Sweet Baby Octopolish!

This week at work, we had a super important inspection with a team of site visitors from outside our institution.  While science-land is plenty relaxed about office-appropriate attire, and even the bigwigs in my group don't care what color my nails are, this was most certainly one of the times where a loudly non-traditional color didn't need to do my talking for me. indoor, bright CF lighting Out of everything I could have grabbed, I debated only a few options, and went with the most flattering nude/neutral in my stash, Butter London's All Hail the Queen.  outdoor, bright sunlight I've worn this before , and know that it looks great with my skintone, tastefully neutral in all lighting, and is utterly put-together and professional.  I couldn't quite handle being utterly plain all week, though, so jazzed it up a bit (very subtly) this time. outdoor, bright sunlight First off, to amp up the extremely subtle scattered holo shimmer (of which there's...

The very first  polish that came to mind when I decided I was going to revisit older things I'd never blogged/photographed before was Butter London Two Fingered Salute.  I swooned over this when The PolishAholic (sweet baby octopus I miss her blog and perfect pics!!) said it was an all-time fave, and yet it was distinctly underwhelming on me.  Definitely time for a reload! indoor, bright CF lighting Two Fingered Salute, an exclusive for Nordstrom from way back in 2012, is an earthy crelly somewhere between aqua and green, utterly jam packed full of shimmering copper microflake. outdoor, direct sunlight The microflake flashes between metallic copper and metallic pink - I never could decide if it was duochromatic or if there were two different types of shimmer, but it's a fun effect regardless.  If this was a more saturated aqua color in this shade, I'd end up with lobster hands for sure, but the earthy mutedness that makes this look dead-on for copper verd...

Though Butter London doesn't always work great with my body chemistry, ever the eternal optimist, I picked up a bottle of plenty of peoples' favorite nude, All Hail the Queen (aka, All Hail McQueen in a prior version). indoor CF lighting Queen is a deep modern nude - somewhere between tan and taupe - with a softly scattered holo effect.  The formula was dead perfect for me: not too thick or thin, tolerant of plenty of manipulation and over-brushing, almost no cleanup required, and dried to the sort of lovely, lustrous shine that topcoat only enhances but isn't required for. indirect late afternoon sunlight The holo sparkle was subtly present in bright light, but never as a linear flame/arc on the nail, and to a lighter degree than even the a England type scattered holos.  Though the holo wasn't even a little obvious from the bottle, instead there was an interesting magenta/red flash in the bottle that wasn't present even a little on the nail.  Weird. ...

I'm packed up for a nice vacation, so the next few posts will be pretty short & sweet.  Today I have one of Suzy's favorites (she talked me into its awesomeness despite my chemistry just not working with the other Butter London polishes I've tried), Prince's Plums. indirect sunlight PP is very tricky to photograph with any color accuracy, like plenty of other purples that shade toward blue.  The first coat shows much more of its red-plum base, but by the second, the blue/purple shimmer predominates.  It's a duochrome this way for some people, but the color was pretty consistent on my fingers. indoor incandescent lights And what lovely shimmer it is, aaaaaaaah. Rating:  3 out of 5 stars.  BLs still don't work great for me - this wears and chips inside of a day - but if your body chemistry loves their formula, it's a pretty damn nice color (i.e. my esteemed colleague calls this one a 5-star all the way). Where to buy:  Nordstrom's,...

Let me tell you a story about this polish. Once upon a time, someone mentioned that butter London had some Nordie's exclusive called Prince's Plums.   I am not a huge fan of butter London because of personal chemistry issues (it lasts precisely not at all on me), but I googled and googled and found one picture of PP that looked good enough to make a decision on. And I went home, and went back out in the driving rain, with a migraine, to the mall to go to Nordstrom's, looking like something the drugged cat dragged in to buy this polish.   The Sales associates looked unimpressed with me.  Whatever.  I was there on a mission. And this polish is worth it.  It's purple, but with a mulberry-plum-red base that shows off at the edges.  And it flashes different colors and totally glows. My boss.  MY BOSS, who has absolutely no understanding of my polish needs actually complimented me on this one. FLASH!  There's the red... and the sparkle! ...