Sparkly With A Spike

I have no idea what to call these nails, or how to describe them!  

Recently I've been consciously trying to NOT use Barry M polishes, because I'm aware that I use Barry M far more often than any other brands.  So a couple of days ago I painted my nails using Tami Gleneagles Glamour, which is a really pretty rose gold with holo glitter.  I then thought it was a bit boring, so I freehanded a black line and a bit of a curve round the cuticle... using a Barry M nail art pen!  Oops.

I really liked how these looked, but I don't think my colleagues were very impressed. Several people said things along the lines of "oh... they're... different. I loved the ones you had on yesterday though!"  

Oh well, I don't care. I liked them.

SCOTTISH Nail Polish! New Brand Review - Tami Beauty

Oops! I haven't posted since before Christmas, sorry! I wasn't in the mood for nails particularly for a couple of weeks, and then last week I had a really nasty nail break so my left hand looked quite unpleasant. I'm still missing a big chunk of nail on my middle finger, but at least it's not too awful now.

Anyway, I was contacted recently to ask if I'd like to review a new polish brand, and I was particularly excited to see that they're Scottish! I'm not Scottish my self, and I don't live there now, but I was at uni in Dundee and spent 4 very happy years living there. 

Tami Beauty is a new brand, and they sent me all three of their colours to try out. 

Don't they look pretty? Left to right, here are Gleneagles Glamour, Lady of Lomond and Skibo Sunset.

Check out their website here.  Tami polishes are 3-free, and are not tested on animals in any way. 

I tried Lady of Lomond over new year, before I had my broken nail. 

This is a pale green polish with lots of holo particles and tiny glitter. 

This is two coats, with topcoat. The formula is nice - a little runny, and dragged a couple of bare patches on the first coat, but the second coat was perfect.  This dries slightly matte, so I added topcoat to smooth it and add shine. The brush is nice - fairly short and slim, and easy to control.

Isn't this pretty? I wore this for three days, and the wear was excellent. There was no chipping, peeling, shrinkage or anything else. Removal was a little tricky as the glitter was pretty solidly fixed, but it was nothing that the foil method couldn't solve. 

Next up was Gleneagles Glamour, which is a pale nude-pink with the same holo and glitter as Lady of Lomond. The formula seemed slightly better, as I didn't get the dragged patches. 

This again is two coats, with topcoat.

I really like how this one looks. It's sparkly and pretty, without being OTT, and I think would be work-appropriate as well as very pretty.

It's such a pretty, delicate polish, don't you think? You can see the rose-gold glitter particles there, which make it a really flattering shade.

The last of the three is Skibo Sunset. This one is a bright cerise pink holo. It doesn't have the glitter particles of the other two, and dries with a shinier finish. 

This is two coats, with topcoat. Again, the application was really good, and the polish dried quickly.  This is the least unique of the three shades, but it's really pretty, especially in bright light, where the holo is more visible. 

Isn't it lovely?

I really liked all three of these polishes. The formula is good, application is nice, the brush is the sort I like best.  They are available on the Tami website for £9 each, or £21 for the set. I think the £9 price is perhaps a little steep for a new brand, when you compare it to brands like Nails Inc or China Glaze, but then again it's a small company and I can understand why production costs more. And the polishes are really really nice, so it's a big thumbs up from me! I'm looking forward to seeing what their next colours are going to be. 



These polishes were provided for my honest review. See my Disclaimer section for more information.




 


 

Pink and Blue Holo with Metal Studs

Recently I was sent this set of beatiful studs from the Born Pretty Store to review.  Aren't they gorgeous?

This is a set of very shiny metallic studs in circles and oval shapes, in a variety of bright colours. See here for the details on the store website, where they cost $2.32 for this pack.  

I decided to wear these with some of my favourite holographic polish. I used Jade Deja Vu and Jade Mystic Gold, and then stuck on the studs using topcoat.  

The studs themselves are light, and have a flat back. Because they are quite large, I bent the oval ones slightly by bending them round a pen, so that they lie flush on my nails. This was really easy to do, and makes them lie on the nail much more easily. 

I think these studs are pretty fantastic, and they're even better paired with a sparkly holo polish. They looked amazing in the sunshine!

If you fancy trying out these, you can get an extra 10% off using my discount code. 

I received this product for review purposes, but words and opinions are entirely my own. I do not receive anything if you use my discount code, although when it's been used ten times, BPS will let me host a giveaway for my readers! See my Disclosure page for more details.



 

 

Jade Vermelho Surreal - Red Holo

I have shown you this polish on my blog before, but it was years ago, and my nails and photography weren't great. So here it is again. 

This is Jade Holografico in Vermelho Surreal. It's a gorgeous tomato-red linear holo. 

This is two coats, with no topcoat.

I wore this on its own last week for a couple of days, and then with stamping over it (see here). 

The Jade holos are beautiful (I have several) and the formula is so nice. I bought mine at Sally Magpies, which if you're a UK-based nail varnish fan, is a shop you NEED to know about. 

Born Pretty Stamping Plate 21

I had a very exciting delivery yesterday of FIVE new Born Pretty Store stamping plates. They all look fab, but I thought I'd start with BP-21, which has 4 geometric designs. The Born Pretty Store plates look like the traditional plates you get from many designers - small round discs about 2 inches across. 

This one has 4 designs which stamp like this. The designs stamped really well. I sometimes find that very detailed fine patterns like the one on the bottom left can get a bit smeary or blurry, but this transferred really well. 

I decided to stamp using the circle design, over the polish I was already wearing, Jade Holografico Vermelho Surreal.   

I stamped using Models Own Chrome Gold. 

Doesn't this look fab? I really like the design of this stamp, and it stamped really clearly.  I can't wait to try the other designs and the other plates.   You can buy this plate on the Born Pretty Store website here, for $2.99 and you can get 10% off any order using my discount code.

  This stamping plate was provided for honest review. See my Disclaimer section for more details.

Orly Color Blast Amber Luxe Shimmer, with Gold Holo Stamping

I bought this orange polish a while ago now, but hadn't got round to wearing it. I saw a new display in a large Boots in Sheffield - everything looked fantastic! I ended up buying three. I think these were £9.50 each. 

This is Amber Luxe Shimmer. 

This is three coats, with topcoat. Whilst the end result is pretty stunning, and I do like the effect (glowy shimmery orange, it's right up my street!) I don't think I'm particularly impressed with this.  Application is tricky; the first coat is very streaky, and this dries so quickly that it wasn't easy to get a totally smooth finish. The second coat made parts of the nail opaque, and parts still really sheer, so the application is also quite patchy. 

This is really pretty, but I don't think it's nearly as good as OPI Take the Stage, or China Glaze Riveting or Bend Over Backwards, which all look similar but have much better formulas. As you can see, there's also a really interesting greenish gold duochrome appearance in parts of the bottle too, but that doesn't translate to the nail. 

I then decided to stamp over this using the lovely gold holo from the other day, Freckles Polish Kicking Up Leaves (see swatches here) and MoYou London Mother Nature plate 02.  

The contrast isn't particularly pronounced, but I think this makes a really pretty finished effect as it's quite subtle.  I found this almost impossible to photograph clearly.

What do you think?   

Freckles Polish - Kicking Up Leaves

You may remember that I posted recently about winning a couple of prizes in the Digit-al Dozen giveaway. I posted about one of my prizes, Laquerdaisical Jaffa Fake, here.  Tonight I'm showing you the other!  I won a polish of my choice from Freckles Polish, plus a matching pendant!

Freckles Polish is a UK indie brand, made by Julieann, and can be found on her Etsy shop here. She has some gorgeous colours, but I chose this beautiful brownish gold holo called Kicking Up Leaves. 

Kicking Up Leaves is a stunner! This is two coats, with topcoat.  Application was perfect, and it dried easily.  

Isn't it lovely? So perfectly autumnal. In general office light it looks like a nice tasteful, natural colour, but then in sunlight or more direct light, it really comes alive with the linear holo particles. 

I like this so much! I've worn it for two days running as well, and it still looks perfect. No chips or peels or tip wear or anything.

The necklace is really nice too. It's more ornate than the things I usually wear, but I think that works really well with the colour. 

 

If you haven't already entered my birthday giveaway, you can do so here - entries are open for another week. 

 
 
    

Colour Me Crazy! Green Week - A-England Dragon

I have just about managed to post this one in time! The British Nail Bloggers Colour Me Crazy challenge is up to week 4, Green.

I received the STUNNING A-England Dragon in my recent swap with Ananka, and knew I wanted to use this for green week. Although it's a stunning polish on its own, I decided to try it out for stamping!

I started with a base of MoYou London Spring Green (this is a stamping polish, but applied superbly as an all-over colour) and then stamped over it using Dragon and MoYou London Mother Nature plate 11. 

I love the way this came out!

The holo in Dragon is most effective outside in sunshine, but it's actually a bit overcast today, so the photos don't look as amazing as this actually looked in the sunshine this morning. Oh well!  

Check out the rest of the British Nail Bloggers' contributions to Green Week here:

An InLinkz Link-up

Born Pretty Store Circle Glitters - Gold and Black

I was so excited to receive these glitters from the Born Pretty Store! I mean - just LOOK at them!!

This item (#4625) is a set of 12 different colours of round glitters, measuring approximately 2mm across. Each colour comes in its own little pot with a screw cap, and all 12 come in a neat little box with a lid, which keeps it all very tidy.

For a first try with these, I painted my nails with three coats of Jade Mystic Gold, a fabulous gold holo which I bought from the wonderful Sally Magpies store. I love this gold polish!  I then painted my ring fingers black using (surprise surprise!) Rimmel Black Out. Then I got busy with my wax pencil and some topcoat, and covered the black with the gold glitters.

This glitter is thin and smooth, so lies really flat on the nail. The gold is SOOOO sparkly! It's really hard to capture the range of holo sparkle in there - as I move my fingers around in the light, my nails are like a mini mirror ball!

I absolutely love these! While I've tried hexagonal glitter/glequins previously, I was really frustrated that I couldn't see well enough to line them up exactly evenly and all facing the same way. The organised part of me HATED seeing them not placed right! So these circular glequins are much better!

I'm bursting with ideas at the moment for using the other colours!

This set sells on the Born Pretty Store for $7.60, which is a little pricier than some of the other items I've tried. However, that works out at 63 cents per pot, which makes you realise how bargainously cheap that is!   

You can buy these and many other shapes and sizes of glitter on the Born Pretty Store site, and of course you can use my discount code for 10% off.

























I received this product for review purposes, but words and opinions are entirely my own. I do not receive anything if you use my discount code, although when it's been used ten times, BPS will let me host a giveaway for my readers! See my Disclosure page for more details.

Jade Holografico - Deja Vu

This is the last of my lovely Jade Holograficos which I splurged on from the fab Sally Magpies this month.  This is Deja Vu, the pink one.


Like the others, this applies well and dries fairly quickly. I like the brush - it's small and neat and doesn't leave me with polish all over my cuticles, which some of the wider brushes do. 


In indirect light, this is a pretty bright pink colour. In bright light, like the other holos, it goes bananas and shows a spectrum of colours in the holo. 

I think I like this more than the black one (Magia Negra) but possibly not as much as the red and gold ones!