishes for the year.

Pretty Serious Mummy Mush is from the Monster Mash collection and it's a golden glass fleck polish that it totally unlike any other I have seen.  The base colour is actually quite pink. When I swatched it onto my swatch sticks I was amazed at how pink the base was, especially when holding the stick up to the light.  However as soon as you layer two or three coats, that pink disappears and ends up providing a soft fleshy coloured gold.  The gold flecks are just how I like them, cool toned (and it even has a blue flash), yet the pink base warms it up just slightly. I'm completely in love with this polish, if your a gold lover like me - this one is a no brainer!

This is three coats of Mummy Mush with a single coat of Seche Vite.

Pretty Serious - Hot Summer Nights & Twinkling Lights

Here are a couple of polishes from the Pretty Serious - Christmas without Snow collection. 

Hot Summer Nights - This one is a deep, dark blue jelly.  It's a bit darker than my photos show, which were taken in full sun so they really bring out the dense glittery sparkle.  Although it's dark, you can definitely tell its still blue, and not black.  The glitter particles are really dense and the finished look is really glamorous and sophisticated.   Because of the fine glitter in this, I found it was a little textured so I put two layers on top coat on.

Twinkling Lights - These two are perfectly paired with each other, in fact that is exactly how Kaz designed them.  This is one coat of Twinkling Lights and the photos are taken in the shade.  You can see the base colour is much darker in the shade, and almost looks black. But when the light hits it you see the dark blue sparkle shining though all the small aqua blue glitters and copper hexes.

Picture Polish - O'hara

Happy New Year everyone!  I hope you all had a wonderful time.  As for me, I was cozy and snug in my bed, the days of seeing in the new year are long gone for me.  That's what small children do to you!

To start the year, I'm excited to show you a brand new shade from Picture Polish.

O'hara - for the Scarlett in all of you! That's the little catch phrase on the top of this bottle.  Is there anyone out there who doesn't know who Scarlett O'hara is?  Well, Scarlett O'hara is the protagonist in the novel Gone with the Wind.  I've not read the book, but I certainly remember seeing the movie when I was in my teens.  I still recall the last words Rhett says to Scarlett - do you?

This is the brightest scattered red holo polish I've ever seen.  The formula on this is just like Kryptonite and Cosmos with the same shard like scattered holo pieces.  The red base is so amazingly bright, it's a blazing cherry red.  This one isn't as much of a jelly as kryptonite and cosmos, I'd say it's more of a crelly (a cross between a creme and a jelly).  The holo bits shine through easily but it's opaque in two coats.

These pictures are two coats with a coat of Seche Vite top coat.  Formula was great and I didn't need to do any clean up for these photos.

O'hara will be launching later this month, so make sure you like the Picture Polish facebook page to find out when it's available.