Sweet Baby Octopolish!

When you have an untried pile well larger than intended and all clamoring for your attention, you gotta come up with some way to pick one for the next round; my method is usually to poll the man.  This time, he's adamant about both red and blue.  "I'm going to look like superman or something, " I say.  "Well, it has to stand out," he says. outdoor, direct sunlight Well, alright then baby. Brazillian brand Jade makes marvelous holos, typically of the jelly sort with a bright linear flame.  The first coat always looks a little too sheer to work, but nope, nice opacity with 2 coats and a perfectly manageable formula.  Vermelho Surreal (Surreal Red, if my Portugese is correct) leans just the slightest bit orange-wards of true apple red, and goes on quite easily. indoor, bright CF lighting I've stamped over it using the the paisley henna-styled waves from the BP-10 plate, covering only my ring & middle fingers entirely and highlighting t...

Now that the sun has finally come back (begone, long winter of '14-'15!!), it's HOLO time! indoor, bright CF lighting Jade's Irresistivel is a gold linear holo, in their typical petite bottle with lovely brush.  Jade's holos are the jelly finish type that lets the holo sparkle through as brightly as possible, and it's sheer enough that I've used this color as a holo topcoat before.  At 2 coats, though, there's only the suggestion of VNL, which is plenty opaque enough for me. indirect overcast sunlight In the shade, Irresistivel has a foil finish that looks like individual nano-flakes of gold in an almost clear background.  Indoors in office fluorescents, it looks like a softly shimmering, nearly nude shade of champagne gold. Hit the sun, though, and POW!!!!!! bright sunlight. Subtle, this is not.  It's so blinding, i could land airplanes with these signal flares.  Check it out - the holo is so sparklingly clear that you can see...

Tape trees are pretty much the staple of Christmas decorated nails:  super easy, yet resulting in a clearly identifiable design.  All you need is some quick-dry topcoat and some basic scotch tape, of the sort that's already laying around on the table where your mom was wrapping presents just a little while ago. It's as simple as painting on your desired base color, topcoating and waiting for a good 10-15 (if you're using something as fast as HK Girl), then placing 2 small pieces of tape such that it makes a triangle with the free edge of the nail.  Brush on your tree color and peel the tape while it's wet.  Add some Glitter tinsel or ornaments or a star topper if that's your thing.  Done. For mine, I used OPI Christmas Gone Plaid for the thumb, middle finger, and tree; a England Perceval for the index and pinky; Julep Mia for the silver ring finger, and all topped with a bit of Jade Irresistivel because my soon-to-be-sister in law said more sparkles is...

A friend recently challenged everybody in the group to rock "a badass mani," and while I think the previous 2 were certainly contenders in the awesome arena, the real rockstar is Jade's Magia. outdoor direct sun, of course I've seen bottles labeled as "Magia Negra" and just "Magia," but either way they have it right:  this stuff is magic.  It's an incredibly strongly linear holo, with a fascinating bronze metallic flash in the center of the rainbow flame. Yup, those zingers of sparkling metallic aren't just the reflection of the nice sunlight we had that day, they're really there, in any lighting bright enough to make the flame clear.  The bronze at the heart of this one really made it stand out for me. The other huge winner was the formula.  Though it was definitely a jelly-type polish, 2 easy coats was all that was necessary for total opacity, and it wore like iron.  These pics taken after 3-4 days of wear, with only t...