Monday, May 30, 2011

Butter London Victoriana: when good polish goes bad


Urgh...ever have those manicures when nothing goes right? This is one of those. Nice polish, gorgeous colour...crap manicure. Figured I should post it anyway because it doesn't look that bad in the pictures despite the awful inception.


This one was doomed from the start, since it was done on Eurovision night. For anyone who's not come across Eurovision - lucky you - it's an annual knees up where tragically awful acts from European countries get to perform, and then every country votes. Usually for their neighbour. Hence why Azerbaijan (where?) won this year. It's a cherished cultural institution in Europe, because it's wonderfully naff and usually involves parties where everyone gets dressed up as a country and then proceeds to get blind drunk. Can you see why this was a bad idea?

As it happens I wasn't at a party last night - we stayed in with friends over - and I decided to do a mani/pedi to keep me occupied, because I'm a fidget who can't sit still in front of the television. So I did my toes first, whilst knocking back the ale (the pedi was even worse, by the way - I took Illamasqua Alarm off which stained my toes tomato, and then tried to put a nude over the top. Result: hot mess). By the time I got to the tips I was polishing with the kind of exaggerated comedy concentration normally only seen in five year olds. I did two coats, and then the takeaway arrived, whereupon I dinged them to hell and lost the bottle cap. Epic fail.

The next day, cracking hangover in tow, I tried to tidy it with a third coat and topcoat. This was the point at which Neurotic Cat had a minor breakdown and decided that if I didn't give her a cuddle that very moment, she would leave home. Then Kamikaze Kitten got jealous of the attention and jumped on my lap too. They then had a fight. Meanwhile, I'm holding my hands in the air like I'm directing traffic. Finally I kick them off and go to put topcoat on, but my seche vite has set like jelly and makes it even worse. I give up.



This is the result. The Polish is a gorgeous colour - a kind of dingy teal-blue with silver microglitter. It would probably be fine with two coats if those two coats hadn't been applied through beer goggles. I find the BL brushes a little fiddly because they're narrow, and the glitter in this means that the polish doesn't move very far, so thick coats are necessary. But it's lovely and I will definitely be trying it again under more auspicious circumstances.


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17 comments:

Piff said...

Nice polish!

Laura said...

Haha, this is a gorgeous polish, and I'm sorry you had such a difficult time applying it, but your story was hilarious!!!

Snappy said...

It may be a crap manicure but it's a great write-up!

Erika said...

I'm laughing with you. Not at you.

Really.

That polish is gorgeous, even given how it came to be on your nails. I am kind of lusting hard after this polish and one day I will work up the guts to actually spend the $14.00 it lists for, here.

Any chance of seeing the pedi? *runs and hides behind sofa*

Apriltini said...

I agree, it's a great story. I applied Victoriana last night, and everything went perfectly, and the formula was a dream to work with.

Thays said...

What beautiful nails.

Johanna (Paillette) said...

Hey!
Eurovision gave us Abba!
(which I secretly adored, even though I was a full on rock/punk/goth girl later on!)

Carly @ Lacquered Lover said...

I can't wait to get my first Butter London colors soon! I think the color is gorgeous and sorry that the manicure didn't work so well!

Katie said...

Oh, it wasn't THAT bad. You mani looks better than mine when I'm sober (which is all the time, by the way. I'm alcohol-intolerant). I love this color, by the way. I wear it all the time in fall!

(The story is funny, by the way.)

The Phalanges Friend said...

LOL that was a disastuh.
But the mani looks pretty too!

HappytPumpkin said...

You sound like a grown up Georgia Nicolson, I love it. This polish is great by the way.

Anonymous said...

Absolutely beautiful color! You are an absolute riot, btw. You definitely know how to tell a story!

JadeyLou said...

But it's so beautiful!!!!

Grace Thomas said...

@ Piff, Tata-nadaver, Katie: Thank you :)

@ Hermione, chaosbutterfly: thanks ;)

@ Laura, HappytPumpkin, Lori: I'm very happy to have provided you with some amusement! Schadenfreude is the kind of humour I gravitate towards, and fortunately I seem to award myself plenty of grounds to laugh.

@ Lacquered lover, JadeyLou: it is a really nice colour!

@ Ice_Queen - the pedi lasted all of three days before I couldn't live with it any longer! No photographic evidence thank God :p If you're tempted, I would get it - I don't think you'd be disappointed. I will definitely be rocking it again.

@ Apriltini - I can't wait to try it sober...

@ Pailette: Any words of condescension towards Eurovision are spoken out of love. I cross it off in my calendar months in advance.

Lucy said...

It seems when you get one ding than all goes to hell! That happened to me the other day. I just couldn't wait to put way my top coat in my manicure bag. Why didn't I wait till my nails were dry? Dinged one, then fixed it and dinged another. Love that Butter London polish. It's gorgeous and you can't tell anything bad happened to your nals.

Sminkan said...

It is a very pretty polish! A favourite!

PolishPig said...

I just love your story! It could totally be me, I have Victoriana in a mail box, waiting to be opened.

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