Sweet Baby Octopolish!

 One of my fave brands had an absolutely stunning deep blue with rainbowy aurora shimmer, and before I clicked "buy" I thought wait a sec, where have I seen that before... indoor, bright CF lighting for all photos Aaaaaah, yes, that's it.  In yet another example of "stunning things I've left untried for literally years" we have the amazing Mortal Coil, which Laquester released way back in 2017.  I was stunningly in love with the green version, which I wore nearly immediately on arrival , yet somehow never got around to the OG stunner.   This is a very slightly dusty navy blue, lightly dusted with holographic microglitters and filled to the brim with a gorgeous aurora shimmer that shifts red to bronze to green.  My nails were always multiple colors at once and the little holo sparks shone out like stars in a night sky. lookit that shift! This polish is staggeringly beautiful in bright sunlight... of which we had absolutely none after the first day I wore it....

As per my usual, after one or two or a few rich bright colors, I gotta go with a palate cleanser of some type of neutral just to change things up a bit. indoor, CF lighting Lacquester Pearl Grey First Pick is one of those polishes where the name is 100% accurate.  This is a soft, somewhat sheer grey with a subtle pearlescence due to the scattered holo finish. outdoor, overcast daylight I'm thinking the "first pick" part of the color name is from the generous helping of gold metallic contrasting shimmer - the whole is a lovely neutral jewel that's both cool and warm for those of us that like to wear both silver and gold. outdoor, cloudy daylight I'm wearing 3 coats here, which leaves a light translucency at this point.  While I don't have a super opaque free edge, I love ethereal not-quite-sheer looks of this type, so I don't find the opacity to be a fault. outdoor, indirect daylight Unfortunately for me, Lacquester has gone to the w...

The man picked "metallic" for my start point to dig into my mountain of untried polishes this week, and flipping through swatch sticks of silvers, golds, and coppers I was struck by how I'd never used any of the Ms Sparkle polishes I own. indoor, CF lighting Ali Baba was part of a 2015 collection themed around the 1001 Nights tales, all of which appear to be sheer duochromes with UC flakies in them.  Most all of the swatches I could find of this polish are over black, and the first coat is so light but even that you could 100% get away with this as a topper that would give you a smattering of gold dust + flakies over your base color.  Wearing it over black, though, emphasizes the duochromatic nature of the shimmer while drowning out the base color, so I'm showing 3 thin coats solo - this built to opacity pretty well, with absolutely minimal texture from the flakies. indoor, bright CF lighting Ali Baba by itself sans black or other undies is a rather unusua...

Lacquester's recent custom for one of my FB polish groups reminded me of all the pretty bottles of untried magic from her I have laying around my stash.  When I pulled out OMG recently , I was actually debating between that one and a handful of others, and this one ended up staying on the mani table until I used it. indoor, CF lighting Dragon Heart Holo is a warm red-leaning orchid purple jelly that is jam-packed with fiery ultrachrome flakes that appear copper in most lighting, a scattered holo effect, and I think some shimmers to bridge any remaining space in between. window-filtered overcast daylight The first coat goes on very sheer but quite even - this would work great as a topper, and would look stunning as 1-2 coats over a darker/richer purple.  This builds up very nicely, and I'm showing 3 coats here. outdoor, direct bright sunlight indoor, bright CF lighting In direct sunlight or any bright lighting, the flakies catch the light as a gloriou...

My favorite color is green, so I'm a permanent sucker for any unusual or striking green polish.  When Lacquester released a green version of her gorgeous Mortal Coil early this year, of course I leapt right to it! indoor, CF lighting The bottle shot of Lacquester's One More Green (aka OMG, natch) tells you most everything you need to know - we have a luscious hunter green base jam-packed with a contrast shimmer that shifts from red to bronze and a dusting of holo microglitters, and Lacquester has switched to a new bottle design that feels more sturdy and luxe (me likey!).  The one fib here is the borderline lobster hands - this polish looked lovely on me all the time IRL, and only tinted me reddish in this pic.  Even slight color correction or lightening of the photo made the color accuracy of the polish itself off, and I wouldn't do that to ya, so here's my faux-crustacean moment. window-filtered daylight This polish went on in thicker coats than I usually ...

This week saw the first day of autumn, which is not a huge transition after our mild summer, but I have loads of leafy stamping plates and fall colors that I wanted to jump on. indoor, bright CF lighting Lacquester Song From a Vampire is a lovely shade of wine that I'm wearing here in 2 coats.  The formula has good consistency, and flows smoothly, but Lacquester has that wide brush that I do not like, because it created more cleanup than this formula would otherwise need. indoor, bright CF lighting In the bottle, you can glimpse a gorgeous array of pretty flakes and a scattering of holo dust, but the flakes were more subtle on the nail in the bright lamp light of my mani cave.  I wanted FFLLLAAAAKKKESSS, so I've added 1 coat Essie Shine of the Times and 1 coat Sinful Colors All About You to create a thick wall of tiny falling leaves on the wine base - all pics shown with this layering combo, none of Vampire alone. outdoor, bright afternoon sunlight Though the...

My hugest lemming is Cirque Coronation.  Yeah, shocker I know, anyone who likes purple, who likes shifty polishes, or even knows about that sparkle magic in Clarins 230 has a hankering for Coronation, so my tears are far from unique.  I've bought a whoooole lot of purple polishes with some sort of shimmer or shift in them to try and calm this lemming down, and it's always a fool's game since I don't have the original to compare them to.  But I think I came pretty damn close this time. indoor, bright CF lighting indoor, CF lighting Lacquester's Doomed Diva is everything other people's lavish swatch pics made it out to be.  It's a devastatingly rich royal purple, slightly more blue then slightly more red depending on the lighting, and always suffused with a gorgeous coppery pink shimmer that stands out as a brighter flash along the center of the nail, so you get a devastating "glowing from within" look.  Yeah, I'm gushing.  Yeah, it...