Zoya Spam!

Happy Easter, everyone! How about some Zoya spam to celebrate? 

Zoya Aurora: gorgeous (and insanely sparkly) scattered holographic purple. Looks different in the following pictures depending on lighting- in reality, it's somewhere in between. 

Zoya Bela: soft and squishy-looking peachy pink jelly.

Zoya Jacqueline: creamy yellow-toned off-white creme.

Zoya Marley: a light pastel purple with soft pearly shimmer. Very pretty, and perfect for Easter!

I hope everyone is having a wonderful weekend!

Rescue Beauty Lounge Piu Mosso with Max Factor Fantasy Fire

Rescue Beauty Lounge's Piu Mosso is a deep navy blue with barely-perceptable golden shimmer (easy to see in the bottle, very hard to see on the nail). I've tried my best to catch the shimmer in these photos, but in reality, it mostly looks like a deep navy blue creme. 

Directly under artificial lighting- the most shimmer I could coax out of this polish:

Piu Mosso is the very first Rescue Beauty Lounge lacquer I've ever tried- and I have to admit, it didn't quite live up to expectations. While gorgeous in the bottle, that pretty golden shimmer doesn't really translate on the nail. And it certainly didn't look anything like it does in these swatches. Formula-wise, it can't be faulted (practically a one-coater, easy to control), but it was something of a let down. Especially with the high price tag (even higher once you factor in international shipping). 

Thankfully, I have a super awesome friend who is also into lacquer, and presented me with Max Factor's fabled Fantasy Fire for my birthday back in November! Amazing, right? Even better, she gifted me TWO bottles of Fantasy Fire. It's like she could see the dilemma coming- if you've only got one small bottle, you can only use it sparingly. But with a back-up, I can awesome-ize any boring manicure I want. Case in point: Piu Mosso gets taken from "meh" to "zomg!!1".

In the sun:

In the shade:

Utterly drool-worthy. And to think, I'd never expected to get my hands on this one. Fantastic birthday present, from an amazing friend. You know who you are!

Pirate Polish Holiday 2012 Collection Swatches!

Tomorrow I'll be releasing the Pirate Polish Holiday 2012 Collection! Here's a sneak peek:

Left to Right: Holiday Glow, Joyeux Noël, Sugar Cookies, Christmas Lights, Christmas Tree In Blue

Sugar Cookies is a creamy white polish with multicoloured pastel glitters in various shapes and sizes. For me, the quintessential holiday treats are the sugar cookies my grandmother used to bake. Here I've tried to replicate the slightly golden hue of white sugar cookies fresh out of the oven; this isn't a stark white, it's very soft and warm, with some yellow in it.

I've had this fantastic metallic blue tinsel glitter in my stash of supplies for some time now. It reminded me instantly of the blue pine needles of a faux blue Christmas tree. I feel like coloured trees went through a phase of popularity back in the day- does anyone else recall this phenomenon? This is my Christmas Tree In Blue, a mixture of metallic blue glitters, silver hexagonal glitter, fine holographic blue glitter, and different sizes and shapes of white glitter. The overall effect is very snowy, icy, and glitzy. Below I've swatched it over a grey-beige shade.

Holiday Glow is a luxurious mixture of superfine copper and gold flakes, as well as a smattering of gold holographic glitters. It's a luminous combination that reminds me of candlelight. Below it is pictured on it's own, but it could also be layered to create an interesting effect.

Joyeux Noël is a perfect Christmas polish- red and green metallic glitters in a multitude of different sizes, along with a smattering of gold holographic hexagonal glitter. Very festive! Below it is swatched over a forest green creme. 

I wanted to create a lacquer reminiscent of Christmas Lights at night- this is my take on that theme. A deep grape purple jelly containing multicoloured matte hexagonal glitters, small twinkling silver holographic glitter, and large metallic purple glitters. Below it is shown over a dark purple creme (Illamasqua Baptiste).

I'm also pleased to be offering minis for the first time! They will be available individually for $5, and as a set for $22. The regular size bottles are priced at $10 each, and are available as a full set for $45.

This collection will be available tomorrow in the Pirate Polish Etsy shop. You can also follow updates by checking Pirate Polish out on Facebook.

What do you think of my Pirate Polish Holiday collection? Is anything catching your eye?

NARS Candy Darling + Lush Lacquer Party Rockin and Flippin Out

Today's post comes to you from a slightly grumpy Lacquer Tracker. The reason why? It's 5:22pm and the last bit of sunlight is disappearing beyond the horizon. In another 20 minutes it'll be pitch black. Ugh. It's not the cold or snow that gets me down about winters here, it's the incredibly short days. And until winter solstice comes around (December 21st), the days will keep getting shorter. Ugh. Okay. End rant. Let's get onto the nails, shall we? 

NARS Candy Darling, a very light and sheer beige; this took 4 coats to reach this level of opacity, and as you can see, it's still a touch sheer. For the first several coats it was streaky as well. Can't say I'm a big fan...

But two coats of glitter should improve this manicure (and hopefully my mood as well). Enter Lush Lacquer!

This is Party Rockin, by itself, over Candy Darling. Pretty!

Even better, here it is with a layer of Flippin' Out as well.

 Well, the sunlight may be gone, but at least my nails are brighter. That helps, right?

Pirate Polish - The Pirate With The Golden Gun!

Have you been wishing for a more affordable way to cover your nails in luxurious flakes of real gold? Well, Pirate Polish has a (possible) solution for you! Presenting... 

The Pirate With The Golden Gun! Made with 0 karats of real gold flakes!*

But don't take our word for it. Read this user testimonial:

"If I close one eye, and kinda squint, it looks exactly like popular brand name topcoats of a similar name!" -T

Now available in the Pirate Polish Etsy store! 

*Made, in fact, with gold-coloured (read: yellow) shredded glitter. 

Well, I hope you all got as much of a chuckle out of reading that as I did writing it! If you're curious, these swatches are done over an old black label OPI (my only black label OPI, actually!) called Mrs. O'Leary's BBQ. 

Here it is by itself:

I hope you enjoyed today's post... let me know what you think of it!

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