A right royal haul: Butter London

…In which I discover Butter London, and my wallet weeps.

One of our lovely readers asked if I could get hold of Butter London's 'No More Waity Katie' to swatch. The answer was that yes, I could, but only if I was prepared to surrender fifteen of my Great British Pounds (about $25) for the privilege. Fifteen! Plus postage! That's almost enough to buy you a house in some of the less salubrious parts of Birmingham*. Ironically it's much cheaper to buy over the pond - it's available to US and Canadian customers for the much more reasonable sum of $14.

Anyway, incredulous cheapness aside, my interest in the brand was piqued. I decided to try a few of the more 'me' polishes available (their regular polishes are also quite a bit cheaper than NMWK at around the £9.50-£12 mark, which is a little less than an Illamasqua polish). So I put in an order from powderrooms.com (I've not tried them before), and prepared to pounce on my nice postlady. We've had four bank holidays the space of 11 days here, so all the nation's post is sitting in some mighty pile at Royal Mail HQ while the posties top up their tans in the unseasonably good weather we're having. Just as I was starting to sweat that I would have nothing to show you, the package turned up! And what a package it is:

The little envelope one? SWEETS. With 'powder rooms' piped in the centre. Greedy squee!

Here's my haul. L-R: Henley Regatta, West End Wonderland, Victoriana, Rosie Lee. Confectionary, blogger's own

I'm really stoked about the glitters. I mean, it doesn't take much to get me fired up where glitters are concerned, but these are So. Pretty. West End Wonderland looks to me like a finer, sparser version of OPI Gift of Gold (which I have been stalking on ebay since Christmas, but I can't quite bring myself to drop £17 or so on it). Henley Regatta is a little like China Glaze Atlantis in the bottle, except that the colour in Henley is glitter in a clear base, whereas atlantis is silver holo in a coloured base. Same hue family, though. Victoriana is paler than I was expecting, probably as a result of all the pearly silver shimmer/micro-glitter. It's only a wee bit deeper than Illamasqua Caress, although I'm expecting it'll dry darker, so I'm looking forward to trying it. Rosie Lee I have nothing even vaguely alike - not a surprise since I don't wear pink (on which more later) but it's just oodles of awesome.

Which one do you want to see first?

I may have already put in another order. Happy wedding day, Royal people! If you'll excuse me, I'm off to coat my mitts in glitter.

*Not really. I'm allowed to make that joke because I live there.

T-Shirt Grey - Barry M Grey

I think this is just a magnificent dark grey creme...

As simple as that! Just like my favourite dark grey t-shirt.

Do you have any Barry M favourites that you think I should try? I've been loving this brand!

kittytokaren

Zoya Phoebe (Mod Mattes, Summer 2011)

Back from Taipei. Too tired, too harried, too stressed out... sigh.

Zoya Phoebe

I am so bad at applying mattes! This was a goopy mess for me. I love the color: this almost wispy, ethereal shimmering blue satin... and then there are the clumps. Two coats. Because a third would've been even worse.

Zoya Phoebe with topcoat

Better, much better. Such pretty blue shimmer with topcoat, no?

Time to prepare for section...

GOSH Miss Sweety and a giveaway

This is from the annals of 'colours I loved in the bottle, and hated on me'. In the bottle it had such promise - a lovely peachy tan nude, just a little darker than my skintone. I had it in mind as a potential go-to neutral, for the occasions - conferences, meetings and the like - when my usual manicures are a little de trop. I think it would probably look nice on someone with a tan (i.e. not me, at least not if it keeps raining), but I just can't wrap my head around what's wrong with the colour - too 1980s? Too sickly? Too dark? I'm not sure.

Aside from the colour, the application was a pig. This is three thick coats and the first two were streak city. The third evened it out, but after whacking on some seche vite and waiting half an hour trying not to mush it, I managed to completely melt one nail getting dinner out of the oven. Four. Hours. Later. Then I buggered another nail in the bath six hours after application. Crazy. Needless to say, I won't be reaching for this for a while.

Anyway! Following that rather negative review, I do have a positive. I bought 6 GOSH polishes on three-for-two and managed in the process to buy two exact dupes for polishes I already have. It appears I know what I like and forget what I own. This is...what, dupe number four for OPI hot & spicy that I've accidentally bought? Oops. This tendency also accounts for the number of largely identical pairs of purple high heels I own.

So, rather than hog the dupes, I will be giving them away. I will post them anywhere, so if you can't get GOSH in your country this is for you! To enter, please leave a comment on THIS post, tell me what things you can't help yourself from buying 'repeats' of.

RULES:

- one entry per person

- anyone can enter

- closes May 2nd midnight GMT

- I will announce the winner the following day; you have 7 days to contact me before I select another winner.

Enjoy!

Cute Cute Cute! - Essie Chubby Cheeks

Hehe I always giggle when I say the name of this polish! It is so cute! (Kawaiiiiiii!!!) I'm not sure what exactly this coral colour has to do with Chubby Cheeks, but the colour is pretty cute as well!

To add to the cuteness, the colour is really close to the packaging of my eos lip balm in Summerfruit - my favourite flavour of all the eos balms.

Check it out...

The formula on this was great - I believe this is two coats? And I had minimal clean-up to do.

I'm really itching to start wearing my spring/summer colours. I wore this when it was really dreary out to perk myself up, but it seemed a little out of place. I got lots of compliments though!

Have you started wearing spring/summer colours yet?

kittytokaren

China Glaze Blue Iguana and Cha Cha Cha (Island Escape, Sumer 2011

I'm leaving soon for my grandfather's funeral in Taipei. It's going to be quite the trip: about 60 hours in Taipei + 30 hours travel time. But what can I do? I want to be there for my mother and grandmother -- even though I have very strained relationships with both -- and I can't miss doing my sections on Wednesday. So... Saturday to Tuesday it is.

Speaking of sections, funny thing happened a few days ago. I noticed that one student had some minty nail polish on and I couldn't resist asking. When I asked, "Oh, what color is that?" I got the response, "uhhh... it's kind of minty."

Oddly enough, this sort of response is pretty typical when you ask people about their nail polish. They describe the color to you (and usually very vaguely -- I was surprised I got "minty" rather than "green"), even though you've got enough eyesight to recognize they're wearing nice polish to begin with.

It was even more odd because I was wearing this:

China Glaze Cha Cha Cha

A somewhat unusual (to the non-obsessed and uninitiated) color that is probably best described as "radioactive". (Three coats, a little more streaky than I would've liked though careful application gets rid of most of that.) With Nail Life Gripper and Poshe, it has lasted me four days without a single chip and barely any tipwear! But it took a very long time to dry for me... but the longevity definitely makes it worth it.

Anyway, back to the minty green polish story: Because I LOVE minty polishes, I just HAD to know what brand that polish was from. (I mean, it could've been from a company I didn't know about! ...which, I realize now, is unlikely.) It looked like such a creamy, smooth mint. So I persisted, even though it was right before section started.

"No, I meant... who makes it?"

"Um. China Glaze? It's called Refreshmint."

And before I could stop myself, I said, "Oh! Wasn't that last year?"

She gave me this surprised look and said, somewhat sheepishly, that yeah, she was "kinda obsessed" with nail polish. And I really wanted to ask, "Nail Board, blogs or both?" But I couldn't, because I had to review z-scores with them. :P

China Glaze Blue Iguana

One more photo for the road. Also from the Island Escape collection: what's really sad about these pics is that there's just the TINIEST bit of purple duochrome lingering around the edges of this pretty sheer (this is three coats) shimmering blue. Also, because this was an NOTD, I can tell you that this one as a bit of stamina too (with Gelous and Diamont): I think I got about six days wear out of it -- and it was still going strong on day six but I was BORED OUT OF MY MIND of this color.

(Before I forget: thanks to those at China Glaze for sending me these polishes to review.)

TA'ing stats has become a bit of a disaster. It is TA hell. Stats is inherently difficult to teach well -- psych majors usually freak out when it comes to stats -- and I'm completely sucking at the moment. But the actual teaching part isn't what's painful: it's how disorganized everything is.

I pretty much redid the syllabus when I realized sections weren't going to match up to classes; it took about six hours. The homework assignments are generated by the prof but are missing answer keys so the TAs take turns doing the homework...because we don't have enough to do grading 45 of those things 1-2 times a week! (Last week, those poor kids -- and we poor TAs -- had to calculate the standard deviation of a set of 50 scores by hand. 50!) The textbook company sent us one text to share between five people and promised they'd send more but it's halfway through the quarter and we're still passing the one lonely text around. The prof has a bunch of conferences and is gone for pretty much one quarter of the classes, so he leaves it up to the TAs to lecture to the students (and to plan the worksheets in his absence). In the span of nine weeks, there are three exams, five pop quizzes, nine homework assignments and nine section worksheets; we grade all of them except for the worksheets.

The amount of time punching in numbers to Excel alone... the amount of time spent on email alone...! The other two TAs (there are three for the 135 students) and I are constantly going back and forth, debating how to grade assignments, figuring out who has the textbook, who has the exams, who has this, what exactly does the prof want us to do, and what the hell are we doing, etc.

So when the student who regularly either beatboxes or sleeps during sections stumbles in late to a section, slumps in his chair, and interrupts me to ask, "Uh, why is it taking so long to get our exams back? Like, how hard is it to grade Scantrons?!" -- because, you know, I didn't already answer the same question three times before he decided to grace us with his presence -- it can be so hard to respond in a polite, measured fashion.

And now I'm flying off to Taipei and will have no time to prepare for next week's section before the day of the section. Let's hope I'm not too jetlagged for that.

"Robot Hot" - OPI Not Likes The Movies

I'm not typically into duochrome polishes - I'm not sure why, but I'm just never drawn them. I'm really a creme girl at heart! But for some reason I got a hankering for OPI Not Like The Movies, and was lucky enough to get it in a swap with a lovely lady!

Here it is:

I'm so happy I decided to go with my gut and try this out! I absolutely adore it! It is a silver base that flashes green, purple and gold and is laced with fine silver glitter throughout. The overall effect is smooth, non-brushstroke-y, and just gorgeous. I can see myself wearing this one quite often actually. Maybe I've gone batty, but I couldn't stop looking at my nails, and it seemed to go with every outfit I put on! The hubs declared my nails "Robot Hot". Good enough for me!

How do you feel about duochrome polishes? Hot or not?

kittytokaren

Essie Mint Candy Apple

An oldie but a goldie! I've been wanting to try this for ages, after seeing others' lovely swatches. I have a long and unsuccessful history with mint green polish. I tried China Gaze re-fresh mint and it gave me monster lobster claws, so I gifted it to my sister-in-law who has a much richer skin tone (and it looks amazing on her). Perhaps jealous of her success I decided to give this a go to see if it was any less garish on my skin.

The finish on this is soooo dreamy. This is two perfect coats. It wasn't patchy, chalky or draggy - I tend to have very low expectations of pastel polishes after experiencing a few horrorshows (Illamasqua load, I'm looking at you) but this is very easy to apply. It dries fast and lasted five days with only minor tipwear. I also like the colour on me, and it reminds me of mint ice cream. So overall, a definite winner!

I Am Fortunate- Essie Lapis of Luxury

Ever have a sudden urge to wear a particular colour? I did! One day I woke up and decided I *had* to have this soft blue-with-a-touch-of-periwinkle on my nails. HAD TO. So I did.

Sometimes I remember how good I have it if this is what my mind chooses to focus on. I have to remind myself that even though I'm a poor grad student, in the grander perspective I truly am living in the lap(is) of luxury. (HA!)

What do you feel fortunate for today?

kittytokaren

kittytokaren's Spring Things GIVEAWAY winner!

The winner of the GIVEAWAY is:

Qian!!!

Congratulations - I'm contacting you through the email address you left, so I can get these lovely prizes on their way to you...

Thank you so much to everyone for entering - I hope to have more of these giveaways in the future!

kittytokaren

OPI & Illamasqua teals

This manicure has a short story behind it: my aunt took a weekend trip to Florence (Firenze) and asked me for recommendations, since I spent a fortnight there in '09. I duly provided her with a long list of gelato vendors (I used my time there productively) and asked me to bring me back some scarves, since I'd overloaded my carry on luggage on the way home with four. She picked well: a beautiful teal shawl, which is very possibly my favourite colour. And since I wanted to wear it immediately I decided co-ordinating nails were in order.

OPI ski teal we drop, two coats + Illamasqua muse tips, one coat (with Nailtek foundation II and Seche vite)

Since I had no exact match I decided to do a two-colour french. I've worn both of these colours on their own and both are perfection in their own way: 4-5 day wear with minor tip wear, easy two coat application (possibly one if you're less of a klutz than me), shiny and intensely pigmented. And the colours are goooorgeous.

The respective brushes lend themselves really nicely to this kind of manicure, since the OPI pro wide is so…well…wide, and illamasqua's brushes are very narrow and precise (much like Essie's).

I really liked this combo and would probably do it again with variations - I'd love to try a grape and plum combo, or maybe banana yellow with white, or navy and green.

Are you ever inspired by fabrics? What's your favourite?

Not-So-Purple JELLY - OPI Houston We Have A Purple

*****Don't forget to enter my Spring Things GIVEAWAY with Essie and Pradman Jewelry! Check out the post here or just enter in the sidebar!*****

I *SWORE* I wasn't going to get any of the OPI Texas collection polishes, but then I got curious...

Houston We Have A Purple is one of the polishes in the collection with the "sorbet" finish. (I hate this. It's a jelly, people. We know what a jelly is. OPI insults our intelligence.)

I personally find this to be more pink-red than purple, but I've got to say - I really like the colour! This was four coats, and while that wasn't so fun to do, the result is quite pretty - I think the finish adds depth to the colour without the need for shimmer.

Will I be picking up more of these? No. But will I wear this one? Absolutely! I'm going to love it in summer especially!

What do you think of OPI essentially "re-branding" the jelly finish? Smarmy or smart?

kittytokaren

China Glaze crackles - crushed candy and lightning bolt

Hello! My first post here. Thank you for having me on board, I look forward to posting reams of manicure pictures and exciting all the lovely readers rather than boring all my lovely colleagues.

My early efforts with crackle polishes were, frankly, pretty grim. I tried painting it thinly, which just made it look patchy, speckly and weird. I kept trying colour combinations that seemed great in my head (navy and white, how can that go wrong?) but which looked like I'd done myself some kind of grievous injury in practice. I nearly gave up. But then I tried painting thick coats and picking complementary base colours, and now I'm quite pleased with the effect. The finish makes me think of duck eggs for some reason.

China Glaze crushed candy over Essie playa del platinum

China Glaze lightning bolt over OPI hot & spicy

The only thing I am not loving about the crackles is my total inability to apply them neatly. My only objective is getting it on thick and quick before it starts to crack. As a result it usually ends up all over my fingers. My 'swatch hand' isn't too bad, but the reason I didn't take any pictures of my dominant right hand is that it's flecked with bits of white crackle everywhere (in some frankly improbable places) and I expect my colleagues will be asking me tomorrow whether I’ve been repainting my bathroom.

Looking forward to the OPI and Models Own releases later on in the summer to try some different colours – orange, navy and turquoise are high on my list of current wants!

Two announcements: winner and runners-up of the Inque Nails Design Contest... and...

...we have a new blogger!! I'll tell you about her in a minute. ;)

But first...

Congratulations to Keri, the winner of our Inque Nails design contest! Her entry is called Galaxies Gone Wild: check them out!

The very, very close runner-up was Melissa, from Silly Bee's Chickadees. It was so close that I'll make sure to stuff a little extra in her goody bag. :) Her designs can be viewed here.

The third and fourth runners-up are Nadia and Holly H.! (Click on their names to see their entries.)

Thanks to everyone who participated! It makes me happy to know we have such talented, invested and artistic readers. :) I will be contacting the winner and runners-up via email over the weekend. (If I don't, please email me to bother me about it. :D)

...now... new blogger news:

Welcome to Polish or Perish, ilexica!

We have our first UK blogger! She's a PhD candidate in political economy and theoretical macroeconomics... and she (obviously) has better access to UK nail polish brands than we in North America do. But I'll let her make her own introduction more fully, so be sure to watch for it!

China Glaze Starboard layered with Lippmann Boom Boom Pow!

Lippmann Boom Boom Pow layered over China Glaze Starboard

I wish I could have properly captured this manicure. It really doesn't look like just haphazard pieces of glitter in shimmery gold (but very sheer) base. It gave it a really lovely and somewhat unusual look; from arm's length, it looked as if I had put on very fine gold leaf over Starboard.

Contradictory Colour - Essie Island Hopping

*****Don't forget to enter my Spring Things GIVEAWAY with Essie and Pradman Jewelry! Check out the post here or just enter in the sidebar!*****

Since the weather can't decide whether it wants to be icy winter or full-blown summer, I thought I'd wear a colour that can't decide either - Essie Island Hopping.

The name suggests a tropical hue, but the murky purple-taupe-brown of it all just says fall/winter to me.

I didn't even realize that it coordinated with my Juicy Couture Ikat scarf so well!

A confusing colour for confusing weather! The formula was absolutely fantastic - a dreamy creme! I'm really liking this one a lot, and I can see myself wearing it often - in all kinds of weather.

Do you have a polish(es) that you wear rain or shine?

kittytokaren

Couldn't bear to take OPI Jasper Jade off... so I put Clarins 230 on top of it

It's like the dance of the rare polishes... Between what I paid for Jasper Jade (~$6) and Clarins 230 (~$50)... this manicure ALMOST made up of two expensively (but not crazily) priced nail polishes.

Clarins 230 over OPI Jasper Jade

'scuse the many pictures! Whenever I take a photo of a polish that's as multichromatic as 230, I always feel the need to include ones that show "just a little more green" or "look, the brownish red instead of the orangeish red!" The green of Jasper Jade really shows through the edges of the nails.

OPI Jasper Jade! A long a-wanted HTF :D

Before I forget: thank you everybody for your kind words about my family. I really appreciate them.

And now, my NOTD:

OPI Jasper Jade

When I joined NB in early 2007, this was the HTF that everyone was raving about. Not quite on par with the sort of raving that goes on with Clarins 230... but it was up there. (To this day, it's still expensive on eBay.) I've been dusty-hunting since the end of 2007 and have never been able to locate it. So when a lovely NBer said she found a stash and could get me a couple of things... OMG, so excited! (And so grateful!) And so she sent it. And I gotta say: I like it, it's not bad at all, but compared to what we get these days, the major thing that it has going for it is its rarity. Three coats, a little brushstrokey, normal dry time. It is a rather pretty blackened forest green shimmer. :)

Jasper Jade bottle sticker

Closeup of Jasper Jade

Don't forget to vote in the Inque Nails Contest, using the sidebar poll!! Voting closes tomorrow night!

A little circus story - OPI I Juggle...Men

*****Don't forget to enter my Spring Things GIVEAWAY with Essie and Pradman Jewelry! Check out the post here or just enter in the sidebar!*****

When my dad was in grad school he quit - and joined the circus. Seriously! He was in the circus for a long time, mainly as an acrobat and he sometimes even did the magic sideshow. I loved this when I was a kid - I would always demand that he perform tricks for my friends while I looked on proudly. (My favourite was him doing a handstand on a skateboard and skating back and forth between two driveways!) He's taught me some things along the way, and as a result I have a huge affection for the circus! (Except clowns. Ugh.)

So when I heard about the OPI Femme de Cirque collection, I couldn't help but swoon with nostalgia. The only one I've picked up so far is I Juggle...Men. (Ironic, because even after all this time, I still can't juggle for crap. I breathe fire, ride a unicycle, but I can't juggle. Go figure.) I can see myself picking up the whole collection at some point though, just because I adore the theme and the names!

And I just *LOVE* this topcoat! It is perfection!

I present - OPI I Juggle...Men! (Over Essie Looking for Love.)

I got a little carried away filing my nails down...oops!

Close-up to see the shimmer...

The shimmer in this is much more colourful and beautiful than in my pictures - its insanely hard to capture. Oi. Just trust me, it's beautiful and should be seen in person! I took some bottle pics to try to give you a better idea...

I put this over Essie Looking for Love because I wanted something soft that would coordinate with the shimmer in I Juggle...Men. It would also look great over a dark or contrasting colour , but this is just the mood I was in. The little sparkles in this twinkle pink, purple and blue (NOT silver, like it looks in the picture!) and are just the right size to go seamlessly over any polish without looking contrived - it looks like it just *belongs*. I got so many compliments on this mani it was insane!

So here's to you Dad - maybe one day I will finally learn how to juggle! (And then quit grad school?)

kittytokaren

Orly Pure Porcelain and Ancient Jade (Precious, Spring 2011)

Orly Ancient Jade

Ahh Orly. You of the lovely formulas since everyone became B3F (unusual because the first B3F polishes seemed like they were kinda wonky... or maybe just China Glaze?). I love mint greens but I have a thousand mint greens by now. It's a great color if you don't own one like it -- and it went only very smoothly in two coats. Like, but not love. I think I'm jaded. (haha, get it?)

Orly Pure Porcelain

I don't know why my fingers look so lobstery in this photo. It IS a fairly stark pastel pink (and if you're careful, you can do two coats instead of three -- which is awesome for stark pastels) but it didn't look so bad in regular indoors lighting. (Both these photos were taken in my lightbox during one of the more dreary winter days a couple of weeks ago.)

I need something to do. I mean, I guess I could do work? My research is starting to look like one big fat bust at the moment. (And SPSS is being a bitch so I'm kind of teaching myself R. I used SAS in the past so R's utter lack of drop down menus and little boxes to check isn't as daunting... but it still took me half an hour to figure out how to run a multivariate correlation analysis, which is easy-peasy in SPSS. Frickin' SPSS.) I could put together a lecture on probability for the intro stats course I'm TA'ing. I could do the dishes. I could continue making jewelry out of leftover beads and wire that I found in my closet (from previous jewelry-making ventures). I don't feel like doing my nails. I HAVE to do something or else I'm going to go crazy. My grandfather, after many months of weaving in and out of a coma, passed away this morning. Even though he and I were never close, I'm still kind of devastated. So I need to keep busy. Very, very busy.

China Glaze Senorita Bonita (Island Escape, Summer 2011)

First thing's first: vote for your favorite set of nails in the Inque Nails Design Contest!

YOU MUST VOTE USING THE POLL THAT IS ON THE RIGHT SIDEBAR.

(excuse the caps but I didn't want votes to be discounted just because I didn't make the instructions clear...!)

China Glaze Senorita Bonita

I thought I wouldn't like this one at all. Purple shimmer with some very active shimmer! (It almost seems like it should be microglitter, it's so good with light: it reflects mostly pink but in some lights, it looks blue.) Three coats, very good application. But what I really like is that I've been wearing this mani since Saturday (six days ago) and it's still very minimal chippage. Thumbs are not fab but the rest of the nails (save for that little pinky chip in the photo) are still perfect... if a little grown out.

(This was sent to me for review by China Glaze.)