Friday, November 29, 2013

Urban Lacquer: Winter collection


Hello and Happy Black Friday shopping! I've got an awesome collection from Urban Lacquer to share with you, and not a lot of time to write so I'm going to let the photos speak for themselves. Besides, who doesn't like a picture story?!

Before we get started, I wanted to say happy anniversary to Brenda at Urban Lacquer! I've been swatching for her since November last year! It sure feels like yesterday!

Promo info:

If you got last year's set, you'll notice that a few of the new polishes this year were inspired by them, only, kicked up a notch and different!

Extreme Mall Matte-ness - one coat of amped up matte glitters worn over Twinkling Elf from 2012.



Comparison swatch of Extreme Mall Matte-ness and Mall Matte-ness.


Robo Elf - Two coats with touch ups of this gorgeous jelly with green sparkly glitter. I see a holiday theme with this one, last year's was Twinkling Elf!




Chimney Burn is a shifty lil thang! I wore one coat over WnW Black Cream, love this one!




Although I couldn't capture all the colors it shifts to, I caught a few and put them in a collage for easier side by side comparison. I did see an emerald green shift in low light which you can sort of see in the top left corner image.


And by customer request, this is Chimney Burn compared to Orly Space Cadet. (left to right, SC, CB, SC, CB) While both are shifty the coloration is quite different.



Glittery and Bright 2013 is a new version of last year's Glittery and Bright. The new version has larger glitters, more glitter payoff in one coat, more holo glitter and a clear base.




Comparison swatch: 2012, 2013, 2012, 2013


Lit up Like the Tree is a super holographic silver and gold blend of beautiful glitters! I wore just one coat over Robo Elf and look at the glitter payoff! When I was deciding what to swatch this one on top of, I immediately eyeballed Robo Elf, which is funny because I swatched last year's gold glitter topper over dark green too!




Comparison left to right: Dazzle Me Darling (2012), Lit up Like the Tree, Dazzle Me Darling (2012), Lit up Like the Tree


Last, but certainly not least is Board Games from Santa a sparkly texture polish! The red is sparkly and the white and green are matte glitters. This can be worn dabbed on in one coat, or brushed on in two. I wore no topcoat in the first three photos, and added Gelous and HK Girl in the last three photos for extra shine!




With topcoats:




I hope you have enjoyed the photo story and will shop at Urban Lacquer's Etsy shop today. Remember to use promo code WINTER25 for 25% off your entire order November 29, 1pm Central through December 2, 11pm Central time!
Definitely a sale you don't want to miss this year, this is the best discount offered by Urban Lacquer this year!

Friday, November 22, 2013

Wingdust Polish

I first discovered Wingdust some time in 2012 when polish was being sold to raise funds for an upcoming mission trip to Zambia. I was quite touched by it and have followed the brand's updates since. She achieved her goal and was able to help give supplies and clothing to children in need, build a home for an orphan child and her grandmother, assist with a 4th grade class and even sponsored Namatama, a local girl. The Wingdust facebook page has a photo album of the trip with more great stories and some beautiful photos!

...But you all are most likely here for polish photos, yes?

I opened the pretty black box and was pleasantly surprised with beautiful packaging! Each polish is wrapped in bubble wrap, tissue paper, and placed in an organza draw string bag. She included some tasty treats, a business card and some cool nail art pieces!




Let's unwrap! Stephanie sent six polishes for me to review, plus a gift polish of my choosing! Can you guess which one I chose?


If you guessed the one with the white label, you're right! Steel Town Girl was the one I chose to receive as a gift. Even though gifted polishes don't require review and swatches, I just _had_ to share it! Wingdust describes it as: A deep steel blue linear holo base, this polish is loaded with blue and holo and iridescent flakes, and shreds as well as 23 karat gold leaf.
I think its a brilliant mixture! I love the formula, it has that thickish consistency like most indie polishes do when compared to say, an OPI cream color. I prefer this type of formula because I feel I have so much more control over where the polish lands. I had very little clean up to do after two coats and topcoat. If you look closely in the photos you can see a lot going on, from flakies to glitter and shimmer and its even a linear holo! Holos are a bit difficult to shoot indoors, but I think some of that is visible on my pinky and ring fingers in the first photo.




Summer Storm is described as a grey crelly base, purple shimmer with purple, silver, fuchsia, pink, grey, and gunmetal glitters in all shapes and sizes. I really love a nice grey with a pop of color and this one was done really well. I wore two coats alone and did dip the brush a few extra times for some of the larger dot glitters. I feel that the crelly base gave good coverage in two coats and the amount of glitter on the nail and playing peek-a-boo, is perfect I think!




Somewhere Out There is a song I sang quite often in my younger years and sometimes when I need to say that phrase, I still sing it rather than saying it. It makes me smile and this polish does too! The polish consists of a deep wine/burgundy base, loaded with gold, fuchsia, peach, copper glitters in all shapes and sizes, gold moons, holo bars, dots, and iridescent shimmer.
I have to admit, when I first saw the bottle, I thought oo pretty glitter but...the base looked so dark in the bottle. I was skeptical but boy was I wrong about that! Its beautiful, has a TON of depth - like looking into one of those glass art pieces or a clear blue ocean or something. I was pretty blown away when I wore it. The polish description does not include red glitter, yet I see red. The way a tinted jelly base changes the glitter colors is pretty nifty and I think Stephanie has a talent for pairing them perfectly!

The first swatch photo is one coat over Revlon Chocolate Truffle which is a very dark brown cream. The rest of the photos are only two coats of Somewhere Out There.





I don't know about you but after seeing those first three polishes and now Muskoka Sunset, I'm totally confused as to which one to call favorite. Mind blown. They're all so beautiful!

Muskoka Sunset was a fan chosen name by Courtney Walker Strople on facebook. She even provided a gorgeous sunset photo as inspiration for the name.

Just like the photo, the polish has hues of purple, peach, pink, and periwinkle and is packed with shimmer. I wore just two coats of this jelly which impressed me yet again. All of the jelly polishes in this review are just two coats, there's no VNL and they're still jelly looking! Who loves awesome jelly formulas? This gal!




Waking Dream is the perfect name for this polish, and I'm curious about the inspiration behind it. The deep purple color reminds me of late nights when all is dark. The red and silver stars with shimmers and sparks of bright purple conjure memories of how it "looked" when I'd rub my eyes a while before opening them. The polish also has large red dot glitter and holo red diamonds. I did dip the brush a while to get the red dot glitter out of the bottle, but it was worth it. Again, I only used two coats of this polish to cover vnl, yet it has such depth and that peek-a-boo glitter that I love seeing with jelly glitter polishes.




When I first saw Honest Puck in the bottle, I thought the base was teal. After applying two coats it turned out to be a beautiful earthy green jelly. The copper, gold, neon green, matte green, and iridescent glitter loftily floats and peeks out here and there. The shimmer twinkles like little stars reflecting in an oasis at nightfall. The sound of crickets and frogs drift in the cool nighttime breeze. Such a calming, happy polish.




The Deep End is where people say you've gone when you do something irrational or extreme. It stems from referring to the deep end of a pool being dangerous and how you can get lost in the deep end. The phrase refers more-so to the emotional rather than the physical danger.
If this polish is what the deep end looks like, I'm having a party there and you're all invited!! The blue leaning purple jelly base plays tricks with the huge silver or is it white or lavender hex glitters. The shimmer pops and sparks when you least expect it and then there's that punch of raspberry! I wore just one coat of this polish over Revlon Wild Violets.




Overall, every one of these polishes is unique and complex and based on these few I reviewed, I think that any polish from Wingdust will be spectacular. Color me impressed.

Wingdust polish information and updates can be found on facebook and you can shop for their polish on Etsy.