Swap №11: First WIC & Indie!

After quite a while I did another spontaneous swap. Lovely Sarah from Netherlands contacted me about one polish we had here in Germany, and in exchange she offered something I couldn't resist :) Here's what she sent me: 

Left to right:

- Hugo Boss Nuit parfume (I loooved it!)

- W.I.C. by Herome Bogota

- China Glaze Stone Cold

- Lush Lacquer Party Rockin

So, I got my first W.I.C. by Herome nail polish, first indie brand polish, Stone Cold which I was chasing mainly for stamping, a bunch of nice sweets and a cool perfume. How pleasant is that! : )

Traditionally, I'm showing swatches of one of the received polishes, although I tried all of them already. But for this time, it's W.I.C. by Herome Bogota:

I was craving Bogota since I saw some random swatches long ago. Moreover, I so much liked the concept of W.I.C. (by the way W.I.C. means World Inspired Colours) - naming the polishes by cities/countries! Before recently I had not a single connection with Bogota as a city, until my bf went there for a couple weeks for his work and brought a bunch of interesting pictures and stories. I think I urgently need "Frankfurt" too :)

Bogota has a muted dusty greyish-blueish jelly base complemented by golden shimmer. The texture is semi-sheer and light, the coverage in 2 coats gives a decent opacity though. If you don't want the 'tip wear effect' which is so common for jelly polishes, you have to polish your nail tips well, also from the ridges.

The closest shade to Bogota that I had in my stash was Orly Pixie Dust, so I couldn't but post a lil comparison. The difference is that Pixie Dust is greyer, and has silver half-flakies half-shimmer, and Bogota is bluer with golden shimmer. Because I love such texture so much, I'll keep both in my stash.

And, although I won't post swatches of China Glaze Stone Cold today, I'll show how it stamps instead. It was exactly the reason why I wanted this polish - a graphite shade for stamping. And I was right, it does work well, with one only condition: you have to be fast. By fast I mean lightning fast. Otherwise it dries on the stamper and never transfers to a nail. With some efforts to understand its character, here is the result I got: 

Oh, and I can't wait to show Stone Cold alone! It's such an enchanting matte graphite polish.. And Lush Lacquer is great too. So stay tuned : ) 

Iced Licorice + comparison

"Whaat, is she crazy? Such a gloomy shade in the middle of summer?" - you might think, seeing today's swatches. But I've been craving Nubar Iced Licorice for ages, and after I got it, I couldn't let it stay in untrieds for a long time. Moreover, a fellow bloggerin, TatiN (check her blog, she has very pretty swatches!), asked me to show it. So I am doing: 

And of course I was VERY curious to compare Licorice with my favourite Deborah Milano #60. They look pretty similar in the bottles, no?

Although both polishes have purple base, the difference here is that Deborah is more cool-toned, and Licorice is slightly warmer.  Also, the golden shimmer is not the same: Nubar has mica-type flakies, and Deborah just usual small golden shimmer particles. Whereas Nubar has a more delicate shine, Deborah is more of a blingy-thingie. By formula, Nubar is thicker than the quite sheer Deborah, and covers in 2 coats vs. Deb's 3. 

Yeah, might be not that much of a difference on the photos, but there is more in real life, you see it. They are NOT dupes. And as for me, I ❤ them both! :)

Lilac Treasure

One day absolutely randomly I combined two polishes on a nail wheel, and I was amazed by the result. Some time later I could help repeating it as a full manicure. Please meet Sally Hansen Hidden Treasure over Butter London Muggins: 

The base colour swatches you can see below. After Victoriana, Muggins is the 2d Butter London I'm trying, and I'm reeeeally satisfied with everything: colour so airy, texture so easy to apply, finish so glossy (no TC!), quality so perfect, price so *khmkhm*. But it's worth it. And I got it with a discount ;-P

Of course, in real life it looks way more charming. So I advise to all the ladies: if you have a nice lilac polish and flakies - combine them together, it's worth it : )

Some Autumn Nails

OPI Malaga Wine was one of those polishes I wasn't really planning to buy, but suddenly hit a good price on ebay (3 or 5 euros with shipping!), and after trying it I still can't really decide if I'm happy having it or not. The colour is wonderful, wine red and glass glossy finish, but the rest... Application was pain in the ass, it was my first OPI and now after trying a few more I can state: I HATE THE BRUSH. Let all OPI fans forgive me, but hey, how can you control it?? I would never call my nails small or narrow, but this brush is huge for them! Grrr. Another thing - Malaga Wine chips easily. 

Okay, firstly just some swatches of the polish: 

And now something more interesting: Malaga Wine topped with Sally Hansen Hidden Treasure! 

Besides the burning flame, Hidden Treasure on red is associated with autumn leavesin my mind. Impossible not to like this combination. I got many questions and many compliments from my friends :)

What do you think about these polishes with "mica effect"? Do you own any?