Essie A Sweet Time Of Year Collection

I am not buying these, guys, so no swatches, but I did try them out today at Ulta. The Sweet Time of Year Collection is three polishes, a baby pink, a mint green, and a red. Same good Essie formula.

The pink is basically a French manicure color. It's a super sheer wash of baby pink. Reminded me a lot of their Yes We Can pink for Breast Cancer Awareness Month. It's not worth it, in my opinion. The red is a nice semi-opaque jelly. It's a kind of geranium petal red, very brash. It has a nice feeling to it though. One coat gives a jelly semi-translucence, two coats full coverage. The mint is a nice bluish mint green, and had it been a jelly I would have gotten it too. But it was a creme, so I passed. Ulta has these buy one at $8.00 get one 50% off, or you can wisely buy the mini pack at Transdesign, or the full bottles much cheaper.

Orly Once Upon a Time Collection!

I no sooner heard about this in an email than it was in my hot little hands! I can't find info on it anywhere on Orly's site, so I have no real information other than what it says on the box. It says "6 Pix from the Once Upon a Time Color Collection". So I don't know if there are more, if this is Fall or Winter, or what. "Once Upon a Time... Orly's collection of modern nail lacquer shades, inspired by the darkness and drama of classic fairy tale stories". Update: This is a Fall 2009 Collection that comes out in September!

The collection pretty much does bring out that feeling for me. It is a change from the brighter more jeweled colors and mattes being offered. It has a typical decent Orly formula, I had a few mishaps but nothing horrible. The colors are richly pigmented and except for Pixie Dust, were easily two coat perfect. It's a nice palette of cool tones, a chocolate brown creme, a medium red jelly, a light grey creme, a light bluish grey shimmer jelly, a dark bluish green fir tree colored creme, and a dark pomegranate with purple shimmer.

Prince Charming, a sort of melted chocolate ice cream colored creme. Not my idea of Prince Charming, but it meshes with the collection nicely. Manages not to look like poo.
Orly Prince Charming:


Mirror Mirror is a light grey creme that really floats my boat. Apparently I have a grey fetish where other people have a green fetish, I am coming to learn. That suits me just fine. I love this color. Reminds me of urban camo.
Orly Mirror Mirror:


Poison Apple is my least favorite. It is simply not apple colored, this is a tomato. It's a jelly on the opaque side. A richer candy apple red would have meshed better with this collection, IMO.
Orly Poison Apple:


Orly Enchanted Forest, a kind of dark, solid wall of foreboding blue green fir trees sort of creme. Well done!
Orly Enchanted Forest:


Pixie Dust is a bluish grey, almost denim. It's light, and it's a sheerish jelly. This was 4 coats, but you could do three, I probably only needed 4 on one nail. or you could do one for a sheerer look, which would also be pretty! It's got a ton of shimmer, I think it's very nice.
Orly Pixie Dust:


Happily Ever After is a juicy reddish purple with a darker purple shimmer. Very sexy, one of the best of the collection.
Orly Happily Ever After:


I hope I helped you make some decisions regarding this collection!

Zoya Matte Velvets - New Collection!

So now that I have a moment, let's talk about the new Zoya Mattes. There are three, one dark grey, Loredana, one black, Dovima, and one red, Posh.

The basics: these are thick, and start to dry FAST, like neons. LOAD your brush well, and do not hesitate. You can always clean afterwards. Slap that stuff on thick and do not go back and restroke polished areas! Just dive in. You can always remove and redo. One coat should be fine except for Loredana, which I found much thinner than Posh and Dovima. I needed two coats for Loredana.

Zoya instructions are to wear these polishes with no base or top coat. I will admit I DID use base coat in these pictures. My nails or too thin and ridgy not to. I had no loss of matte-riffic beauty. I have some matte topcoats coming in and will discuss if they are useful for these or not, but I did not use topcoat this time, shiny topcoat certainly would not work. I think they do not want polish slippage and problems from overlapping strokes, but I had pretty similar an experience with plain nail application and with base. Maybe be extra careful if you use base. This stuff is worth the extra time.

Dovima, the black, is gorgeous and so edgy. I think it's hot. I don't think you need to be Goth anymore to wear black nail polish, or even a rocker or metalhead. It's just cool, and would look great out on the town. Okay maybe not on Paris Hilton, but thank god for that anyway.

Zoya Dovima:



The grey is a nice dark grey, with a lot of texture. This required two coats, though your bottle may vary.

Zoya Loredana:



While I love the first two, I think Posh is the scene stealer here. It's a lovely deep wine red, and man this looks just like velvet. Red velvet. It has a shine that comes from below, like the shinier fabric that the velvet pile is based on, and it makes the whole nail look glowing and soft and deeply plush. I will need about four bottles of this, because what if I run out in 2023 or something???? God I love this.

Zoya Posh:


So there's the scoop. Use a bit of care and learn to work with this polish and you will be a knockout.

Update on Zoya Matte and Zoya Truth and Dare Collections!

I got chips of the Zoya Truth, Dare and Matte Collections yesterday!!




Let's start with Matte. Matte consists of three polishes, a black named Dovima, a grey named Loredana, and a dark red named Posh. The colors are rich and should make lovely mattes. They have a velvet appearance in the chips. They come out on July 1, so not a long wait for these! I will soon, I am sure, have real swatches on nails to show you! These are meant to be worn without base or topcoat. Now I am not happy about the base idea, but I will experiment with these when I get them and give you the rundown. Zoya says these will have less staying power, not having base or top coat and a different formula. This is to be expected and I see no problem with it.


Zoya Dovima:


Zoya Loredana:


Zoya Posh:


On to the Truth and Dare Fall 2009 Collections. Truth is a set of six warm colors that range from a gold with a bit of orange, through orangey reds, to blue reds, to pink. These are jewel tones, not pastels, or runway weirdness, or chalky. These are shiny, rich, deep colors in glowing shades. Chips can only tell us so much, but I am not expecting to be disappointed with these! These come out July 15, with the Dare Collection.


The Dare Collection is six cremes in darker shade which also appear to be jewel tone, from red, through reddish purple, to green to dark blue. the dark blue, Ibiza, has a "subtle shimmer". I think it will probably be like the shimmer in some of the reds, it matches the tone so enhances the color rather than making the nail appear to be sparkly. Once again, only so much from chips, but these look exciting and I expect to have bottles soon and believe me will photograph them six ways to Sunday! These come out July 15!! Start saving up now!!

Butter London - I'd Rather Have Sour Cream.

I got gifted the Butter London Fashionista's Favourites Spring/Summer 2009 Collection, thanks to the lovely Rebecca. She did it not as a favor, rather as a punishment. I shan't be telling you what she called them.



This collection, five polishes, one ashy bronze shimmer, four cremes in lilac, red, sun yellow, and sky blue, is within the boundaries of recent color trends, the blue resembles somewhat Essie's Shelter Island, the lilac Zoya's Malia, the bronze MAC's Mercenary. So while I am not gushing over the colors, they are pretty if not mind-grabbing. The blue is pretty but has been done before, the red is banal, the bronze is nice but not great, and the lilac is lovely but been done also. I think the standout is the nice yellow, Cheeky Chops. It's a sun yellow, not a mustard, not a neon, not a butter. It's not even lemon. It's different and therefore pleasing.

The BIG problem with these is the DISGUSTING FORMULA. Hot ass and Cheetos this formula is awful!!! Okay the shimmer is fine, if a bit watery, Just be careful with it and you should be able to control it okay. But the cremes! Take them from my sight and let them be lashed with thistles and cast into darkness (Sorry, reading the Bible for a class and I feel a bit unctuous). This is like half dried white glue. Copious amounts of polish thinner did little other than make it spread more like fresher glue. Only the red, after I added 25 drops of thinner to a brand new bottle, spread decently. I would not buy this polish, especially at its price, if this is what I got. Only a color that was absolutely stunning would get my cash. Oh and a final insult - the top is hard to put back on.

One positive note - this polish set quickly. After applying my second coat of red, the doorbell rang, and after getting my keys, a package, and inadvertently getting my fingers in a cat's face, my nails only had one tiny blemish. Nice!

And just an opinion, forget about runway trends in your nail polish collections, companies. Give us good colors, set your own trends. The fashion world and its bizarrities and seasons should not affect you. Let them come to you for inspiration, not the other way around. I'll still be using your best colors long after this season's hottest purse is on eBay because someone grabbed it then used it twice.

Butter London Artful Dodger:


Butter London The Old Bill:


Butter London Blowing Raspberries:


Butter London Cheeky Chops:


Butter London Muggins:



Tyler Durden's opinion of Butter London Spring/Summer 2009 Collection:
Bob had bitch tits.