New Nail Polish Shades including Catrice Cosmetics Genius in a Bottle

Hello everyone :)

I know I keep saying this is NOT just a nail polish blog but it sure looks like it for now :P

Just wanted to share with you a couple of new nail polish shades I got from Catrice mainly these past weeks.

I added another shade or 2 to my summer bright colours as you can see in the pics below. I also got 2 shades from the Catrice Big City Life collection which is actually a winter 2011 collection if I am not mistaken but I liked 2 of the shades so I got them anyway ;) I also got a bright orange shade from Inglot and the duochrome nail polish shade from Catrice which is said to be a dupe for a very famout Chanel shade ;) check out the pics and description below. Let me know what you think!

Catrice Ultimate Nail Lacquer shades:
Left: 820 Pimp My Shrimp - New shade with the new wide tapered brush like the brush on their Ultimate Nudes collection
Right: 030 Meet Me At Coral Island - a previous shade with the previous regular brush.
As you can see, Pimp my Shrimp is slightly more on the orange side of coral while Coral Island is slightly more on the pink side. See below for side by side swatches. They both apply nicely, but require at least 2 coats for a good opaque look.

2 shades from the Big City Life collection.
Left: C04 New York - a pretty powdered blue creme colour. Comes with the regular brush since they were out in 2011 probably. I like the imagery on the bottle... with some of the famous New York landmarks and the NY skyline :)
Right: C01 London: kind of a banana yellow shade with slight shimmer in it. Good colour payoff but requires 2 coats of good opacity too. Comes with the regular brush too and has some London landmarks on it too ;) These 2 shades are of course limited edition since they are from a specific collection but they are still available at least locally in Malta.

Here you can see my bright yellow/orange/coral shades. I was not a fan of bright warm shades such as these until last summer so I'm still working on my collection.
From LtoR: Catrice Big City Life London, Inglot 949 (bright orange with a hint of shimmer - new 2012 colour), Catrice Pimp My Shrimp, Catrice Meet Me At Coral Island, OPI I'm His Coral Friend (SUNBelievable collection 2011).

Here you can see all previous 5 bright shades swatched on each nail with 2-3 coats on each. As you can see Catrice Pimp my Shrim and Meet me at Coral Island are very similar when swatched but Pimp my Shrimp is a teeny bit more on the orangy side.

The lovely Catrice duochrome shade in Genius in a Bottle 840. I saw this shade and did not buy it but I had to go back and get it! Have to admit the duochrome effect is not as evident on the nails.What do you think? I later found out it is an exact dupe of the Chanel Le Vernis Peridot 531 which costs considerably more!!

Catrice Genius in a Bottle in the sun and swatched. Comes with the new wider/denser and tapered brush since it is a new shade. Applies very smoothly with no streaking and gives good coverage with just one coat but I went for 2 coats anyway! No chipping so far for 2 days with base and top coat as always.

Catrice Genius in a Bottle side by side with OPI Rally Pretty Pink (OPI Serena Williams Glam Slam France duo collection - came with red shatter) which is my other duochrome polish which changes from a pinky purple to a pretty golden bronzy shade.

Just FYI. Locally Catrice nail lacquers retail for I belive round €2.40 while the limited edition ones were for €2.80. Inglot shades retail for €11 locally but I got mine half price during a promotion. OPI shades retail for around €11 euro locally too I believe but I get mine online and usually they cost me a little bit less.

UPDATED Catrice Cosmetics - Ultimate Nudes Nail Polish Review with pics + 1 week of wear photo

Hello everyone :)

Finally writing a blog post! It has been AGES! It so happens to be another nail polish review! I promise, my blog will not be about nail polishes only! For the time being however, I did want to share this review with you as I was quite pleasantly surprised with these Catrice Cosmetics nail polishes which I purchased this weekend.

I bought 3 Catrice Nail Polish shades, two Ultimate Nudes and one from the Ultimate Nail Lacquer range. The Ultimate Nudes shades have a new brush which I will be talking about. The shades I  got are:
Ultimate Nudes: 090 Karl Says Tres Chic and 050 Moulin Rouge Light
Ultimate Nail Lacquer range: 030 Meet Me At Coral Island

First off... I like the names... as you know, if you read my previous posts, I love OPI nail polishes and love their names... it seems the idea is catching on, Catrice nail polishes have some interesting names too!

The nail polishes are made in Luxembourg and seem to be of good quality. I like the packaging and particularly like the wide cap which makes it easier to open when it gets kind of stuck with the dried polish on the neck (white cap for Ultimate Nudes, black cap for Ultimate Nail Lacquer). The consistency of the Ultimate Nudes nail polish is very creamy, nicely opaque and does not streak too much. The description says that with one coat you get subtle coverage... which is true... one coat is quite enough but I like a higher coverage so I went for two coats.

Now on to the more interesting part... the brush! Now I have been a fan of the OPI Pro Wide brush but I think this new Catrice brush will take first place on my books! Their regular brush (on the Ultimate Nail Lacquer polish) is of medium lenght, flat and the ends are cut straight. It is a regular black bristled brush, nothing too impressive, slightly thinner than the OPI Pro Wide brush. The New Brush on the Ultimate Nudes however has white bristles for one thing, feels more flexible for some reason, is thicker/denser and slightly shorter I believe. Most importantly however, the ends of the bristles are tapered! They are kind of rounded which makes the brush PERFECT to apply polish to the cuticle area without making a mess!! I LOVE this brush!

In terms of shades, the Catrice Cosmetics Ultimate Nudes Nail Polish collection has 7 shades, which range from subtle pinks to nudes and browns
http://www.catrice.eu/products/nails/nail-polish/detail/product/ultimate-nudes-070.html

Their Ultimate Nail Lacquer collection on the other hand currently has 40 shades according to their website.

http://www.catrice.eu/products/nails/nail-polish/detail/product/ultimate-nail-lacquer-350.html

Locally, they retail at 2.50Eur which I believe is an excellent price for the quality of the polish and the quantity you get (each bottle contains 10ml - OPI shades contain 15ml but cost a lot more).

All in all, I do recommend these polishes, in terms of quality I think they may be on a slightly higher scale than the e.l.f. polishes I have. They are worth checking out if you are a nail polish junkie like me ;)

See pics below! Hope you enjoyed this review. Please note that I bought these products and was not paid to do this review!

Until the next post, take care ;)

*UPDATE*

After 1 whole week of wear - polish still looks bright and shiny, no actual chipping, still looks decent and wearable! Slight wear along the nail edge and since my nails grew a bit longer, bottom part of the nail is slightly exposed (it probably wore off from the cuticle area a little bit too) - Excellent wearablity over all I would say!

090 Karl Says Tres Chic - Catrice Cosmetics Ultimate Nudes Nail Polish - 2 coats

090 Karl Says Tres Chic - Catrice Cosmetics Ultimate Nudes Nail Polish - 2 coats

Ultimate Nudes 090, 050 and Ultimate Nail Lacquer 030

Notice the difference between the 2 brushes?

After 1 whole week of wear

OPI Black Shatter Nail Polish over Bright Coral!

Hello everyone!

It's been quite a while since I last posted... shame on me! There is so much stuff I would LOVE to blog about but there is so little time and I was horribly sick over the Christmas holidays! :(

However I had to share this at least.

Up to yesterday I had long nails which I had been growing for a while since December but after an "almost broken in half" nail accident I decided to finally chop them off... which I did. So I now have the more comfortable and practical shorter nails I love :)

I've had my OPI black, white and silver shatters for a while but went back to them recently. I was wearing my white shatter over the Spark du Triomphe.... LOVE that glitter! So yesterday I decided to go for black.

1. As a base I used my OPI Nail Envy Maintenance as usual (OPI have a range of treatments in the Envy range - I use Maintenance since my nails are rather strong already and using a hardner would make them break).

2. I then used OPI I'm His Coral Friend from their 2009 Summer SUNbelievable Collection and topped that with KIKO's Sparkle Touch nail polish in No4. (KIKO is an Italian makeup brand that has some awesome products at fantastic prices) to make it just a little bit sparkly... who doesn't love sparkles??  ;)

3. Once that was completely dry (very important) I applied a thin coat of OPI Black Shatter and let that dry (Black shatter has been out for a while, there are now a number of shades from black to blues to red and pink and purple and white). I applied my shatter polish vertically as usual but you can try applying it diagonally or in sections for a different shatter effect!

4. I then applied a top coat. OPI recommend this step to lock in the shatter and avoid chipping. It also makes the colours more vivid but if you like the matte effect of the shatter polish you may want to skip the last step ;)

Have a look at the pics below.

I personally love the Black Shatter... I find it crackles nicer than it's white counterpart and creates an AWESOME effect on bright shades like this coral colour!!

Give it a try ;)

Until the next blog post, take care x x

The nails - OPI I'm His Coral Friend + KIKO Sparkle Touch no4. + OPI Black Shatter

Nails and the products used ;)

Nail products used - OPI Nail Envy Maintenance (for already strong nails), OPI I'm His Coral Friend from the Summer 2009 SUNbelievable Collection, KIKO Sparkle Touch No.4, OPI Black Shatter, OPI regular top coat.

e.l.f. nail polish in Mod Mauve review & pictures - one week of wear update!

So I finally got down to writing my first ever blog post. There are so many things I would like to write about but I decided to start with this e.l.f. nail polish review first as I got my nails done last night while watching Killer Elite with my fiance haha so here it goes.

The e.l.f Mod Mauve nail polish is a lovely creme nail colour that goes on smoothly and does not streak in my opinion. It is quite pigmented (not very sheer on the nails) but I would still suggest 2 coats to get a totally even coverage and to achieve the true colour as seen through the bottle.

Mauve is supposed to be a moderate grayish violet to moderate reddish purple according to dictionaries. I would consider this shade to be a pinkish brown shade... like a rosey mauve shade. In fact, I think it matches a Max Factor Colour Elixir lipstick in 833 Rosewood perfectly for those of you who like the matching lips and nails trend ;) 

Bottom line, I think this is a lovely colour for autumn/winter. I think it would look good on most skin tones, it looks just fine on my beige/yellow undertones skin. Regarding staying power and chipping, from my experience with other e.l.f. nail polishes I think it should not be a problem. Most colours last up to a week with no extreme chipping (assuming you use a top coat and a base coat like I do)

Would I repurchase? Yes definitely... it's great value for the price and works just fine as a creme nail polish even when compared to more expensive brands like OPI.

Comparison to other browns and pinky browns: L to R: OPI Barefoot in Barcelona - e.l.f. Mod Mauve - e.l.f. Smokey Brown

e.l.f. Mod Mauve with a swatch of MF Colour Elixir Lipstick in Rosewood 833

Hope you find this useful and if you're thinking of buying any e.l.f. nail polishes or other items, do so this weekend if you are in the UK or Europe... don't miss out on their 4th Birthday offer.

For those of you interested, I buy most OPI shades from ebay from various sellers as I find them to be cheaper usually from the USA or Singapore. The Max Factor lipstick was purchased from cheapsmells.com as they are cheaper from the UK too and they now have free postage to Malta at least for sure!

Please note, I bought this nail polish myself and am being totally honest in my review of it ;)

After a whole week of wear with absolutely no touch ups, not even a reapplication of top coat or spray - nothing, my nails looked like this:

As you can see, there is some wearing round the edges and at the cuticle however, if you ask me, it is very much comparable if not better than some of the OPI shades I have. Therefore for all of you who like me, where a little bit hesitant about buying e.l.f. nail polishes because you might think that they are too good to be true.... they ARE good! Bear in mind however that I did use a base coat - OPI Nail Envy Maintainance and a top coat - OPI Top Coat but I believe any decent base coat and topcoat would do! With the price of 1 OPI shade you can get about 5 e.l.f. shades! I'm not saying I will stop buying OPI mind you, they have loads of beautiful shades and they are of excellent quality but if you're a bit tight on cash and still want a new shade, e.l.f nail polish is an excellent substitute! Good luck! ;)