KB Shimmer

KB Shimmer makes some of the most amazing looking polishes that I've seen in a long time. I've lusted for this brand for a long time, and finally took the plunge and purchased 5 polishes.  This brand, in my opinion, is one of the most consistently well done brands.  Every collection creates more and more lemmings for me, while also making polishes that are new and exciting.

Something else I love about KB Shimmer is that the website recommends how best to wear each polish, whether it be layered or worn alone.

Oh Splat

A white crelly base loaded with red, orange, yellow, green, blue and purple multi sized glitters. This is 3 thin coats.

Full Bloom Ahead

A white crelly base loaded with fuchsia, orange, navy, teal, and gold multi sized glitters. This is 3 thin coats.

Spring Training

A pale, minty green crelly base loaded with pastel pink, purple, lilac, pale green, and gold multi sized glitters. This is 3 thin coats.

Will Yule Marry Me?

A deep gray jelly base loaded with multi sized and shaped holo glitter.

Christy, the creator of KB Shimmer, really has mastered the balance between glitter and base.  She manages to cram these polishes full of glitter, yet they still apply smooth and flat.  I am so impressed and can't wait to add to my KB Shimmer collection.

What are your favorite KB Shimmer polishes that I should check out?

Stay Sparkly,

A

OPI Spring Comparisons

Just a warning, this is extremely picture heavy. If there are any additional comparisons please leave your request in the comments.  Without further ado…

OPI Amazon…Amazoff vs OPI Fly vs China Glaze Exotic Encounter

Fly on pointer finger, Exotic Encounter on ring finger, Amazon…Amazoff on middle and pinky fingers.
Fly is much lighter and more blue based, it is also a more jelly like formula.
EE is more grey based and lighter.

OPI Live, Love, Carnival vs Essie Sunday Funday vs China Glaze Flirty Tankini

OPI on middle and pinky, Essie on pointer, China Glaze on ring finger.
All 3 are similar tones but OPI is a pure creme, Essie is a glass fleck and ChG is a shimmer.
China Glaze is the lightest, Essie is in the middle and OPI is the darkest and brightest.

OPI Kiss Me I'm Brazilian vs OPI Suzi's Hungary Again

       pinky/middle                     ring/pointer

Suzi has a subtle silver shimmer while Kiss is a pure cream.
Suzi is a few shades darker, also has a more sheer formula requiring 3 coats for full coverage.  On me, I prefer Kiss.

OPI Red Hot Rio vs OPI Vodka and Caviar

       ring/pointer         pinky/middle

Both a jelly based formulas that take 3 coats for opacity. The first coat of each is decidedly pink toned, each additional coat deepens the red significantly.  To my eye, these are total dupes! As Vodka and Caviar was recently discontinued, I understand the need to dupe it.  At least they didn't dupe a currently existing polish.

OPI OPI Scores a Goal vs OPI Skyfall vs Chanel Accessoire

       pointer/ring                   middle             pinky

Skyfall is much more red based, where Goal is purple/burgundy based
Accessoire is darker, more vampy, and most opaque (this is one coat!!!) , it is easily my favorite of all 3.

OPI Toucan Do It If You Try vs Chanel Orange Fizz

pointer/ring                                    pinky/middle

Formula wise Chanel is much thinner/less opaque. On me orange fizz pulls slightly pinker and dustier.

And the odd man out, my sole purchase from the MLB collection

OPI Umpires Come Out At Night vs OPI Eurso Euro vs Dior Sailor vs Revlon Royal

        ring                                               middle                   pointer             pinky

In the bottle these all look very similar, but on the nail they are clearly not dupes.  Sailor is much brighter and bluer, Euro is much more purple toned. Umpires pulls more navy, while Royal is truly a deep royal blue. This is my favorite color palate to wear, so I am pleasantly surprised that none of these are dupes.

Stay Sparkly,

A

OPI Brazil Collection pt 2

So Sally Beauty had the OPI Brazil Collection buy one get one free so I had to pick up 4 more polishes from the collection.

So that I don't sound like a broken record, I'm going to start this review by saying how fantastic all of the formulas are.  Creamy and opaque, easy to polish with, ideal cream formulas that OPI is known for.

Red Hot Rio

3 coats, no top coat- hello shine. This is a very jelly like formula, if anyone can recommend a true red cream, I would love to know. I suspect this is just a renamed version of cult favorite Vodka and Caviar, I will be comparing them in a later post. This is a glossy, ultra shiny cherry red. V and C is one of my all time favorites so I am happy to have this back up of the now discontinued shade.

Kiss Me I'm Brazilian

2 coats. An almost barbie toned pink. it is an ultra flattering medium pink, this is pretty and feminine without being too cutesy girlie… which is an important shade distinction for me.

Toucan Do It If You Try

2 creamy perfect coats. This color screams summer to me. It is an orange based coral, that boarders on neon.  It's incredibly flattering and I can see myself reaching for this as a perfect pedi color.

OPI Scores A Goal

2 coats.  This is slightly less creamy and opaque as the others.  I love this with the first coat, but the second coat makes it look very brown and muddy on me. Its a pretty color, but it isn't a color for me.  This color also screams fall to me, I don't think it really fits in with the whole bright fun concept of this collection.

If you missed the first part of my OPI Brazil review, please click here to check it out

I'm working on a comparison post featuring all of the polishes I picked up from this collection. If there are any comparisons you'd like to see please leave your request in the comments.  I will try my best to do all suggested comparisons.

Stay Sparkly,

A

Spring 2014 Comparisons

Just a warning, this is extremely picture heavy. If there are any additional comparisons please leave your request in the comments.  Without further ado…

Essie Find Me An Oasis vs Sinful Colors Tidal Wave vs Lancome Simply Aqua

Essie on middle and pinky, Sinful Colors on pointer, Lancome on ring finger.
SC is slightly darker and bluer
Essie is the most white based and also the most opaque
Lancome has a slight greying-purple toned base
All have similar thin jelly like formulas but I prefer the Essie most for color and formula.

China Glaze What A Pansy vs Sinful Colors Lavander (their spelling, not mine)

ChG is on my middle and pinky, SC is on my ring and pointer. SC is a true creme, much more opaque formula. Also SC is much grayer and also has a slightly blue base.

China Glaze Lotus Begin vs Sinful Colors Beverly Hills                      

                            

ChG is on the pinky and middle, while SC is ring and pinky. SC is much pinker and dustier.
On my skin tone I much prefer the ChG even though the SC has a better formula.

China Glaze Lotus Begin vs China Glaze In A Lily Bit

These are both from the spring 2014 collection, these are very similar with Lily being the lighter and slightly pinker little sister. I think these would blend beautifully in a gradient mani.  These look much more similar to me in the bottle than on the nail, which I am very happy about.  On my skin tone I prefer In A Lily Bit, but that is just personal taste.

China Glaze In A Lily Bit vs China Glaze Sweet Hook vs Sally Hansen Lacey Lilac vs L'oreal Sweet
Lilac

ChG In A Lily Bit is on my middle finger, ChG Sweet Hook is pointer finger, SH is pinky, L'oreal is ring finger.
Lily has absolutely the worst formula, it is so close in color to Sweet Hook, I don't understand why China Glaze screwed up the formula so badly when they have done it so fantastically before.  Sweet Hook is slightly more gray based while Lily is more pink based.
SH is much more blue based and looks like a true purple compared to the other much pinker options.
L'oreal is far whiter and paler.
No dupes here, though both China Glaze polishes are close enough that you probably don't need both.

All China Glaze At Vase Value vs For Audrey vs Too Yacht To Handle vs Kinetic Candy
                                 ring                  middle             pinky                                pointer

No dupes here. Yacht is much brighter/deeper. Audrey is much dustier and darker. KC is much grayer than At Vase Value, but is about the same level.  While At Vase Value has the trickiest formula of the 4, it is by far my favorite.

China Glaze At Vase Value vs Maybelline Mint Mist vs OPI Gargantuan Green Grape (blue version)

China Glaze is on my ring and pointer finger, Maybelline is on my middle finger and OPI is pinky.
OPI is much lighter and a jelly like formula while ChG is a true creme.  Mint Mist is very similar, but isn't neon and is slightly more green.

Again, if there are any other comparisons you would like to see please request them in the comments. I will do my best to swatch your requests.

Stay Sparkly,

A

Essie Find Me An Oasis

Essie is just not a brand I gravitate to… but sometimes they make a polish that just pulls me in completely.  I stalked blogger swatches and anxiously awaited a CVS coupon, cause you know they always show up right after you've splurged.. As soon as I could Find Me An Oasis was mine!

This is 3 thin coats topped with Seche Vite, as I actually wore this instead of just swatching it. Far too pretty to just remove.

Find Me An Oasis is a stunning pale icey blue crelly polish that covered easily in 3 coats.  Usually with polishes this pale and white based formula is really difficult, but this formula is amazing and the color pay out is even better.  

Yes I get a slight case of lobster hands with this color but I love it so much I just don't care.  Do you have any polishes like that? Absolutely love the color but it doesn't play super nicely with your skin tone… do you keep wearing it out of love or find something that goes a little better with your coloring? 

Just for fun/practice I decided to do a glitter placement accent using a bunch of silver, holo and white glitters. Great in theory, just not so much for this manicure.  Enjoy this mani fail :)

Stay Sparkly,

A

China Glaze City Flourish

I always love China Glaze spring collections, they may not always be the most innovate but pastels are a spring staple for a reason!  This years spring collection includes 10 cremes and 2 shimmer polishes. I picked up 5 of the creme polishes

What A Pansy

A dusty medium purple with slight blue undertones. A semi sheer crelly formula, it is very self leveling and squishy.  This is 3 thin coats with no top coat, look at that amazing shine!

Before these next 4 swatches I'm going to post my review of just the formula. The formula is interesting… it isn't awful but if you don't love the color then I wouldn't want to deal with it.  I found the neck of the brush held excess polish no matter how much I wiped the brush on the neck of bottle.  These polishes dry to a strangely matte finish, careful application with prevent you from overworking the polish and making it streaky or lumpy. I applied 2 thin coats followed by 1 medium coat to even everything out.  Each swatch is shown with top coat.

Lotus Begin

A medium pink based lavender with a strong white, almost chalky, base.

In A Lily Bit

 A very whited out pastel pink based lilac. disclaimer- bubbles in the swatch were caused by thick topcoat- not the polish itself.

At Vase Value

A pastel yet neon turquoise. Love the color but it tends to give me lobster fingers.

Spring In My Step

This pastel corally-pink is my favorite of the collection.  The formula is terrible but I love the color so much.

I'll be doing a spring collection comparison post in the next few days, so if there are any colors you would like me to compare please leave your request in the comments.

Stay Sparkly,

A

Rainbow Glitter Nails

These nails are too fun! I was playing around with glitter placement and this is what happened!

Base is OPI 4 In The Morning, glitter is all loose hex glitter from Michaels

Glitter placement is addicting!! I'm so lazy when it comes to glitter removal that I don't do it nearly enough. Can't wait to try the new OPI Glitter Off Base Coat, I think I will do way more with glitter if that works as well as I hope it will. 

Stay Sparkly,

A