Dare To Wear Back To Basics Collection

So I ordered this collection of polishes after seeing Lextard's swatches on her blog.  Seriously, when I need lemmings, I just check out her blog.  I have a nail crush on her.  I got these from Ebay for around $30 (USD) after shipping.  Not a bad deal, I think.  I really like all of them except I had some trouble with the white one, which I'll explain later.  For now, here are my swatches!

First up, this is True Red.  Seriously, this one's a perfect cherry red creme.  I used two coats for this swatch, but I could have gotten away with one if I'd been a little more careful.

This is Yellow Twist.  I don't usually wear yellow polish, but I do know about how difficult they normally are.  This yellow isn't difficult to work with at all.  I only needed two coats and I will definitely use this one as my perfect rainbow yellow from now on.  Great formula.

Enchanted Forest is a deep, mossy green.  I was under the impression that this was a jelly and I have no idea where I picked that up.  I might be confusing it with Nars Zulu.  This is definitely a very pigmented creme and I only needed two coats for this swatch.  Still, it's a great color and I'm glad I have this set.

Ocean View is a medium blue creme.  It's super pigmented as well and I only needed two coats.  It's been a while since I swatched these, but I wrote "perfect" in my notes when I swatched this one.  It's seriously perfect.

Powerful Black.  I needed two coats here, but the formula is super creamy and pigmented.  When I reach for a black creme for layering, I usually go with Wet 'n' Wild Black Creme, but I just might reach for this one next time.  Sure, I needed one more coat, but it's super glossy and nearly perfect to work with.  Very nice, indeed.

And lastly, this is Rue St. Vincent.  Unfortunately, I think my bottle sucks.  The formula is chunky and watery at the same time.  I carefully applied three coats for this swatch, but I would definitely not wear this one as a manicure when there are much nicer white polishes out there (Sally Hansen White On, for instance).  I swatched this one first and was a bit disappointed so I'm glad the rest made me change my mind.  Since this was the only one with a horrible formula, I'm thinking that it's just a fluke.

Overall, I really like these.  The kit came with a clear top coat as well.  I'm pretty sure it's not fast drying, but I'm going to try it out with Seche Vite to see if that'll stop the shrinkage I get with Seche Vite.  All these swatches are without top coat (most of mine are) and you can see how glossy they are.  I am very glad I ordered these.

UPDATE:  I tried the Dare To Wear top coat underneath Seche Vite and it ended up wrinkling.  :o(

Dare2Wear Prism swatches: Silhouette, Pirouette and Kiss the Rain

I'm not entirely sure what the story is with Dare2Wear polishes. I am under the impression that they are a relatively old brand, found mostly in dusties... except they have some newer collections like Disco Tech (mixed glitter awesomeness, omg). Anyway, I ordered these from BeautyWests.com against the advice of some NBers -- questionable CS, minimum shipping of $25 -- but they were the only place I knew of that had this set so... I took the chance.

(Actually, I thought BeautyWests was great. It got to me relatively quickly and was well-packaged.)

I was thrilled when I got them and saw that they contained holo glitter! They're a bit unusual for holo glitter'd polishes though as they are also somewhat frosty-looking. (They're not actually frosty; they just have very bright flashes of shimmer in different colors that appear silver in these photos.)

Dare2Wear Kiss the Rain

I loved this song as a moony fourteen year old girl in a "long distance relationship". (Actually, I still quite like this song and I've long since outgrown both being fourteen and that relationship. Thank heavens on both counts.) And I really love this nail polish even though it would take at least five coats to become completely opaque on me. Still, a dusty light blue with a pink flash and holo microglitter... hard to argue with that combination. There's something really ethereal about this polish in person: it's serene and twinkling all at once.

Dare2Wear Pirouette

This is one of the more unique polishes I've seen lately. Totally ugly-pretty. The base color is somewhere between a pumpkin and a terracotta shimmer but what really makes this go *POW* is the amazing greenish-gold shimmer and holo microglitter interspersed throughout. ...it's seriously ugly but so incredibly pretty. Three coats.

Dare2Wear Silhouette

Mauve (taupe??) shimmer with ridiculously bright silver shimmer and holo microglitter. This one was so shimmery and sparkly that this was the only photo I could get that was in decent focus. Three coats, pretty thick (but manageable) stuff.

I took videos of all three but I swear, the sparkle made my camera wiggy. So instead of showing three very blurry videos, I thought I'd just post one:

Video of Kiss the Rain