Wet n Wild The Crown Is Mine... or not

Wet n Wild The Crown Is Mine was part of the Coloricon Be Jeweled collection released earlier this year. It's a duochrome foily microglitter with larger multicoloured glitter interspersed in it, much like the China Glaze Prismatic collection - in fact, a lot of them are dupes. I loved other people's swatches, but on my nails? 3 coats over black:

You guessed it... Too. Freaking. Glitzy. I am so not a proper glitter person, I couldn't wait to get it off. The Crown Is Mine is a purple to green-gold multichrome, and even though I'm a duochrome addict, I'd gotten rid of it before capturing the duochrome.

I won 4 of this collection in a giveaway, and I'm determined to love at least one of them. These are sheerer than the China Glazes, and apparently you can do a pretty good approximation of galaxy nails using just one coat, so I'm planning to try that. In a sec. After I've recovered from the SHINE IN MY EYES.

Wet n Wild Believe Me It's Real (Ice Baby) over Orly Stone Cold (Holiday 2011)

Wet n Wild Believe Me It's Real over Orly Stone Cold

I've seen photos of this Wet n Wild and it looks like that it does get opaque but I got really bored of my Stone Cold mani and didn't feel like taking it off. Lots of lazy layering. It made my nails seem HUGE though: between the basecoat, two coats of Stone Cold, one layer of topcoat, three layers of Believe Me It's Real, plus two more layers of topcoat... pretty thick by the end of this process. Extremely sparkly blue glitter with some purple hex glitter mixed in. 

I found most of the Ice Baby nail polishes at my local Walgreens... but not all of them (and that makes me sad because I really wanted Diamond in the Rough). And there MUST MUST MUST be some nail polish blog (or NB) enthusiasts in my neighborhood because the cashier at Walgreens told me that people were in asking for these polishes before they were released (and pretty much snapped up most of the display immediately). I wish I had some nail polish friends locally so I could go a-huntin' and a-paintin' with 'em. 

Layering Love with WnW Blueberry Fizz

So, how does Wet n Wild Blueberry Fizz hold up under some of our favorite layering polishes? Well, let's have a looky-looky.

Blueberry Fizz under NfuOh 54

I believe that the answer would be... ahhhhmazing. (I might be a bit biased, however; I'm sort of under the impression that Nfu Ohs could make even the most heinous polish acceptable.) I think Blueberry Fizz works as a great base color for this flakie goodness - the color pops and even brings out the purple undertones in the flakes in sunlight.

So how about matte-ified?

... with Essie Matte About You

Lovely as well, although I did myself a huge disservice with this one. I tried to do a gradient with the Nfu Oh (didn't work) and went a little polish crazy before finally adding the Essie on top which led to a bit of a drying mess, hence only the two exposed nails. The ring finger was... let's just say, irregular. It's a lovely effect, though, don't you think? I really enjoy the matte look over these flakies.

I hope you enjoy the layered looks!

Happy day, all!

Wet n Wild Blueberry Fizz

I guess I just need to admit to my weaknesses: I cannot pass up a good blue polish.

Granted, I like all bright, striking colors, but I have a special place in my heart for a good blue creme and this one does not disappoint. Wet N Wild's Blueberry Fizz was part of an end cap in a Rite Aid that I ran over to and attacked in Pennsylvania a few months ago. That's one of the few benefits of living far away from my family - I get to hunt for polishes in DIFFERENT TIME ZONES.

Anyway, back to the polish. It's got great opacity at two coats, shines like the dickens and was only 99 cents. Sounds good to me! Oh, and it's great for layering, but more on that some other day (hint, hint).

Happy day, all!

Wet n Wild Craze Cancun and Cozumel

I feel like the summer's practically over... how is it the end of July?

Wet n Wild Craze Cancun

Warm yellow jelly. Pretty easy to apply but took four coats to get close to opaque. I suspect a fifth one would've really done the trick... but I knew I was going to layer this one with its shimmery counterpart that was found in the same display. That and there's really only so long I can handle that stumpy little brush.

Wet n Wild Craze Cozumel

I really love this combination of yellow jelly and shimmering gold. The cool gold shimmer is not even close to ever getting opaque so I'm guessing it was meant to be paired with the opaque jelly in this collection. A couple of extra steps to get the full effect but I think it's an effect worth getting for $4 total. ...though maybe not worth five coats of nail polish.

Ulta Celebutante layered with Wet n Wild Barbados

I spiffied up the Ulta Celebutante mani I showed off a couple of days ago with Wet n Wild Barbados.

Ulta Celebutante with Wet n Wild Craze Barbados

I really like this combination. It looks almost glass-flecky. I'm not sure the Wet n Wild can be opaque on its own: it seems like it may be pigmented enough to reach opacity with four or five coats but I suspect the shimmery polishes in that particular collection were meant for layering.

In the meanwhile, I'm freaking out about the talk I'm giving in three weeks. THREE WEEKS. EEP! And my data is all (excuse my language) fucked up. I've been unable to sleep well in the last week worrying about it all. Summer is just moving too fast.

Some old swatches: LA Girl Disco Fever (and with Wet n Wild Gumdrop)

Some old swatches I found from what I generously call "my archives" (i.e. the bottom of one of my photo folders which has unlabeled photos).

LA Girl Disco Brites Disco Fever

Anyone who enjoys a jelly should own at least one polish from the LA Girls Disco Brites series. It's all brightly colored jellies. This one happens to be a cheery cherry red. Three coats, glossy and squishy. :) Please excuse the uneven nails...

LA Girls Disco Fever with Wet n Wild Flirt Gumdrop

I haven't yet been wowed by the WnW Flirt line which offers slightly smaller polishes (0.29fl oz vs the normal 0.5fl oz) at $2 each. This one was just a normal sparse bronzy glitter. Eh.

Some layered NOTDs using Wet n Wild, FingerPaints, Kanebo and China Glaze

These were two of my favorite manis back in May.

Wet n Wild Blueberry Fizz layered with FingerPaints Sapphire Shimmer

This NOTD just mesmerized me for as long as I wore it, which was about three or four days. I got barely any tipwear with it (using Nail Life Gripper and Diamont). My nails looked and felt extremely strong, almost fake (in a good way). And it sparkled. My goodness did it sparkle! I loved it so much that I didn't take it off until I had done the same combination on my toes; it's been my pedi for the last month. Wet n Wild Blueberry Fizz is well worth the dollar: it's a little thick but it's nicely pigmented. As for FingerPaints Sapphire Shimmer, a mixed holo glitter in dark blue jelly... I had wanted to be opaque but even sheer, it's a fun polish. Thanks so much to Adrienne for picking one up for me!

Video of the sparkly!

Kanebo The Red layered with China Glaze Dynasty

Yes, the Kanebo is actually called "The Red". It's basic dark red creme and is perfect in three coats (you can probably get away with two). After having that as my mani for a couple of days, I decided I needed to jazz it up with a little glitter. I broke out China Dynasty and wondered what took me so long to use it! It's a mixed holo glitter in a brick red jelly and I think you can probably build it to opacity with enough patience. Though on top of Kanebo The Red it is a dark, rich red, Dynasty is actually an almost-orangey faded red. A lot of people don't seem to like it precisely because it isn't a saturated red but I like it because it is a slightly unusual jelly color. I'll probably try it out alone someday this summer. I LOVE holo glitters in the summer.

Chanel Illusion D'Or & Wet n Wild Blackmail

First of all, I want to thank the lovely people who emailed me saying that they would be happy to donate an hour of their time to help me with my experiment. Your support is really touching. I'm not sure if I will be able to do that yet but I will keep you all updated. (The experiment is definitely not going to take an hour anymore though: it'll be about 15 minutes. I actually spent 15 hours of my weekend putting together the hour-long experiment... which my advisor and I nixed on today. I'm trying not to think all that I could have done in the 15 hours instead.) Thanks so much for being there for me. :)

Anyway... these are some NOTDs from about a week ago: two polishes that are at the very opposite ends of the cost spectrum.

First, I had on Wet n Wild Blackmail (which I keep calling Wildfire for some odd reason) for a couple of days.

Wet n Wild Blackmail

Black creme with bronze and silver microglitter and seems to reflect blue and red too sometimes. I thought this looked pretty cool: it definitely appears black at a distance but has enough twinkle to keep it lively a bit closer up. Cost $1.99 and applied beautifully in three coats. What more can one ask? (Besides to not have tipwear and shrinkage and for the latter, I'm going to blame Diamont.) Well... one can ask it not to STAIN MY NAILS. Argh. Nail Life Gripper was working so well for keeping stain-y polishes from staining my nails but for not for this one. I took it off after about four days and boom, orange nails. But before making that unfortunate discovery, I wore this with Chanel Illusion D'Or over it for a day or two.

Chanel Illusion D'Or over Wet n Wild Blackmail

I know Daydream222 posted this yesterday but she posted it over green. ;) This was the first Chanel I've ever bought for myself; they're just too expensive to indulge in regularly. I had bought a set of three Chanel polishes years ago for Mother's Day for my mom and had tried those out, but the experience was so dismal, I just didn't lust after Chanel polishes for the longest time. (That sentiment led me to miss out on Jade but I'm cool because I have Claire's Dream Catcher and Charlotte Russe Jade. Those two completely satisfied my lemmings.) Anyway, when Illusion D'Or came out, I was immediately intrigued and figured it was better to buy now and think later. Well, it's later and I still don't know what to think.

It looks like it's made up of gold mini flakies and microglitter that are as bright as OPI Dazzled By Gold (though this gold is cooler than Dazzled by Gold). When the sun hits it, it just radiates light. And of course, there are the blue-purple opalescent hex (or circular?) glitter that are so thin and fine that they disappear in some lights and reappear in others. It is, if nothing else, a unique polish. When over black, it reflected as a blackened olive shade (unless it's in direct sunlight in which case, it is definitely a blackened gold).

Close-up of Illusion D'Or over Wet n Wild Blackmail

It looks super pretty in the bottle. I'm going to have to try layering it over a light gold to see if I like it like that.

I think my verdict on this for now is: "Very interesting but not very pretty." But maybe I just haven't found the right base color for it.

CC Wild and Willing

My NOTD is CC Wild and Willing layered over WnW Black creme. I saw photos of this color by itself and liked it, but I think that the black base really brings out the multi-chromeness of this polish.

Unfortunately, I failed to capture the pink in this. But you can definitely see in these pictures what a chameleon this shade is.. green, copper, gold. It has this really amazing shimmer in it too that makes it super glowy. I had a lot of fun with this as my mani, moving my fingers and hands to watch it change :)

Cheap drugstore thrills: Sinful Mint Apple and Wet n Wild Night Prowl

Evidence that nail polish can be good without being expensive or hard-to-find!

Sinful Mint Apple

I'm going to pretend like the name of this polish doesn't sound like the Essie polish "Mint Candy Apple". But who cares about non-creative borrowing when a polish is as fantastic as this? Blue-leaning mint green with silver shimmer. I'm used to Sinful polishes being a bit on the thin side but this was a surprising two-coater. Often, I don't think of Sinfuls as a great use of $2 but this was definitely worth it. The shimmer is really what makes the polish: it never quite looks like a creme but the shimmer becomes very obvious and extremely pretty when the light hits it.

Wet n Wild Night Prowl Blue Moon

How do you beat 99¢ polish? You don't! This was a bit on the thin side and required three coats for me to get to completely opaque (though it would have been passable at two). The gold-highlighted light blue shimmer in the polish sort of disappears on the nail but it still remains a solid blue shimmer. Honestly, I was a tad disappointed in this polish: I have had great experiences with Wet n Wild Shine polishes and I was hoping it would look more like the bottle color.

On a red-eye to NYC tonight. Sigh. I hate red-eye flights but it's usually 1. a direct flight and 2. the cheapest to boot. So... plan for tomorrow... get into NYC at 6:30am, nap for a couple of hours and then a day full of talks on sentence processing.

As pristine as the newly fallen snow: some white swatches

This is probably going to be a visually boring post as it is devoted to one single color: white. But hopefully it'll be informative to somebody -- hopefully, D's whet some appetites on white nail polish with her Underware comparisons.

I'm pretty much always on a quest for a perfect opaque white creme. WnW White is often recommended. But in my experience, it isn't as fab as WnW Black. Very streaky and chalky on me.

I can't locate photos of all the opaque white polishes I've tried out and so before I forget, here are some of the ones I've tried but won't be showing photos of:

• Anna Sui 015: Soft white. As much as I love the candy rose scent of these polishes, this one was a nightmare. Three coats, totally uneven, goopy, and it never dried. (And it resembled White Out in texture.) Smelled nice... but nice-smelling nail polish is of no use to me when I can't wear it!

• Rescue Beauty Lounge Underware: Stark white. D's covered this one already. I've heard tell that this is a brilliant one-coat wonder! For me, that was simply not true. Three coats, also uneven. I tried it under the pastel jellies like Bikini Bottom for the "lit within" look... It looked pretty bad because the Underware was very streaky. So whatever power other people have over RBLs... I certainly do not possess it.

• CND Cream Washed: Beige-white. Not opaque at all. Trust me, I tried...

• OPI Alpine White: Stark white. It's been years since I've used it but have found this to be a pretty trustworthy white: two coater for me, IIRC.

OPI Tickets to Paradise

This is definitely not meant to be an opaque polish: the photo above shows five or six coats. It also leans a bit pinkish grey. It's a very nice polish with a pleasant jelly finish but not quite what I want in an opaque white creme.

Missha WH001

Soft white. Four coats, still VERY uneven. It was only a couple of dollars but totally not a worthwhile polish for me.

CND Brilliant White

Stark white. Four coats, very easy to build (please ignore the ugly chips that happened because it refused to dry for hours and hours). Certainly very close to what I want in a white (opaque, smooth and creamy in texture) but four coats was pushing my patience. Brilliant White was probably one of the better ones I've tried though!

American Apparel Cotton

Cream white. I like how soft this white is: it just has a tinge of tan in there. It does even out in three coats -- and does apply quite nicely for a white -- but man oh man, did this totally not dry at all.

Revlon Street Wear White Out

And saved the best for last: I need backups of this one. It's closer to a softer white than a super stark white. Passable at two coats but really needs three... but when you apply that third coat, it's opaque white polish perfection. So smooth (though not glossy). And so easy to apply! I hate having a discontinued polish be an HG of any sort -- and thus, the search continues -- but really, quite a jewel of a polish and one of the ones that I got for 4 for $1. :)

Old swatch: Wet n Wild Flirt Frostbite (but mostly an excuse to update)

I keep on forgetting to update you all on the recent contests:

We do have a winner for my Orly Sweet collection giveaway: congratulations to Lauren! I have been in contact with her and will be sending off her polishes soon. :)

All the submissions are in for the Polish or Perish banner contest. The response was bigger than anticipated: we received a total of 107 banners! Thank you so much to all those who participated: I am just floored by the talent and creativity of our readers. We received many truly stunning banners and it's going to be tough to decide which one to use. We're currently going through them and will be voting on a winner and a runner-up in the next two weeks or so. Hopefully, we'll have a whole new look for the blog by the end of the month! (eee!!)

And now, something to look at...

Wet n Wild Flirt Frostbite

I've had this swatch for at least three months now. For $2, I'm not complaining... although the Flirt line from Wet n Wild is pretty small (0.29 fl oz). It's a basic silver foil but it's actually surprisingly blingy and bright. Three coats, definitely a bit on the thin side.

Hello everyone! The weather has been so crazy here in NJ. Last week it was rainy and cold, and this week.. sunny and pleasantly warm. CRAZY WEATHER i tell ya! The wet and cold weather makes it easier for me to study since I'm not staring out the window wishing I was out enjoying the beautiful sun.

Today, i have an oldie but goodie to show you! OPI's My Private Jet. I've been passing over this beauty many times, mostly because I've read so many posts on it on MUA about OPI having so many versions of this polish out, and I didn't want to risk buying it online and getting the non holo version. Well recently I came across the holographic version of it in person at my local beauty supply. Here I have two coats of My Private Jet over Wet N Wild's Black Creme. I wanted My Private Jet to appear more black than the charcoal brownish color it looked by itself in the bottle. Wet N Wild's Black Creme is an awesome awesome black and is completely opaque in one coat. In addition, it is also only 99 cents! Can't beat that!!




The only downside about holographic nail polish is that you can only see its true beauty under light, because in low lighting this polish just looks boring! But I still love this color even when it is in low lighting and just looks like a charcoal with silver shimmer in it.

Franken: Funky Chunky with CHEESE

Still haven't had a chance to put this cutie back on for pictures in the sunlight. I wore it for about a day: it dulls slightly over the course of the day and becomes a tad bumpy, though nothing that filling it out with clear polish wouldn't fix. :)

This was a pretty straightforward franken:

• Wet n Wild Black (super pigmented and smooth, love this stuff)
• a LOT of Wet n Wild Clear (which is always sold out everywhere I look! is everyone frankening?)
• one scoop of large silver holo hex nail art glitter from eBay
• more scoops of large blue opalescent hex nail art glitter from eBay (because those look better)
• many scoops of holo glitter from Coastal Scents (man, that jar was totally worth it)
• a dash of ChG Kaleidoscope Him Out (because I could)

...so maybe this isn't that straightforward. It felt like it because I was just mixing in things as they occurred to me.

A note on the name: when I showed it off on NB, I hadn't named it yet and somebody mentioned that it was what Lippmann Funky Chunky should have been. I didn't necessarily agree with this but then someone (possibly the same person) mentioned some Burger King commercial about a burger "with CHEESE"... and I figured "Funky Chunky with CHEESE" was as good a name as any. (Okay, you had to be there. And even if you were there... well, I have a weird sense of humor and a soft spot for this particular MUA-er whom I accidentally met IRL at Sephora Times Sq while in search of $OPI 212.)

Funky Chunky with CHEESE in the bottle

That weakass silver holo hex glitter was a mistake. I should've just gone with the blue: it's so much more reactive with the light.

Funky Chunky with CHEESE (indoors with flash)

Super serious holo glitter going on here. Hard to tell with still photos, as always but I've got videographic proof of it below the closeup shot!

Closeup of Funky Chunky with CHEESE on the nail

Video of Funky Chunky with CHEESE

Sigh, I hate swatching at night. No good sunlight to show off anything accurately! Even the video doesn't accurately reflect how sparkly this sucker was!

Cheap thrills

Happy hump day everyone! I'm always on the look out for great deals, and who doesn't love a bargain? I looove bargain hunting and shopping. It makes me love the item more knowing that I got it for cheaper than original! So today I have my recent bargain acquisitions!

First up is Pure Ice French Kiss from Walmart. Gorgeous blue creme, I mean honestly.. I have too many blue cremes as it is, but I couldn't pass this up for the $2 price tag.

Direct sunlight:


Indirect light:

Seriously, perfection in two coats and formula is fab!

Here we have Wet n Wild Shield from their Craze line. These should be widely available now, I've been spotting these at many Rite-Aids, but also disappearing from shelves quickly! My brush had one bristle sticking waaaaay out, but with a snip it was perfect! This is also two coats. What makes this polish amazing is the little bits of copper shimmer in the gold base makes it POP. Also $2 from the drug store!



And finally, Wet n Wild Wild Orchid. Super pretty blurple polish with holographic glitter. Unfortunately my camera made it blue, but really it is more purple than this. One downside about this polish is that it took me four, FOUR coats to reach bottle color. BUT for four coats, it dried pretty fast! And for 99 cents, the price definitely makes up for four coats hehe


And more importantly, drug stores sometimes have sales on Wet n Wild, like buy one get one free or buy one get second 50% off. Even without the sales, these are seriously a bargain, and you get more than what you pay for!

Bloom swatches: Mena, Bonnie and Bianca

Thanks to the same lovely swapper (also a women's college alumna, which makes me happy -- there are so few of us these days as only 50-something women's colleges are left in the US, with tons more likely to go down the pipes with this economy) who let me swatch her Marquee Moon that I CP'ed for her, I am the proud owner of a couple of Bloom polishes. Well, pretty proud. I'm SO happy I got to try these out but I'm even happier that I'm no longer lemming the brand.

The one I wanted most was Mena, based on some amazing swatches I saw online. I'm wondering if this is what it feels like to get the non-holo version of MPJ (i.e. disappointment)? I thought it'd be a lot more eye-catching than this...

Bloom Mena

Three coats, no topcoat. The photos do wash out the holo effect a bit but it was pretty faint and scattered to begin with. Sigh. I guess I'll have to be happy with my $2 bottle of Diamond Cosmetics Chainmail Charm or $3 bottle of CC Revvvolution (or $6 bottle of Mattese Revolution).

It's a little more pronounced in the bottle:

The video shows off the holo a lot better but as you can see, it's very scattered holo:

Bloom Bonnie

Three coats, looks far better IRL because the dark blue shimmer has a pink-purple duochrome to it. However, this effect is only really obvious in the bottle (again) and disappears a bit when it hits the nail. Weird! The closeup with flash shows it off well though.

Closeup of Bloom Bonnie

Admittedly, I got kind of impatient with it -- I was in a colorful mood -- so I layered Wet n Wild's Fantasy Makers Black Magic bar glitter on top.

Bloom Bonnie with WnW Fantasy Makers Black Magic on top

Two coats of Black Magic, a multi-colored small bar glitter polish. Wonder if I could get it almost opaque?

Closeup of Bloom Bonnie with WnW Fantasy Makers Black Magic on top

Sometimes it seems like sacrilege to layer cheapie polishes over expensive ones. But a polish is a polish is a polish. :)

But happily, one polish was as beautiful as its picture and bottle promised!

Bloom Bianca

Three coats, could've used four. Gorgeous bluish-teal with a green-gold duochromish shimmer. This is exactly what I wanted NYX Jungle to look like and you could probably get Jungle to look like this by layering it over a dark blue polish.

The polishes were all of great consistency: the formula was very easy to work with. I just wish the first two colors were a bit more showy. And that this brand was cheap and available in the US!