Wednesday, August 31, 2011

So Sorry

I have been having some health issues lately and then the beginning of school for my son, so I haven't had a lot of free time to post swatches etc.  I apologize for that.  I have plenty of swatches to post, just haven't been able to post them. 

In my last post I showed you Essie French Affair, and today I am going to show you another color from this collection.  For your viewing and informational pleasure I present Essie Nice is Nice.

 This color is the reason I bought this mini set, it was a nice light lavender for Easter and I couldn't beat the price.
sun-ish, this washes the color out slightly, it definitely has more purple to it, the shaded parts are more true
Nice is Nice is a light/soft lavender color perfect for Spring and/or Easter.  Unfortunately, the formula and application on this was the same as with the other Essie polishes I have been swatching.  That is, it appears to be ok in the bottle, not gloopy or too runny, but when it comes to actually getting it onto the nail it wants to streak on the first coast and then not self-level on the second.  For a brand that costs as much as Essie does, I would definitely expect better application.  The color is spot-on for a Spring collection, but nothing that is terribly unique or original.  Until nest time, thanks for reading.

Wednesday, August 3, 2011

Pink Wednesday - Essie French Affair

It's Wednesday which means it's time for pink polish.  Today I have for you Essie French Affair, which is the namesake polish of Essie's Spring 2011 French Affair collection.  I got this polish as part of one of Essie's mini sets, 4 mini bottles from a particular collection.  I was looking for a nice pastel purple for Easter, and this just came along in the collection.  I probably would never have bought it except the set was on clearance at Beauty Brands so I got it 50% off.

Bottle in the shade, the sun picture washed it out too much.
French Affair is what I would call a petal pink, almost bubblegum but leaning very slightly lavender.  A dusty Barbie pink, all in all a very pretty color, I got a few compliments from complete strangers on this color.

Sun

shade
The swatches are a base of Seche Retain, two coats of polish and a top of Seche Vite.  The formula on this one was ok, I seem to be having issues with almost all of Essie's polishes in terms of formula.  It wants to pull and streak on the first coat, and the the second coat doesn't want to self-level very well unless you put it on really thick, which leads to dry time issues.  The polish itself seemed of a good consistency coming out of the bottle i.e. didn't seem really thick and gloopy thus requiring thinning or really thin and runny.  It was a good consistency which is why I was surprised that it gave me so much trouble in application.  Unfortunately this seemed to be a going trend with all of the Essie polishes I have swatched recently.  It won't keep me from using the colors I really like, but it was a bit frustrating.

And since I never seem to be able to leave good enough alone, I present to you, for your viewing pleasure, the Essie French Affair funky french.

shade 
For this I just added Orly Butterflies to the tips and another coat of Seche Vite.  You can see a little bit of shrinkage on the end of my pinky finger, but it's not really noticeable without the macro setting on my camera.

So there you have it, Essie French Affair and a funky french with Orly Butterflies to close out another Pink Wednesday.  I should have the other three colors I have of the French Affair collection posted in the coming days, stay tuned.  Until next time, thanks for stopping by.