From Powder Perfect- Love Angeline and Aliquid

Hi guys, how are you all? Well, as I mentioned in my last post, Jacinta from the gorgeous Powder Perfect has sent me some nail polishes to review, so let's get to it.

Love! Angeline is a US based indie polish maker and the two lacquers I have been sent to review are from her blogger collaboration;
Stargazing Monster, a blackened purple jelly filled with small holo glitter and a warm mutlicoloured shimmer, created with the help of blogger MrsLochness!, inspired by the colors in the sky at twilight and Let Me Fly, a beautiful teal holo filled with a green-blue shimmer and blue and green iridescent glitters, created with LacquerLoon, in a homage to the delightful colours found in the plumage of peacocks.

First up is Stargazing Monsters. The formula for this was great, I used three thin coats for these swatches and topped it off with a coat of Poshe. I like the way the shimmer gives this polish a nice complexity, so it's not completely reliant on the holo glitter for that special something...

Stargazing Monsters

The polish looks quite black under certain lighting, yet in the sunlight you can really see how this is actually a blackened purple base. The shimmer is strong regardless of lighting which I really like, and the holo glitter really gives it a lovely sparkle too.

Up next is let Me Fly. I must say I found the formula on this one to be a little bit harder to work with. There is a lot of glitter and so on in the polish, so it gets quite thick on the brush by the time you're up to the third nail.
I only needed two coats here and again topped it off with Poshe for a nice glassy smooth finish. I didn't really see the holo effect with this one, but the shimmer and the lovely colours of the glitter makes this a really beautiful polish to look at, regardless.

Let Me Fly

The second lot of polish Jacinta sent me are by Aliquid Lacquer, from their Silmarillion collection, based on the writings of the same title by Tolkien.
 
This is Hidden City, a stunning forest green holographic polish finished with shimmery gold flakes. 
The formula is great, two easy coats and oh wow, what a colour... I love this one. I topped it with Poshe and didn't experience any dulling of the linear holo effect either.

Hidden City

I really like this polish, and I don't own any greens quite like this. The formula was a breeze to work with, not at all temperamental the way some holographic polishes can be and, even though it's a dark colour, there was still a lovely holo flame on the nail without any dulling of the green. And in the shade the golden flakes give the polish a lovely depth that keeps it interesting.

Finally we have Day Shall Come Again, a rusty burgundy with a strong gold to bronzey-green shift. 
Again the formula was excellent. I used three thin coats for these swatches and one coat of Poshe. This is a really interesting colour, quite delicate with a fabulous shifting property that is almost strong enough to call a duochrome.

Day Shall Come Again

Both Love! Angeline and Aliquid Lacquer are available through Powder Perfect here in Australia, along with some other fantastic polish brands.

Powder Perfect also make their own stunning polishes, and they have a grogeous Xmas range out at the moment that you really should check out... I have Merry Xmas ya Filthy Animals and it's soooo lush :) 
Powder Perfect's customer service and range is lovely and it was a pleasure to review these polishes for Jacinta, plus there's plenty on their site to keep any polish lover happy, including nail vinyls and fab nail polish-based resin jewelry.

I hope you enjoyed these reviews and, as you know, I always give an honest appraisal of the polishes, whether I buy them myself or if they are sent to me for review.

Anyway, I have some more gorgeous new polishes I just have to swatch, so until next time
~love and polish for all~

Em xox

Today is Two Birds Lacquer day :)

'ello peeps, how is everything going in your world? I hope things are running along beautifully and that stress is down and happiness is up.
It's school holidays where I am so I have the kid at home (she's out jumping on the trampoline and enjoying the sunshine at the moment) which is actually really nice. Of course, my little seaside town is also overrun with tourists, which is not so nice.

I still haven't heard back about that job I applied for working at a local veterinary practice, so I am fairly doubtful that I was successful, but it was still good to get out there and experience a job interview after so long. Mind you, I need to drop some weight because the only interview appropriate pants I own are too small- I guess that's what happens when you spend two years sitting on your bum having multiple surgeries haha

Anyway, I have been taking a lot of pics of my manis recently, which means I have far too many photos to wade through and I've just kinda avoided blogging because that means trying to organise a bazillion images and I just can't... But I really should.
Especially as I am about to receive a fairly substantial package from Glam Polish... after all, it's a given that I'm going to end up taking far too many photos of those babies, and if I don't do some culling now I'll end up drowning in nail polish pics and probably overload my computer in the process.
So here's some swatches for you all ;)
Today is a polish from one of my favourite Aussie indies, Two Birds Lacquer, from their aptly named Floral State-Ments Collection, which consists of nine lacquers based around our State and Territory flowers. This beauty is is Red and Green Kangaroo Paw, the official flower emblem of Western Australia.

Red and Green Kangaroo Paw

Now, as you know, I love a good green, and an interesting green is even better, and this polish fits both criteria beautifully.
Kangaroo Paw is a fabulous pea-soup green creme with teeny tiny sparks of red, white and green glitter throughout- not too much, just enough to give things a little twist. As usual the application was easy, dry time was good and it wore very well too. But what I really love about it is the colour... it's really different from any other green I own, and I own a lot of greens (seriously).

Red and Green Kangaroo Paw

And just because I can, here's a couple of pics of Kangaroo Paw teamed up with another Floral State-ments polish, Golden Wattle.
Golden Wattle is a stunning golden glitterbomb full of all types of gold glitter- tiny microglitter, iridescent glitter, delicate gold flakies... very, very pretty. I used it here as a topper but it can be used on its own also, although you'll need a couple of good coats to achieve full opacity. 

Red and Green Kangaroo Paw with Golden Wattle

So, to sum up- if you're like me and like a good green then I really recommend getting Kangaroo Paw, it is definitely unique enough to warrant buying. Golden Wattle is another delightful polish, and if you like sparkle with a twist then you'll like this one too.
If you haven't experienced Two Birds Lacquer then I reckon you should take a peek at their polishes and give them a try- they make consistently good quality, interesting, flattering polishes and I really think they're an Aussie indie polish maker worth supporting.

Anyway, that's it from me today.
Until next time, as always, ~love and polish for all~

Em xox

Super quick post- a little bit of dead easy "nail art" using Glam Polish's Tinker Bell

Heya again- I know this comes close on the heels of my last post, but it's a quickie ;)

And yes, it does feature another Glam Polish- what can I say? I really dig them.
Anyway, this is Tinker Bell, a bright lime green with a sweet gold shimmer running throughout.
It's such a happy colour, so bright and cheerful, but me being me I had to tweak things just a bit...

Tinker Bell

How cute is this colour? So pretty :)

 

After wearing it "as is" for most of the day I decided to make use of some of the nail vinyls I have and add a little attitude to my mani...the black is just a simple $2.00 Mud polish, which I tend to use for all my black nail art needs as it has great opacity and is easy to use.
Anyway, I love the black and green together, it really makes the green pop and it's very eye catching. I even did the same on my other hand, with straight lines on the thumb, diagonal on the middle finger and chevrons/zigzags on my pinkie, just to mix things up a bit.

All up I think it's a great mani, easy-peasy and cute to boot (woah, epic rhyming abilities there, bow down before the master folks haha). I love easy nail art ideas, so please let me know if you have any tips or tricks to making your mani pop :)

Until next time ~love and polish for all~

Em xox

The second half of Glam Polish's Cast a Spell 1 collection

Hi all, sorry I didn't get this post up sooner... I don't actually have any excuse except I forgot ;)
Anyway, Glam Polish's second Cast a Spell collection is now up and ready for pre-order, as is their Halloween duo. I would highly recommend snagging at least a couple of these babies as they look stunning, and if Glam's first Cast a Spell collection is anything to go by, the polishes will also be amazing in terms of quality and wow factor too.

So, here's the last two of my Cast a Spell 1 lacquers, the first three are discussed here in this post.
As with the other three polishes, Coven and Conjuring are beautiful to apply, with each of them being easy two coaters, or three thin coats if you prefer. The high quality and consistency of Glam's products is why I rate them so highly, and not a single one of these lovelies let me down in any way...just throw on a nice coat of top coat to get that shine factor up and you're done.

So, without any further ado here is Coven, a red holo glitter beauty;

Coven

Nothing I say can suitably describe how gorgeous this polish is in real life. It's a glowing, red masterpiece. it has those teeny tiny little circle glitters that catch the light and look as if there's sparks of flame, flashing out of the vibrant red base. I love this so very, very much :)

Coven

And the last polish from the original Cast a Spell collection is... Conjuring;

Conjuring

OMFG you guys! Can you see this? Do you believe in the glory that is Conjuring? Oh man, oh lord, this is such a stunner, you gotta believe me when I tell you you need this in your life, stat. Even if you generally don't like greens, this is just too captivating not to have.

Conjuring

And that, my friends, is the end of that.
Thankfully, Cast a Spell 1 is still available, so if you see anything you like you can still snag a bottle.
I am currently waiting on the new Cast a Spell II collection as I made my pre-order purchase the morning it became available, and believe you me, I will be sharing swatches of those lovelies as soon as I get a hold of them, so keep your eyes peeled for that one.

As usual you can find Glam's store here and they also have a list of overseas stockists on their site if you're not in the land of Oz.
Glam Polish really are worth a look, and I think they would make a fantastic starting point for anyone contemplating exploring the massive market that is Indie Polishes. There's so many new brands popping up all the time, it can get a little overwhelming, but at least you know with Glam that you're going to get amazing quality with lovely customer service and a product that will actually live up to the hype.

Until next time, as usual ~love and polish for all~

mwah! Em xox

Emily De Molly is back y'all

Hi everyone, how are we today? I am feeling o.k- just got up from a nap because I only got 12 hours sleep last night :p
I do have some good news- I'm off to a job interview on Monday at a Veterinary Clinic to work 3 days a week while I study to become a qualified veterinary nurse... I'm not counting my chickens, but just getting back into going in for interviews is a huge step after two years of no work whatsoever. So think good thoughts around 2pm this coming Monday :)

Anyhoo, today I want to show you two luscious polishes by the lacquer that started my whole aussie indie obsession- Emily De Molly.
Now, her polishes are always, always beautiful to apply, rarely needing more than two coats and sometimes only one. These are no different. Restless is shown here with two coats and one of seche vite, Urban Haze is shown here with two coats and no top coat. Both were delightlful to use, no issues whatsoever.

So, lets have a look, shall we? I feel a little bad as I pretty much spammed my Instagram with pics of Restless, but it's so amazingly reflective and beautiful, I couldn't help myself. I easily ended up with over a hundred pics that I had to sort through and narrow down, this shizz had me mesmerised!

Restless

There's really nothing I can say to fully express how rich this colour manages to be, and as I said, it's also ridiculously reflective which gives it a wonderful luminosity that I love. In the shade it has very delicate flakies which give it depth and complexity and there's also some scattered holo going on in there too, but all of it is so finely balanced that no one thing overwhelms the other. Hayley really does have a great eye for what works.

Restless

The second polish that I'd like to share with you is a much more sublte number called Urban Haze, a smokey olive holo that has very small gold flakes scattered throughout. This is very holographic in the sunlight, but I actually prefer it in the evening, where a colour shift seems to happen that sees the polish reveal a lovely metallic charcoal as shadow hits it.
I'm actually planning to wear this on Monday to my job interview as I think it's lovely whilst still being understated (my daughter was surprised by my choice- she's used to me rocking things like bright pink glitters 99% of the time haha).

Urban Haze

Again, flawless application, great coverage, beautiful polish. Then again, Emily De Molly is a master at producing top shelf lacquers, so that's hardly surprising.

Urban Haze

Emily De Molly is available in Australia through their big cartel shop and there is a list of international stockists here.
As I mentioned above, Emily De Molly was my first ever indie polish- I had never even heard of indie polish before seeing a swatch of her amazing Cosmic Forces- and the rest, as they say, is history.
I now own a ridiculous amount of polish, the vast majority of it Australian indie lacquers. As much of a pain as living in the arse end of the world can be, we sure as hell have some amazing polish makers :)

Anyway, I will be back soon with more goodies to share (and hopefully a damn job too) but, until then as always ~love and polish for all~

Em xox