Some Alice in Wonderland bottle comparisons and some of my mini mani travel kit

Before I forget, Polish or Perish now has a sale blog for the bunch of us to sell our polishes... mostly in order to raise funds to buy new polishes. kittytokaren posted the first sale today!

Somebody on Nail Board alerted me to possible Absolutely Alice and Mad as a Hatter dupes the other day. Luckily, Ricky's NYC does online ordering now so I could take a looksee at these possible dupes.

Mattese (or Mattese Elite) is/was (?) a store-based brand, found in Ricky's NYC, a chain of not-cheap beauty supply shops in New York. Currently, their polishes seem to be manufactured by Forsythe and are often dead-on Color Club dupes. So I was surprised to hear about the existence of OPI dupes. I didn't think they'd be dead-on and I was right. I'm leaving for Boston tomorrow (not to mention having my second year talk in the morning) so I didn't have time to swatch these. I will do a comparison when I get back though...

Mattese Elite Legendary Alice vs. OPI Absolutely Alice

Here are a series of photos where it'd be really helpful to click to see the full sizes (if you are really bent on finding AiW dupes). The Mattese seems to use a slightly brighter blue and is missing what I think of as the defining gold glitter that makes Absolutely Alice so great. Instead of the gold glitter in AA, it has highlights of silver glitter instead. Which kind of makes Legendary Alice a more run-of-the-mill blue glitter.

Mattese Nutty Hat Guy vs. OPI Mad as a Hatter

It's like Forsythe didn't have gold glitter on hand to put into these polishes. Nutty Hat Guy (ha) consists silver glitter, light purple (or pink) glitter, red glitter and green glitter. The predominant color that seems to come out is a bright, slightly pinkish silver. Mad as a Hatter contains so many more different colored glitters: silver, gold, dark purple, green, orange and blue. It gives MaaH a darker and more complex look and the predominant color appears to be more pewter in appearance than silver. It does appear that the Mattese Elite versions of this polishes are not as a complex and and a (noticeable) touch brighter than the OPI polishes.

In my opinion, I would never call these dupes. They're close enough for people who aren't obsessed but for those who are... they're close but no cigar. I think they probably look more similar on the nail, from afar though.

And finally, my travel mani kit: getting ready for my conference!

1/8fl oz of Nail Life Gripper, a bit less than 1/8fl oz of Orly Prince Charming and 1/8fl oz of Nubar Diamont. I will most likely pick up new polishes in Boston (and New York) so I'm not worried about bringing something else to change into once my poster is over.

In the meanwhile, I didn't get my paper into my readers before the end of the weekend and am still busily writing. I really, really, really want to get the first draft to them before tomorrow morning -- and I need my sleep tonight. But right now, I have some hope: I have a good first paragraph. (That doesn't sound too good but I generally don't write first paragraphs until at least halfway through the paper, when I've figured out what the paper is about. Also, introductory paragraphs are usually pretty hard if you're trying to be a halfway entertaining writer.) And once I have a good first paragraph, it's like it provides momentum for the rest of the paper. I have about 65% of it done and I completely stalled over the weekend. Now, I feel like with my good first paragraph... there is no reason why I can't finish it tonight!

Mattese Elite Matte Smoke

Nope, it's not a dupe of Diamond Cosmetics Matte Smoke. That I can tell. The Diamond one's finish seems a bit more matte and lighter, if I recall correctly.

I've been a huge fan of Mattese polishes, even before they started releasing Color Club dupes (they are manufactured by the same parent company, Forsythe). And since I adore Color Club polishes, I suppose I'm still a huge fan of Mattese. Except they're only readily available Ricky's NYC beauty supply chain and over double the cost of regular Color Club polishes. I'm not sure what the deal is with the "Mattese Elite" line though.

Mattese Elite, as far as I can tell, consists of less interesting colors than the old Mattese line and are not Color Club dupes. But I like greys and I was curious as to how this brand would interpret "matte". The answer is: satin... and not a particularly matte-y satin. It's the sort of finish you get with neons, pre-topcoat.

Mattese Elite Matte Smoke

Excuse the miserable frazzle! This photo was taken right when I had just got back from my Psychonomics/Thanksgiving travel and my cuticles had been sorely neglected during that time. Anyway, this is two coats: it didn't dry particularly quickly for a "matte" (because it's not a true matte) and it was even pretty shiny for a "satin". It's a pleasant color, a dark grey creme. Not special but easy to apply. Two coats.

Ricky's on 3rd

For those who don't know Ricky's, it's this awesome beauty supply chain in NYC.


They've got so much cosmetics and, well, dress-up stuff from adhesive bras and fishnet stockings to stage makeup. And they carry a line of makeup that I believe was started by Kevyn Aucoin, Mattese. Mattese has a great selection basic cremes and neons but they've also got some shimmers. They also make nail art stripers.


I don't know if they changed manufacturers or not but they are obviously being made by the same company that makes Color Club, Forsythe. People have already noted that the Midwestern Meijer's chains carry Massini, which features CC dupes Fashion Addict and Magic Attraction. Well, here is the Mattese "version" of CC Revvvolution (a dark grey holo):


But I guess the 2 extra V's in the name was too much to fit on the label?


Even though I already have Revvvolution, I picked up Revolution since I had meaning to buy a backup of
Vx3 anyway; Vx1 might as well do. It sucks that they raised the price on these: $6! These polishes are vibrant, easy to apply and wear very well. For the most part, they only need two coats. The black only needs one (though I always use at least two). I also picked up Ice Queen which looks like a jellyish OPI Lincoln Park After Dark and a chunky silver shimmer that I hope I can build to opacity.