Essie Braziliant

Hi guys, I have here for you Essie’s Summer 2011 collection, the counterpart to their Resort 2011 collection recently. This is a six piece collection featuring really hot colors– and I mean they are hot! 😉 Most of them have hidden shimmers, and FOUR polishes are in the red-coral-pink family! I guess I’m okay with that because… Great pedicure colors. That said, I need to do my toenails sometime soon. I’ve been so lazy about it- they have been naked for about a month!

Before we start, let me tell you- my camera hates bright colors, so the pics are a bit crazy but they’re color accurate for the most part, at least on my monitor.

Formula was flawless, a la Essie. Two coats for all. Great names!

First up is Super Bossa Nova. It’s a hot pink with a great shimmer.

Smooth Sailing. The love of many nail bloggers. As you can see mine bubbled a bit, but that may just have been due to rough handling. Yes, I said rough handling. My bottles get dropped a lot and jostled around.

This is lovely, though. These two pictures above pull a tad too blue. It’s a perfect periwinkle, I think, with light blue flecks running through.

Too Too Hot. OMG My camera hated this! It’s a hot red creme. I like to put the crazy colors on my toes because everything looks good down there! (What she said LOL)

Meet Me At Sunset. What’s up? Burnt orange creme. Or is that called burnt sienna??

THIS is the most color accurate.

Absolutely Shore. Pale seafoam green. The bottle I had was a streak fest =\

I need to revisit this one and see if I love it. So far it looks like a leave it.

Finally, the namesake of the collection! Braziliant is one I really like, too. It’s a hot orange with a great shimmer.

Check out that awesome shimmer 🙂

What did you guys think? Will you be grabbing any? Or leaving it? I saw these at Target!

Essie Braziliant

Hi guys, I have here for you Essie’s Summer 2011 collection, the counterpart to their Resort 2011 collection recently. This is a six piece collection featuring really hot colors– and I mean they are hot! 😉 Most of them have hidden shimmers, and FOUR polishes are in the red-coral-pink family! I guess I’m okay with that because… Great pedicure colors. That said, I need to do my toenails sometime soon. I’ve been so lazy about it- they have been naked for about a month!

Before we start, let me tell you- my camera hates bright colors, so the pics are a bit crazy but they’re color accurate for the most part, at least on my monitor.

Formula was flawless, a la Essie. Two coats for all. Great names!

First up is Super Bossa Nova. It’s a hot pink with a great shimmer.

Smooth Sailing. The love of many nail bloggers. As you can see mine bubbled a bit, but that may just have been due to rough handling. Yes, I said rough handling. My bottles get dropped a lot and jostled around.

This is lovely, though. These two pictures above pull a tad too blue. It’s a perfect periwinkle, I think, with light blue flecks running through.

Too Too Hot. OMG My camera hated this! It’s a hot red creme. I like to put the crazy colors on my toes because everything looks good down there! (What she said LOL)

Meet Me At Sunset. What’s up? Burnt orange creme. Or is that called burnt sienna??

THIS is the most color accurate.

Absolutely Shore. Pale seafoam green. The bottle I had was a streak fest =\

I need to revisit this one and see if I love it. So far it looks like a leave it.

Finally, the namesake of the collection! Braziliant is one I really like, too. It’s a hot orange with a great shimmer.

Check out that awesome shimmer 🙂

What did you guys think? Will you be grabbing any? Or leaving it? I saw these at Target!

Milani NEON

Hi guys, a drugstore collection for y’all this time! I see them all over. They’re Milani’s Neons. I think I may be missing a few, pretty sure I’m missing a red. Do you know which ones? I’m not sure myself. I could look it up, but I’m lazy. I only have six here for you.

These polishes are kind of sheer, especially the red-pink-purple ones. Like most neons, a bit of them dry semi matte/end up having a plastic finish. I applied at least two coats, and for the sheer polishes they had three coats. I didn’t wait for them to dry before photographing because as you know I like to move on when I’m swatching, but some of them dried quickly enough for photographing.

Pink Rocks. Three coats, still slightly opaque. You can see the semi matte/plastic finish a bit here.

Dude Blue. I love this one.

Rad Purple. I was NOT a fan. Sadly. It looked just like grape juice, and this was three coats. 😦

Pink Hottie. Looking for a hot Barbie pink? This is it.

Awesome Orange

Fresh Teal. Teals are hard to photograph, and this one was no exception however it pulled strongly on the blue side. This photograph is pretty color accurate, despite the crazy skin color. I liked this one too 🙂

Milani NEON

Hi guys, a drugstore collection for y’all this time! I see them all over. They’re Milani’s Neons. I think I may be missing a few, pretty sure I’m missing a red. Do you know which ones? I’m not sure myself. I could look it up, but I’m lazy. I only have six here for you.

These polishes are kind of sheer, especially the red-pink-purple ones. Like most neons, a bit of them dry semi matte/end up having a plastic finish. I applied at least two coats, and for the sheer polishes they had three coats. I didn’t wait for them to dry before photographing because as you know I like to move on when I’m swatching, but some of them dried quickly enough for photographing.

Pink Rocks. Three coats, still slightly opaque. You can see the semi matte/plastic finish a bit here.

Dude Blue. I love this one.

Rad Purple. I was NOT a fan. Sadly. It looked just like grape juice, and this was three coats. 😦

Pink Hottie. Looking for a hot Barbie pink? This is it.

Awesome Orange

Fresh Teal. Teals are hard to photograph, and this one was no exception however it pulled strongly on the blue side. This photograph is pretty color accurate, despite the crazy skin color. I liked this one too 🙂

Essie Resort 2011

Hi guys, I come to you with Essie Resort 2011 collection. You might have seen them at other blogs already, but I like this collection. I usually like everything Essie does, although I wish they would include a bit of more variety in their collections. There is often two or three shades of red/pink/orange. I guess it’s a color they do well 😉
This is a four piece collection with far muted colors than its sister collection, Braziliant. It really does remind me of a safari theme, I love it.
Formula was great, all opaque within two coats. I also love the names 🙂

From left to right: Fair Game, Your Hut or Mine?, Da Bush, Lion Around.

LET’S START WITH MY FAVORITE:

Fair Game! I looooove this color omg. It’s such a beautiful smoky shimmery silvery grey! Holy adjectives batman.

An excellent closeup. If this had a green flash, I think it could have been a dupe for Chanel’s Black Pearl (which I still covet.. le sigh). This does satisfy my lemming for Black Pearl in a way, but not my lemming to own a real Chanel polish 😀

Your Hut or Mine? It’s a coral, with a shimmer– but this coral leans towards a “dark hot pink” (wow oxymoron much?).

The shimmer is like a pale gold. I’m not sure what but it’s lovely. Very thick formula o.O

Da Bush. This is a sister to OPI’s Stranger Tides, and a lot of people find this more suitable for their skin. Myself I like both, but I should do a personal comparison to see which looks better on me. I’m a severe hoarder though and may just keep both 😀

Lion Around
It’s a pale mauve neutral with a shimmer. It almost mannequin’d my hands but not really. This is also my least favorite, but maybe I need to go revisit it and see what’s the matter with it.

Essie Resort 2011

Hi guys, I come to you with Essie Resort 2011 collection. You might have seen them at other blogs already, but I like this collection. I usually like everything Essie does, although I wish they would include a bit of more variety in their collections. There is often two or three shades of red/pink/orange. I guess it’s a color they do well 😉
This is a four piece collection with far muted colors than its sister collection, Braziliant. It really does remind me of a safari theme, I love it.
Formula was great, all opaque within two coats. I also love the names 🙂

From left to right: Fair Game, Your Hut or Mine?, Da Bush, Lion Around.

LET’S START WITH MY FAVORITE:

Fair Game! I looooove this color omg. It’s such a beautiful smoky shimmery silvery grey! Holy adjectives batman.

An excellent closeup. If this had a green flash, I think it could have been a dupe for Chanel’s Black Pearl (which I still covet.. le sigh). This does satisfy my lemming for Black Pearl in a way, but not my lemming to own a real Chanel polish 😀

Your Hut or Mine? It’s a coral, with a shimmer– but this coral leans towards a “dark hot pink” (wow oxymoron much?).

The shimmer is like a pale gold. I’m not sure what but it’s lovely. Very thick formula o.O

Da Bush. This is a sister to OPI’s Stranger Tides, and a lot of people find this more suitable for their skin. Myself I like both, but I should do a personal comparison to see which looks better on me. I’m a severe hoarder though and may just keep both 😀

Lion Around
It’s a pale mauve neutral with a shimmer. It almost mannequin’d my hands but not really. This is also my least favorite, but maybe I need to go revisit it and see what’s the matter with it.

China Glaze Tronica

Yep another Spring 2011 collection we’re visiting now! 😛 There was incredible hype about this collection but it is largely inaccessible online. I had to have my awesome cousin hook me up with them! They were released in only Sally’s I think, or something like that.

It’s supposed to imitate the beloved OMG/Kaleidoscope collections from 2006, but when people found out it was going to be scattered holo a lot us were upset. After swatching them in sunlight, I can say there’s a decent amount of holo. A few colors don’t quite have it, but a lot have some holographic goodness in them and I’m satisfied. 😀

Onward to the swatches! I don’t have much to say about them except that they were quick drying, formula was fine by me, and it was two layers for all of them. I didn’t need to use an Aqua Base or anything like that. They weren’t as delicate as normal holographic polish would be. I love almost all of them! There are 12 polishes total.

This one is just highly reflective but not quite holo as the others.

Formula was thin for this one and I got a bit of cuticle drag.

This was a lovely tan holo!

This just looked like sand– not holo at all. This is in direct sunlight!

This had the same situation as Digital Dawn. It had a strong reflective shimmer, but it reflected slightly silver. Not holo.

My favorite. Of course 😉

China Glaze Tronica

Yep another Spring 2011 collection we’re visiting now! 😛 There was incredible hype about this collection but it is largely inaccessible online. I had to have my awesome cousin hook me up with them! They were released in only Sally’s I think, or something like that.

It’s supposed to imitate the beloved OMG/Kaleidoscope collections from 2006, but when people found out it was going to be scattered holo a lot us were upset. After swatching them in sunlight, I can say there’s a decent amount of holo. A few colors don’t quite have it, but a lot have some holographic goodness in them and I’m satisfied. 😀

Onward to the swatches! I don’t have much to say about them except that they were quick drying, formula was fine by me, and it was two layers for all of them. I didn’t need to use an Aqua Base or anything like that. They weren’t as delicate as normal holographic polish would be. I love almost all of them! There are 12 polishes total.

This one is just highly reflective but not quite holo as the others.

Formula was thin for this one and I got a bit of cuticle drag.

This was a lovely tan holo!

This just looked like sand– not holo at all. This is in direct sunlight!

This had the same situation as Digital Dawn. It had a strong reflective shimmer, but it reflected slightly silver. Not holo.

My favorite. Of course 😉

Nubar Spring Garden

A Spring collection in June?! I know 😛 I told you I was behind!

Without much ado, here is the collection! All of them, except Honeysuckle have a hidden silvery shimmer that’s lovely. It has your usual pinks, whites, greens, purples but with a much more murkier depth. I do like this collection 🙂 It’s an 8 piece collection accompanied with a glitter topcoat called Dewdrop.
I love Nubar’s formula even though I don’t use their polishes enough. I like the brush handle, the brush itself, and their formula 🙂 All were opaque by two coats, and Dewdrop was applied with one coat to all.

Dewdrop is a sheer polish, and impossible to become opaque because of its glittery nature. It’s packed full of gritty pastel colored round glitter and would need a topcoat to smooth things out. I did not apply a topcoat in this collection because 1) I don’t when I’m doing swatches and 2) I was on a swatching roll.
I found that Dewdrop looked best with more bolder colored polishes. With the dusty colors in this collection, a bit of them just looked gritty and dirty– not in a good way.

I will begin with the creme by itself, and then a picture of it with Dewdrop. I have all of them except for some reason, this one:

Baby Sprout
It’s not your usual mint green that you see in Spring collections. This is a murky, light pea color.
I forgot to take a picture/apply Dewdrop so no Dewdrop picture for this one. Use your imagination 🙂

Purple Aster
It’s a dusty mauve lavender, and you can see its shimmer here. This one was okay, I usually love purples and everything else in its spectrum but I didn’t go nuts over this.

Earthen is a murky pale grey. To think of it, I wonder how this compares to Skulls and Glossbones by OPI. Hah! I like this one more, I think, it’s an interesting neutral.

Not a fan of Dewdrop over Earthen.

Pink Lily
I brought this one home with me. I love it, it’s a perfect pastel pink with a shimmer.

I’m sorry about the lighting change, lol. This is more accurate to the bottle color, however. And now you see how flattering Dewdrop can be.

Yellow Primrose
A pale pastel yellow, could be mistaken for white.

Reminds me of Easter. I also like this combination a lot. =)

Blue Hydrangea
Baby blue pastel. Reminds me a bit of Essie’s Borrowed & Blue– in fact, I wonder if anyone could do a comparison? I don’t have this one home with me. 😦

You see a lot of the yellow glitter here.

This is a perfect white! It’s off-white, but not yellow to the point where it’s ivory. A lot of white polish tends to be streaky or runny but not this one. It makes my eyes hurt looking at it and trying to figure out what makes it “not white”. Haha =P

White Peony also is a good base to show all the colors of the glitter in Dewdrop =)

Honeysuckle
MY FAVORITE! I don’t like a lot of pinks, but this is a GREAT color. It’s so beautiful! It’s also a true creme, unlike the other 7 polishes. I have worn this twice, and that is unusual for me. 🙂

with Dewdrop. I have to say I like this by itself, but it also looks good with this topcoat.

Nubar Spring Garden

A Spring collection in June?! I know 😛 I told you I was behind!

Without much ado, here is the collection! All of them, except Honeysuckle have a hidden silvery shimmer that’s lovely. It has your usual pinks, whites, greens, purples but with a much more murkier depth. I do like this collection 🙂 It’s an 8 piece collection accompanied with a glitter topcoat called Dewdrop.
I love Nubar’s formula even though I don’t use their polishes enough. I like the brush handle, the brush itself, and their formula 🙂 All were opaque by two coats, and Dewdrop was applied with one coat to all.

Dewdrop is a sheer polish, and impossible to become opaque because of its glittery nature. It’s packed full of gritty pastel colored round glitter and would need a topcoat to smooth things out. I did not apply a topcoat in this collection because 1) I don’t when I’m doing swatches and 2) I was on a swatching roll.
I found that Dewdrop looked best with more bolder colored polishes. With the dusty colors in this collection, a bit of them just looked gritty and dirty– not in a good way.

I will begin with the creme by itself, and then a picture of it with Dewdrop. I have all of them except for some reason, this one:

Baby Sprout
It’s not your usual mint green that you see in Spring collections. This is a murky, light pea color.
I forgot to take a picture/apply Dewdrop so no Dewdrop picture for this one. Use your imagination 🙂

Purple Aster
It’s a dusty mauve lavender, and you can see its shimmer here. This one was okay, I usually love purples and everything else in its spectrum but I didn’t go nuts over this.

Earthen is a murky pale grey. To think of it, I wonder how this compares to Skulls and Glossbones by OPI. Hah! I like this one more, I think, it’s an interesting neutral.

Not a fan of Dewdrop over Earthen.

Pink Lily
I brought this one home with me. I love it, it’s a perfect pastel pink with a shimmer.

I’m sorry about the lighting change, lol. This is more accurate to the bottle color, however. And now you see how flattering Dewdrop can be.

Yellow Primrose
A pale pastel yellow, could be mistaken for white.

Reminds me of Easter. I also like this combination a lot. =)

Blue Hydrangea
Baby blue pastel. Reminds me a bit of Essie’s Borrowed & Blue– in fact, I wonder if anyone could do a comparison? I don’t have this one home with me. 😦

You see a lot of the yellow glitter here.

This is a perfect white! It’s off-white, but not yellow to the point where it’s ivory. A lot of white polish tends to be streaky or runny but not this one. It makes my eyes hurt looking at it and trying to figure out what makes it “not white”. Haha =P

White Peony also is a good base to show all the colors of the glitter in Dewdrop =)

Honeysuckle
MY FAVORITE! I don’t like a lot of pinks, but this is a GREAT color. It’s so beautiful! It’s also a true creme, unlike the other 7 polishes. I have worn this twice, and that is unusual for me. 🙂

with Dewdrop. I have to say I like this by itself, but it also looks good with this topcoat.