Quilted Chatters

Today I've got a beautiful polish to show you, once again thanks to my awesome friend Michaela.  I've had my eye on OPI Chatters Me Up for quite a while, and when I was at her house the other day (Halloween cookie-baking and nail-painting party) she kindly let me borrow her bottle.  I am now absolutely sure that I need my own bottle of this!  :)

Chatters Me Up is an OPI shade exclusive to Chatters salons in Canada, as far as I know.  It's a wine-coloured polish with a strong pink shimmer that's almost micro-flakies, and it flashes an orangey-bronze in the sunlight.  This is such a complex polish, and unfortunately it was impossible to capture it in all it's glory in pictures, so you'll have to take my word for it! 

I used plate BM-310 and Essie Good As Gold to stamp on this image, the finished look reminds me of a royal quilt, haha!

Chatters Me Up had a great formula, and covered completely in two easy coats.  Doesn't hurt that I love the shape of OPI's brush, it fits my nails perfectly! 

I'm really happy with how this turned out,  I'm actually still wearing it and going on day 3! 

Tomorrow is Halloween, and I have managed to make it to this point without doing a single Halloween manicure!  Remember this post when I was complaining about the likelihood of me spending Halloween at home alone?  Well I've decided to tag along with a group of my friends and we're going to collect food donations instead of getting candy!  I've also finally thought up an awesome costume (my activity on Sunday, haha)  and I will be doing my nails for tomorrow, but they'll be part of my costume and won't resemble anything Halloween-y.  I haven't told anybody (besides my family) what I'm being, and I'm super excited to dress up!  If I get a decent picture, I'll post it here along with my matching nails!  :)

Wishing everyone a safe and happy Halloween, and my thoughts and prayers are with everyone on the east coast!  

Feenix Polish: Falling For You & Feenix Rising

Today I've got two stunning polishes from Suzette, the genius behind Feenix Polish.  I'll just get right to it!

Falling For You is described as "a clear base to which we have lightly added two shimmering pigments in tawny colors.  To that, we have stirred in a mixture of ten different glitters, some of them matte.  The result is a riot of fall colors reminiscent of an October walk in the woods."

My bottle doesn't appear to have any shimmer in the base like the pictures in the listing do, but instead has a scattering of brown micro-glitters throughout; I think I like it better this way though.  The most prominent colours of glitter are red and gold (Gryffindor, anyone?)  I layered one coat of Falling For You over Sheswai Badass, and I must admit that I was very tempted to give each of these two polishes a separate post and call this one "Falling For You, Badass". 

This glitter is very dense, and you can get full coverage in 3 coats.  The base is pretty thick and required dabbing to get even coverage, but the glitter was very well-suspended.  Topped with one coat of Seche Vite for the pictures, though I'd recommend another if you want a perfectly smooth finish.   This polish attracted a lot of attention because it was SO glittery, but the fall colours were very pretty and not obnoxiously glittery at all!  

Feenix Rising is described as "an incredibly beautiful topcoat...which has proven incredibly difficult to photograph.  It is a clear base with four neutral holographic small glitters."  I found the glitters to not be quite holographic, but more iridescent, however the comment on being impossible to photograph was spot-on! 

This polish is SO stunning; my mom said that they looked like these, and she's right!  I tried to take photos of this under my normal lighting conditions, but I was ending up with photos like the first one below, which IN NO WAY looks like the polish does in real life.  Application was the same as for Falling For You, and I used one coat of Seche Vite for the pictures. 

This one is just so reflective, so I went to a shaded area of the house to capture the true depth and beauty of this polish.  Ta-da! 

Now just imagine all of the colours constantly changing (similar to a blue-green-gold colour-shifting flakie polish) and reflecting light, and it looks like mermaid scales on your nails!  I said that I got a lot of compliments on the last one, but this definitely one-upped the fall glitter! 

I tried it over so many different greens, blues, and purples, and they all looked amazing.  I finally decided to layer it over Orly Decoded, to let all of the different colours of the glitter stand out.  Looking at the finished look, you'd never guess I put it over a dark grey even thought the base of the polish was clear! 

So there you have it, two stunning polishes from Feenix Polish!  You can purchase Feenix Polish on Etsy here, and keep in the loop on Facebook here.  I'm absolutely in love with all of the polishes in the shop, I just might have to pick up a couple more... or a lot more.  

Which of these polishes is your favourite?  Are you planning on picking up any of these or her other stunning creations? :)

Disclaimer: The products in this post were sent to me for review and my honest opinion. 

Snow Leopard

I have this awesome friend named Michaela, and she's probably the most crafty and creative person I'll ever have the pleasure of knowing.  She likes doing her nails too and we often talk nail polish, so I was super excited when she decided to get the Bundle Monster 2011 stamping plates.  I have the 2012 set, so last week we got together and borrowed some of each other's plates!

One of the plates I borrowed was BM-221, specially for this leopard print pattern.  I had just recently done a leopard-print mani and wanted this one to look different, so I used my newly-acquired OPI My Boyfriend Scales Walls (LOVE) and stamped with Konad black polish. 

My Boyfriend Scales Walls is seriously the most perfect white ever.  For all intents and purposes it serves as a white polish, but it's heaps more flattering than most which look like white-out.  It also wears really well, these pictures were taken after three days of wear and I only had one small chip on my right hand!  

Last weekend we got the first dump of snow on the mountains, so these nails felt appropriate.  I'm really happy with how they turned out, and wouldn't be surprised if I re-created them a couple more times before winter is over!  Also, don't forget to like the new Globe & Nail Facebook page!

What do you think of this?  Do you like this different winter leopard print look?  :)

Badass

I've got to admit, I was biased towards this colour before I even wore it just because of the name.  I'm wearing this polish right now and have already had multiple opportunities to tell people who like my nails that it's Badass.  Win. 

This is two perfect coats of Sheswai Badass, with one coat of Seche Vite.  Badass is a vampy red-toned brown with a stunning dark red shimmer that gives the polish that glowing look. 

I picked this up on sale at Winners, hooray sales!  It's my first Sheswai polish and I'm extremely impressed with the formula, it's the definition of perfect!  The brush fit my nails perfectly, and the polish covered completely in one coat but I added another for depth.  

I actually put on Badass to use as a base for an indie polish (post to come soon!) but I just had to give this polish it's own post, it's so beautiful!

I LOVE this polish, I think it's a great colour for fall.  Do you like it?  Do you have any Sheswai polishes? Do you get biased towards polishes because of their names?   :)

Also, don't forget to like the new Globe & Nail Facebook page!

Shiny Funky French

First, I have some exciting (and long overdue) news: Globe & Nail now has a Facebook page!  It'll be a great way for me to connect more with all my followers (and blogging idols!) and I'm really glad that I finally got one going!   If you have Facebook, head on over there and like my page!  :)

Today I'm paying homage to the blog that started my obsession with nail polish, Chloe's Nails.  This has got to be one of her most iconic and re-created manicures, I've seen it everywhere!

I started with Sally Hansen Black Out, followed by a coat of Seche Vite and then Essie Matte About You.  I taped off most of my nail and painted the tips with more Seche, and then added a strip of black striping tape.  I was worried about how the tape would hold up without a topcoat, but I took these pictures after a day of wear and the tape hadn't come off yet!

Yea, sorry about the bubbly pinky.  That bugged me too. 

So how do you think I did with re-creating this famous manicure?  I really enjoyed wearing it and I certainly got a lot of compliments! (Many of which were proceeded by "What happened to the pinky?" Grrr)

Don't forget to head on over and like the Globe & Nail Facebook page to keep up to date with all my nail-painting madness!  :) 

Aphrodite Lacquers: Printemps a Paris Collection

Of course I'm mid-photo-crisis when I receive two Aphrodite Lacquers from Rebecca's delightfully seasonally-inappropriate Printemps a Paris collection.  I managed to perfectly capture the lovely colour and depth of these polishes, but you'll have to excuse my oompa-loompa fingers for the time being. 

First I have Terre (translated to Earth,) a pastel-green base (which my friends affectionately described as "frog" when they saw it) with emerald-green and yellow small hex glitters, and hidden green shimmer that comes out to play when the light hits it just right.  I'm not normally a fan of shimmer and glitter in the same polish, but Rebecca nailed it (no pun intended) with the barely-there shimmer that just adds another dimension to the polishes. 

I've used four coats for the pictures, with one coat of Seche Vite; I was very pleased with how smooth this was!  You know when you put top coat over a glitter after doing your mani at night, and then you wake up in the morning and it's all sunk and the glitter is super gritty again?  No problem with that here; these pictures were taken the morning after, with only one coat of top coat! 

The first coat required careful applicaiton, but the next three were super easy.  Great glitter suspension, and no dabbing required.  The jelly base is quite sheer, but if you don't have much free edge or a very visible nail line, you could easily get away with three coats like Stephanie did here. 

The second polish Rebecca sent me definitely does double-duty in terms of being seasonally-appropriate, this is Nuages, (translated to Clouds).  It's a white jelly base (love!) with silver, blue, and gunmetal glitters and a blue hidden shimmer.  

This polish fits in with the springtime collection because of the soft colours, but it's also reminiscent of a snowy winter scene, and I think this also makes a great winter polish for someone who doesn't like the normal dark colours that make up winter collections. 

This one is also four coats, but there is no top coat in the pictures; you can see that it's still very shiny by itself but I'd recommend a quick-drying top coat to help speed up the drying.  In terms of application, everything that I said about Terre applies here.  This one was a tad more sheer so I still had minimal VNL at 4 coats, but I didn't mind it very much with the white base. 

The only negative thing I have to say about this collection is that being a French speaker, in the names of the polishes there are some grammar and spelling issues, along with a lack of accents.  However, this has absolutely nothing to do with Rebecca's polish-making abilities, and I've been smitten with this collection from the get-go.  Anything with French, France, or Paris in the name, and I can't help but be biased towards it.  ;) 

You can find Aphrodite Lacquers always fully-stocked on Etsy, and keep up to date on Facebook. 

Will you be picking up any of the polishes from the Printemps a Paris collection?  Do you let the seasons influence your polish colour choices?

Disclaimer: The products in this post were sent to me for review and my honest opinion. 

Globe & Nail on StumbleUpon

I'm working on a post with some indie polishes from Aphrodite Lacquers to be posted later today, but for now I have a little favor to ask all of you.  If you're as addicted to StumbleUpon as I am (or even if you just have an account) I'd really appreciate if you could take a second to open my blog in this link, and click the thumbs-up "I like it!" button in the top left corner.  I'm  trying to spread the word about my blog, and the more it gets "liked", the more Stumblers will get directed to my blog!

Thank you so much, you guys are the best!  See you later with a polish post!  :)

Lighting Strikes Violet Femme

I feel like I haven't posted in so long!  Reality is that I had a couple of manis that I wore for three days, and I was having a crisis of sorts with my pictures (more on that at the bottom of the post.)  

Today's mani is my first venture into mildly Halloween-y nails.  I'm not at all excited for Halloween this year; I used to get excited about dressing up and going trick-or-treating with my friends (and the candy-eating that followed) but this year my mom has finally pulled the plug on that one and isn't letting me go, saying that I'm too old.  (16 isn't too old as long as you're dressed up, right?)  Since I do school online and am not at all the type to go to crazy parties,  I'll most likely be spending the night at home watching re-runs of all the Castle Halloween episodes alone.  

Mildly depressing rant over, here is my somewhat Halloween-y mani.  I don't care for the standard orange and black combination, so I went instead for silver and purple.  Close enough, right?  I started this mani with a base of Picture Polish Violet Femme, which in my opinion is the most perfect shade of purple polish ever.  Purple is my favourite colour, but I don't have many purple polishes because I'm so picky about exactly which shades I like; this one hits the spot!  It's deep and rich, and super saturated with an almost-neon purple pigment that is oh-so-perfect.  Two coats, and a stamp with BM-305 using Essie No Place Like Chrome, and this is the result.  

What do you think of the rotated picture? 

So, the picture crisis:  I used to take my pictures outside on the deck in the morning before I left for school and dance, but now the annual torrential downpour has started and is unlikely to let up at all until March.  That, plus the fact that it's not very light out by the time I leave in the morning, and I'm a little panicky as to what to do about my photos.  I made a lightbox and played around with it a lot, but I still can't get anything close to what  I want my photos to look like.  I'll play with that, and hope that I can get something to work!

How do you like my Halloween-ish mani, or do you even think it says Halloween at all?  Hate to be a party pooper but is anyone else as not-excited for Halloween as I am?  

Half-Moon Gradient

Good morning!  It's been a couple days since I've posted, but I was really enjoying my last mani and ended up wearing it for 3 days!  (Yes, that's a long time for me!)  Since I'm one of the few bloggers who actually posts what is currently on my nails, I had to take a short break from blogging while I enjoyed wearing my leopard-print nails.  

Anywho,  today I've got a half-moon gradient that I've seen floating around quite a bit.  The main reason I tried this was because I have an audition on Sunday, but I have a social event to go to immediately afterwards and was looking for something that I could do in french manicure colours while being more interesting than a plain french tip.  I gave it a trial run in these colours to see if I liked the look, and it turns out I LOVE it!  

I began with a base of two coats of Orly Plum Noir, and a coat of Seche Vite to speed up the drying.  I then used hole-reinforcers to block off the half-moon shape, and sponged on a gradient of Plum Noir and Nails Inc. Power Pink, followed by a second coat of gradient with Plum Noir and Revlon Raspberry Scone.  Two coats of Seche Vite to smooth it all out.  

As I've already made clear, I absolutely love this; I keep looking at my nails and thinking that I should be seeing them on a model in a magazine or something!  I think that this is such a chic, modern and edgy look that would look great in so many different colour combinations, (dark red and gold for Christmas?), and it wasn't difficult at all!  Needless to say, I'll definitely be repeating this design on Sunday in french mani colours, so keep an eye out for that post early next week!

What do you think of this look?  Do you like my colour choices?  Are there any specific colours that you think would work great for this?  :)

Autumn Leopard

I've been wanting to do something fall-appropriate in orange and gold for a while, but when I sat down with my chosen polishes I had absolutely no idea what I was doing.  After trying out a couple different things (and re-doing some nails multiple times) I was getting pretty tired and didn't want anything more to do with tape or tiny brushes, and I ended up with this.  

I've never done a full-on leopard print manicure before, but I'm really happy with how it turned out.  And best of all, it was super easy thanks to this tutorial by Sarah at Chalkboard Nails!  

My base colour is Essie Meet Me At Sunset, the gold is Essie Good As Gold, and the black is Sally Hansen Black Out.  I'm really happy with my colour choice; I think they look great together and make for a very unnatural-looking yet fall-appropriate leopard print!

Do you love leopard print manicures?  How about unnatural leopard print?  Or do you think the full-on animal print combined with the unnatural colours is just too much?  Let me know in the comments  :)

Reciprocal Gradient Tutorial

As promised, here is a step-by-step picture tutorial of my Reciprocal Gradient nails from yesterday's post.  Here is what the finished mani looks like:

For this look I used Zoya Dove and Orly Decoded, though I'm sure it would look great in a lot of other colours combinations too!   Please excuse the the less-than-desirable lighting in the tutorial, it was nighttime and I had to use artificial light (I seriously need to make a lightbox) but I figured you'd rather have a funny-coloured tutorial than none at all! 

1.  Begin with a base coat, and paint your nails the lighter of the two colours you've chosen.  

2.  Sponge on a gradient, I use this method. (Skip to 2:10)  Add a quick-drying top coat.  

3.  Place pieces of striping tape (or very thinly cut pieces of normal tape, if you have no striping tape and a lot of patience.)

4.  Sponge on another gradient using the same method, but this time reverse the colours.  So if your gradient was going light-to-dark before, now sponge on dark-to-light.  You may have to go over this one a couple of times to completely cover the gradient underneath.  

5.  (not shown)  Peel off the striping tape, and clean around your nails, first with q-tips and then with a makeup brush dipped in acetone. 

6.  Add a couple coats of your favourite quick-drying top coat for a nice smooth finish, and you're done! 

How do you like it?  Was it easy enough to understand?  Will you be trying this?  If you write a post about it, please link back to this post.  If you do try it, email a link or a picture to ecm.dancer@gmail.com.  I'd love to see!  :)

Reciprocal Gradient

I've had this idea floating around in my head for a while, and I don't *think* anyone else has done it before, so I decided to give it a go.  I'm SO happy with how this turned out!  

I started by painting my nails in a Grey-dient with Zoya Dove and Orly Shockwave.  Unsure of how my idea would turn out (regardless of the fact that it looked awesome in my head) I decided to do only my thumb, and if it looked awful I would leave the rest as plain gradients.  At that point I was almost wishing my idea would look awful, nearing 10:30pm, just so I could go to bed sooner...  

Unfortunately, after finishing my thumb, my exact thoughts were "Oh crap, this looks awesome.  Now I'm going to have to do all 10 nails." *facepalm*  Take a look. 

Zoya Dove and Orly Shockwave, with two coats of Seche Vite.  I consistently have problems with these two greys photographing way more blue than they actually are.  Grrr.  

I felt so cool naming this the reciprocal gradient.  I was thinking about nail polish while doing math (I promise that doesn't happen all the time,) and the word popped out at me and it just seemed to fit perfectly  :)

So, since I'm hoping that you'll all love this and want it on your own nails (and then it'll blow up and become a huge trend... Ha. Right.) I took a couple pictures as I was going and I'll post a step-by-step picture tutorial tomorrow!  Awesome nails for all!! 

So you've probably got it figured out that I think this is awesome, but what about you?  Do you like the reciprocal gradient?  Will you be putting it on your (probably lengthy) to-do list of manicures?  Remember to check back tomorrow for a tutorial, and if you re-create the look shoot me an email (ecm.dancer@gmail.com) I'd love to see!  :)

F4 Polish: Gravel Dust

I've got one more great F4 Polish to show you today, Gravel Dust!  You can see my review of the F4 Polish Halloween Collection here.  

Gravel Dust is a medium grey crelly (creme-jelly) filled with tiny pink, purple, and green matte glitters.  The application was easy, and the glitters spread evenly by themselves.  

I've shown three coats here, but if you don't have a very visible nail line or don't have much free edge, you could easily get away with two coats.  I only had time for one coat of Seche Vite (morning mani,) but it was still pretty gritty so I'd recommend two coats of a thicker top coat for a completely smooth finish.  

I've made no secret of my love of grey polish, and this one hits the spot!  I think that it's really unique, and I love the uniform size of the glitters.  This would be a great polish for someone who wants something fun on their nails, but doesn't want to go too crazy.  ;)

You can find F4 Polish on Facebook here, and on Etsy here.  Jenn, Lacey, and Lexy, the geniuses behind F4 Polish, consistently turn out original and quality polishes, and I can honestly say that they are some of the most sweet and enthusiastic girls when it comes to their brand!  :)

Do you own any F4 Polish?  Do you like grey polish with glitter?  Let me know what you think! 

Studded Ink Suede

Let me tell you, if you live in Canada, Winners is THE place to get nail polish.  Often they'll just have a random assortment of bottles, but once in a while you'll walk in and find three full China Glaze displays (Bohemian, Safari, and Glitter Crackle), tons of random Orly, and a bunch of new, old, and hard-to-find OPIs for a fraction of the regular price!

Honestly, looking back on that experience I'm amazed that I managed to walk out with only two bottles of polish.  I got China Glaze Exotic Encounters which you can see I used here, as well as this beauty, OPI Ink Suede. 

I used two easy coats of this blurple (totally a word) with beautiful silvery shimer that gives it a glowing lit-from-within look even when not in direct light.  

I loved the look of it matte ("suede", yea, yea,) but when I topcoated it under the pretense of adding a coat of Essie Matte About You, I just couldn't bring myself to do it.  The shine really brings out the gorgeous shimmer! 

I've heard that it's nothing like the original OPI Ink, but I love it nonetheless.  Do you like this polish?  Would you be interested in a post showing it matte as well as glossy?  And finally, do you think I'm becoming too predictable with the studs?  ;)  Haha

F4 Polish: Halloween Collection

Today I've got three polishes from the F4 Polish Halloween collection to show you.  Once again I'm blown away by the thought and care that goes into making these polishes, and it shows through in the fabulous quality and application! 

First up is Krazy Korn, a clear base with orange, white, and yellow matte glitters of various sizes.  To make it further resemble it's namesake, I decided to layer it over a gradient of Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear White On, Mellow Yellow, and Essie Orange, It's Obvious!    

The glitter is really densely packed in all of the F4 Polishes, and this one is no exception; shown is only one coat! 

Application was really smooth, and there was only a little dabbing required just to get the larger yellow hexes where I wanted them.  I've used one coat of SV for the pictures, but I'd recommend two if you want a smooth finish.  

Green Goblin  is a clear base packed full of various shades and sizes of sparkly and matte green glitter.  I layered one coat of this over Orly After Party, but I have no doubt that you'd be able to get full coverage with this one by itself in two or three coats!

Application was perfectly smooth, I applied it as I would any normal non-glitter polish and it spread perfectly.  Gotta love a great glitter formula!  Two coats of SV are shown and were enough for a smooth finish. 

My favourite part about this one is the mix of glitters in it.  The contrast between the matte and sparkly glitters give it a really interesting visual effect, and the different shades of green give it a lot of depth.  

I've saved my favourite for last, Monster Mash!  This polish is a mix of black matte micro glitters, small green matte hexes, and medium purple matte hexes.  I layered one coat of Monster Mash over Orly Decoded, which I think is a perfect base!  Two coats of SV was enough for a smooth finish. 

The application on this one was a tad more finicky than the other two, but nothing to really complain about since the others were both on a level WAY above average for glitter application!  A little extra time was required to space the green and purple glitters evenly, but the end effect is SO worth it! 

How great is this?  I love that it's subtle (at arm's length) but still really fun, quirky, AND Halloween-appropriate!  This one's a total win  :)

You can snatch yourself up some F4 Polishes on Etsy here, (they ship to Canada!) and keep up to date with news and upcoming polishes on Facebook here. 

Which of these three polishes is your favourite?  Do you have any of these or the other polishes from the F4 Polish Halloween collection?  Will you be getting any in time for this Halloween?  :)



You can see my previous reviews of F4 Polish here: Pink Penquin, Chunky Cow, Pink Salmon, Mint Chocolate Chip.   I have one more F4 Polish to show you, but it's not part of the Halloween collection and therefore will be getting it's own post in the very near future  ;)


Disclaimer: The products in this post were sent to me for review and my honest opinion.