White/Teal/Turquoise Nail Art :)

I did this particular manicure for a contest held by cutepolish on YouTube back in December. I'm really happy with how it turned out :)

Polishes used:
China Glaze For Audrey
Elevation Polish Jengish Chokusu
Sephora by OPI Read my Palm
Zoya Wednesday
Pahlish Colder Than a Wave (the glitter on the ring finger)

As for the giveaway, I think it'll be of polishes I currently own. I haven't picked the polishes yet, but it'll be at least 10-15 polishes and possibly a gift certificate. I'm still figuring out, I'm sure I'll be more inspired in the following days as it is finals time :) At least 1 prize, up towards 3. It may be a long running contest, though, as it may take me a while to decide on which polishes to part with!

Belated Easter Mani: Happy Hands Motherboy jelly sandwich and a return?

Hey guys and gals! so I'm trying something new! I downloaded the blogger app so that I can make posts away from a computer, lol. 

So today's post is about my Easter manicure. It is a jelly Sandwich with OPI Don't Touch my Tutu with Happy Hands Motherboy. One coat of the OPI below the glitter and 2 over, to make the pastel glitter a bit more pastel :) It was really delicate and cute. Happy Hands has sadly shut down but a dupe to Motherboy can be found at Rainbow Polish, named Taffy.

 

Hope there is some interest in this blog still! I'm considering doing a return to blogging giveaway,  comment to let me know if it would be worth doing!  Til next time~

Smitten Polish: Butter Mint

I'm going to apologize for this photo. My camera hates taking pictures of mint polish, so I had to attempt to tweak it a bit in Photoshop. Even then it's not right :(

Butter Mint was a polish that applied very easily and I love black glitter :) it added a little something to the already awesome mint polish!

Anyone have any tips for photographing mint polish? help! haha

Information: Facebook

OCC: Grandma + Gloss 'n Sparkle: Quote Unquote

Coral is always excellent, not just for summer. It just happened to be summer when I wore this manicure combination, as I'm not one to follow convention on what colors are appropriate for which season anyway :)

I received OCC: Grandma as a gift and I loved it at first sight. I've always wanted OCC polishes but never managed to pull the trigger on them, although I do have a few of their lip tars! Which I love. But I digress.

I saw Gloss 'n Sparkle on sale at Llarowe and I loved the the color scheme. So I got it (I frequently check the sale/clearance section of Llarowe to see if there are any good deals to be had).

Onto pictures!

It's hard to capture the color of Grandma but the formula was great. Quote Unquote was also one of the easiest glitter polishes I've worked with recently. 2 coats, didn't even have to dab or manually place glitters.

Information: Gloss 'n Sparkle Website // Facebook

Ulta: Celebutante + Rainbow Honey: Magic Cake

The moment I saw the glitter polish by Rainbow Honey, I wanted it. I held off for a while, though, but finally purchased it a while ago.

The formula leaves something to be desired, but I know that's something that comes with the territory of big glitter. Of course, that means another chunky manicure. But it looked really good!

Magic Cake consists of different neon glitters, big pink hexes and square, neon blue and lime green. There's also a shimmer. It's a really fun glitter combination and with some more careful application, could look less "thick" :) I think I did one coat of Magic Cake and then started manually placing glitter afterwards.

Information: Facebook // Website

Funky green! Essie Pretty Edgy + Salon Perfect Zapped + Pahlish Legra; 1956 + Girly Bits Street Magic

For some odd reason, I wanted a green manicure. With a deeper green. I dug out Essie: Pretty Edgy and actually wore it on its own for a few days. When I saw some tipwear, I decided to add some glitter on top.

I love matte glitters, and got my hands on all of the Salon Perfect matte glitters. I layered Zapped over my nails to create a gradient. It looked really cool, other than the downside that the mani looked thick on a few fingers.

I then received Pahlish: Legra; 1956 in the mail from a little haul and figured it would look cool over the whole mani, and it did. The neon green satin hex glitters and the gold circle glitters added a different dimension.

Then I added another layer of Girly Bits: Street Magic over it just for some additional sparkle.

It ended up being a lot of layers. But I love it :)

It looks pretty radioactive! It's going to be a pain to take off, though...

Different Dimension: Black Dahlia

I haven't worn that many holos this summer, considering that it's summer. This may have been the only holo I've worn so far, which is odd... I have a good number of them.

There isn't much to say about this ABSOLUTELY AMAZING polish. It's Black Dahlia by Different Dimension. It's a black leaning greyish purple scattered holographic polish with micro iridescent glitters. Hard to capture the glitters on camera but in person this polish was awesome. This is 3 coats on its own.

Love love love. This makes me want to wear more holos. Have you worn any this summer?

Information: Etsy // Facebook // Llarowe

Pahlish August Duo: Slow like Honey + Heavy With Mood

Hello!!!! I know I've been very remiss in making posts but finals for summer school came around, then a paper due, then I had a long week of moving. After that I was settling into my new place (aka, my parent's place, haha), school started up shortly thereafter. But anyway, I survived my last first week of law school! Yay!!

As a result of moving, I haven't been doing my nails as much. I kind of like settling into a routine for where my manicure stuff is and everything was everywhere and I was too... tired to try to set things up as I like them. Also, my picture taking setup is going to be a bit different and I had to figure that out. But I finally got around to it and now will do manicures on a more regular basis :)

This post is VERY late. It's the August duo from Pahlish, available until August 31. So, my apologies if this is the first you've seen of it.

The duo consists of two polishes, a creme with some hidden-esque shimmer and a glitter topper. I have to say, it's my favorite duo so far from the ones she has released. The nude creme is beautiful and very clean looking on my nails, and the small amount of shimmer adds a little bit of something. The glitter topper is gorgeous, consisting of gold/copper, green and black glitter in varying shapes and sizes.

full sunlight

in the shade

full sunlight, mattified

in the shade, mattified

 The color for the creme is more true in the sunlight pics.

The August Pahlish duo is available until August 31!

Information: Facebook // Etsy // Llarowe

CrowsToes: Green Thumb of Doom

Before turquoise, I loved mint green. I had this thing about collecting all of the mint green polishes that I could possibly collect (because back then, it wasn't as common) and it still holds a soft spot in my nail polish heart.

CrowsToes: Green Thumb of Doom is perfect layered over mint green. It's a shimmery green that has a multichrome effect from green to blue to gold. The gold shimmer really shows well on the nail. I don't think my pictures quite got it, but even with my love of glitter I didn't get tired of this polish for the week that I wore it (sorry about the nail growth, heh).

Also it's showing up a little bit more aqua in these pictures, but because I used a mint green base, it was more mint green. Not sure why it's not showing up correctly, but you can definitely see the gorgeous shimmer!

Information: Facebook // Llarowe // Overall Beauty

Crowstoes: Shoot the Butterfly

This polish caught my attention when I first saw it. I know the colors are kind of Halloween-y, but looking at it, it definitely reminded me of a Monarch butterfly's color scheme.

This is Crowstoes: Shoot the Butterfly. It's a black jelly with copper hexes, small white glitters and holo microglitters. I did one coat over a base coat of black polish with 2 coats on my ring finger. The glitter is definitely not hard to get out of the bottle. I liked the sparse look better, hence layering one layer over black for the majority of my fingers.

I find it whimsical, despite it being black based, haha. The sparkle that the holo microglitter adds really adds depth, along with the base being black so the white glitters are at different depths.

Do you like the look of one layer or two?

Information: Llarowe // Overall Beauty

EDC Nails! Neon gradient with randon black stripes :)

I listen to mostly Top 40 music with a smattering of more popular EDM (electronic dance music) thrown in. Lately EDM is all I've been listening to, although now I'm on a classical music kick. My tastes varies, I can listen to most anything.

EDC Las Vegas is coming up this weekend and I have a few friends (from all over!) going. I know they're going to have a great time, and one of them asked for EDC nails and I said of course! I didn't quite know what I wanted to do, except that maybe it'd be more complicated. I haven't done "complicated" nail art in a while. A looong time. This is what I came up with.

I did neon gradient with random black stripes :) I used all China Glaze neons.

Thumb, middle finger and pinky are: Pool Party (neon pink), Towel Boy Toy (neon blue), Kiwi Cool-ada (neon green). I also put a coat of China Glaze Fairy Dust over the top of these nails.

Index and ring finger are (these really didn't come out in the pictures): Flip Flop Fantasy (hot neon coral), Sun Worshiper (neon orange), Yellow Polka Dot Bikini (neon highlighter yellow).

I love how these came out. For the gradients I used a cosmetic wedge sponge, painted stripes of the colors and dabbed it on. I use random placement of striping tape and just used my go to black, American Apparel Hassid over.

Only pain in the butt part was the fact that I used neons, which aren't the most opaque nail polishes to begin with. I did use a base coat of white but it only helped a little. I tried to minimize smudging (maybe one day!) but I'm happy with how the lines came out.

If you're going to EDC Las Vegas, I hope you have fun, safe time! Have a great weekend everyone!

The Polish Bar: Shiny Pebbles

I'm not quite sure where I saw this polish but when I saw it, I knew that I must have it. So I purchased immediately. The mix of colors drew me in, I couldn't resist.

It's The Polish Bar: Shiny Pebbles. I love the mix of colors, different glitters and just the execution. It's a mix of various sizes of dark brown, cooper, orange and aqua hex glitters and small aqua square glitters in a white crelly base. 

This is three coats on its own -- I think I might try one coat it over a white jelly base sometime for a less busy look. I love the pop of the aqua glitters against the orange/copper and brown! Brown glitter!!!

Information: Facebook // Etsy

Hare Polish: Electric Flame

Electric Flame by Hare Polish really is a hard polish to capture on camera, you can't quite get all the nuances of it.

It's a  peachy orange jelly with glowing blue and purple glass flecks and the same iridescent blue hexes. It really does glow on your nails, can't get it in the picture although I tried my hardest.

This is 3 coats on its own.

indoors

 

direct sunlight

Information: Facebook // Etsy // Llarowe

Smitten Polish: Capitana El Rubi

Today I have for you Capitana El Rubi by Smitten Polish, part of the new Shipwrecked collection. I was wanting to wear a red when I decided to use this polish. I love the different glitter shapes in it. The formula was pretty difficult to work with -- I tried to use 3 coats, but even though I waited for each layer to dry, it bunched up in areas. The glitter didn't quite come out as I wanted. I suppose I could have used thinner on it but I was stubborn.

It's a maroonish red polish with pink and silver glitter (including circle glitter!) and a purple shimmer/flash and I wanted to love it but it didn't quite happen. It ended up being a very thick manicure (coats of polish plus tons of topcoat). Maybe 5 coats of topcoat -- I added one more before taking these pictures, and in the 1st you can see the trouble area.

Gorgeous polish, in need of a good amount of thinner, though.

Information: Facebook // Etsy // Llarowe

Scofflaw Nail Varnish: David Bowie's Bulge

Hello!!!!!!!!!!!

I've been very absent -- I think finals burned me out from doing anything other than veg. I was only doing a manicure once a week -- when I'd usually do them two or three times a week. And even then, I rarely moisturized (good thing it's not winter) so my cuticles were in a sad state.

But I'm back! Sad news, I did not get into the MBA program I applied to but I think it's for the best in terms of my interests and background experience. So I'll be entering my third year of law school -- actually, I'm already in it as I started summer classes last week. One year left! How... scary.

Onto today's swatch, it's from Scofflaw Nail Varnish. Interesting name, David Bowie's Bulge, eh?

It's a deep coral polish with subtle shimmer, accented with matte and holographic teal glitters of various sizes and also features small dark red glitters and a bronze microglitter. I REALLY loved the bronze microglitter aspect of it, it added some nice sparkle. I think it took me only 2 coats to get this result, and the glitter came out beautifully. Perfect summer color!

Their information: Facebook // Etsy // Llarowe

Coco Allure: Jupiter Aurora

I remember when duochromes first became popular -- Nubar had a number of them out, and I found them intriguing. They don't capture my interest as much as glitter does, so to have the combination of the two is pretty darn awesome.

Coco Allure: Jupiter Aurora is a multichrome glitter topcoat. It shifts from green, to teal, then purple, with some burgundy and hints of copper. I tried to get fancy with striping tape but it may have backfired a little bit. I should have done it the opposite way -- black with the glitter star.

This glitter topcoat is super dense, this really is one coat over black. Gorgeous and I definitely was not bored with it while I wore it.

Coco Allure can be found on their Facebook page here and their Etsy here :)

Don't forget to like our Facebook page and enter in my giveaway for Llarowe GCs!

Nails Inc.: Baker St. + Max Factor: Fantasy Fire

I visited Los Angeles for a few days over spring break and I had a little bit of a hard time trying to figure out a manicure to wear... but then saw this NOTD and felt inspired and so even though it wasn't super glittery, it amused me, especially with the constant sun in California.

I had a hard time capturing the color shift, though. For those that don't know, Max Factor: Fantasy Fire is a weak dupe to Clarins 230 and the other color shifting polishes that are out there nowadays. I do have Clarins 230 but wanted to try out Fantasy Fire, and it was gorgeous. Definitely one of those polishes where you can just... play with your manicure endlessly!

I've had Baker St. forever and it's a gorgeous color -- I need the patience to wear it on its own! Soon...

And I just realized this is a very UK-ish manicure, as both of these polish lines are based in the UK, haha.

Don't forget to follow us on Facebook and to enter in my giveaway for Llarowe gift certificates!

Elevation Polish: Jengish Chokusu + Hare Polish: Dauphine of Decadence

I've said it often but turquoise is one of my favorite nail polish colors. Whenever I see a "what should I wear with this outfit?" post on whichever message board, I always want to suggest something like China Glaze: For Audrey. It's such a pretty and classy color, yet different.

Elevation Polish Jengish Chokusu is a green leaning sea glass creme. It's gorgeous on its own but me being the glitter lover that I am, layered Hare Polish: Dauphine of Decadence over the top. I actually saw Kristi at Happy Hands do this combination in an NOTD of hers and I copied it because they went so well together :)

Hare Polish Dauphine of Decadence is mixture of gold glitter in several sizes of hex & square glitter, with a sprinkling of pale mint green hexes and gold shimmer. This is a complex glitter, as are most of Hare Polish's creations :)

One can find Elevation Polish on her site here and her shop here.
Hare Polish: Facebook // Etsy // Website (with other retailers)

Also remember to enter in my Giveaway here and like our Facebook page here!

Giveaway Reminder!

I did an oops! I meant to schedule a post for tomorrow for a reminder post of my Giveaway, but I'll just edit it and publish it now. :P

Remember I'm holding a giveaway for 3 $25 gift certificates for Llarowe!

Click here for Minnie's Giveaway

Also, remember to do the additional entries by following us on Facebook and the like!

Please share the giveaway and the Facebook page, I may decide to add an additional winner if we reach a high number of likes on the Facebook page! Thanks!

1st Blogaversary! Minnie's Giveaway :)

Giveaway! To celebrate my 1st year at Polish or Perish and to show my appreciation :) Keeping in mind that I am but a student, the prizes aren't very imaginative, but this is the kind of gift I love the most (where I can personally pick, I love gift cards!) so it goes along with what I'd like either way! First, though, a small announcement:

Polish or Perish now has a Facebook page! Please join us in liking the page!

And now the prizes... there are 3 prizes! Instead of doing one grand prize, I decided to go for 3 equal prizes of $25 from Llarowe. Since Llarowe ships internationally and this is in gift certificate form, this is open both domestically and internationally. I may add more later on, so keep tuned!


a Rafflecopter giveaway

End date to enter the giveaway will be May 16, the last day of my finals, and I will post winners on May 17!

Thank you for your support this past year and I hope to continue for many more :)

<3 minnie