Sweet Baby Octopolish!

 This week's light polish (that theme has worked for a whole 3 weeks haha!) is a super bright silver. indoor, bright CF lighting Tonic released I Had the Times Square of My Life way back in 2017 as a store exclusive for Color 4 Nails, and I'd originally passed on it because it was sold as a duo with a red polish that wasn't my jam.  I managed to snag a bottle when Tonic cleared out the vault and it is indeed super sparkly! outdoor, shaded daylight Times Square is a sheer, light silver base filled with both holo dust and holo glitter, and a bunch of metallic multichrome flakies.   outdoor, bright afternoon sunlight Turns out it also has a surprise flame of metallic contrast shimmer that shifts a bit from pale gold to warm copper, which catches and reflects any bright light shining on it. indoor, bright CF lighting Though I can see a bit of VNL in some of these photos, that wasn't the case IRL - Times Square was nicely visually opaque in just 2 smooth easy coats. ...

Purple was the man's pick for the next color, and soon as he said it I knew what I'd be reaching for... indoor, bright CF lighting When Tonic first released Indiglo, I passed because surely there must be a handful of similar things in my collection, like Prince's Plums or Belinda or any number of the luscious purple-plum-indigo beauties I can't help myself from hoarding. outdoor, bright direct sunlight Enough stunningly beautiful swatches appeared all over the interwebs to convince me, quite rightly as it turns out, that I was dead wrong.  Indiglo is indeed ALL THAT , and while she may be a sister to the other richly saturated, somewhat shifty purples in my stash, she is truly unique. Thank all that's holy for destashes helping you out when you made a wrong decision the first time! indoor, bright CF lighting Indiglo's base is a smooth, lightly sheer, distinctly red-leaning plummy purple that is loaded with a staggeringly beautiful electric blue aurora shimmer. ...

One good Clarins 230/unicorn pee shimmer deserves another, right? outdoor, direct daylight I've worn this particular pale green shimmery confection before , and at that point thought I wouldn't like it solo because of the yellow lean inherent in a bright lime green.  Turns out that the base color was probably amped a good bit with the layers of white stamping, much like painting a white base first to really make neon shades pop. outdoor, shady daylight Without the white base layer, the natural color of my nail beds is instead what this polish builds up off of, and since it's sheer as anything, the end result is a more soft sage green than neon lime.  I'm wearing 4 (!!) coats here, and it's still not opaque at all, but is plenty shimmery and suits me a lot better than perhaps the neon lime did.   outdoor, angled bright daylight At this look, it reminds me a lot of Ethereal Rainforest, with it's vibrant but earthy green base and total lack of opacity.  Both of the...

My last of this month's nail art challenge prompts was "frogs."  There was a gorgeous manicure posted for PPU a few months ago that had me purchasing both the beautiful lime green stamping polish and the plate with the cute frog design, and I considered just remaking the same one, but then found another untried polish that needed love. indoor, bright CF lighting At last year's Tonic prototype sale, I'd received a pretty multichrome that I swapped for this bright lime green UP proto.  It's unlabeled with number or working title, and just has the gold unicorn face sticker that she used to label the ones with that Clarins 230 type shimmer. outdoor, sunlight This proto is a sheer jelly polish with plenty of sparkle.  Noticing how sheer it was inspired me to use it like an old-skool jelly for a pond mani.  The idea behind these is that you sandwich a dot or shape in white polish between layers of the jelly, where they highlight the translucency as the c...

Pulling Asylum out of my stash this past week reminded me that I'd originally bought it just a couple of months after Tonic polish released their amazing Dryad's Grove in a collab box.  I wanted the Tonic very much, but had no interest in the rest of the polishes, and unfortunately that was the case for a whole lot of people - prices quickly soared on the secondhand market.  Another month or so later, and Great Lakes Lacquer released O'Rlyeh?, another gorgeous green in the same vein.  I also managed to snap up a bottle of Enchanted's Holiday LE from 2014 from a destash.  And then last year, Tonic sent another few dozen bottles of Dryad's Grove out into the world as part of a mystery bag sale. indoor, CF lighting All swatches go in order of the bottle shots here: Index: Glitter Daze Asylum Middle:  Tonic Dryad's Grove Ring:  Great Lakes Lacquer O'Rlyeh? Pinky:  Enchanted Polish Holiday 2014 So right up front:  none of these are 100% ...

When my recently snagged Tonic oops treasures arrived at my house, I just happened to be in need of a new mani, and these were all super pretty.  Oops 30 jumped right to the front of the line. indoor, CF lighting Oops 30 is a sheer sky blue jelly base, loaded with a gold-to-green shifting aurora shimmer, translucent iridescent glitters in 2 sizes, and silver holo flake. outdoor, direct sunlight There's a whole lot going on in this polish, but everything works beautifully together.  Somehow, the shimmer, glitter, and holo all sparkle in harmony (not the same notes but always complimentary), with each taking center stage separately in different lighting but giving way to the other elements with only a slight tilt of the nails.  outdoor, cloudy daylight The sheer base built nicely by the 2nd coat and came to visual opacity by the 3rd.  In most lighting, the shimmer was dense enough that it looks opape IRL, but the camera occasionally "sees through" the...

Tonic just had a oops batch sale - this time, small batches of color studies, prototypes, or just pretty mistakes rather than individual bottles - and to celebrate scoring all 3 of my must-haves, I grabbed another Tonic prototype. indoor, CF lighting  This particular prototype is unmarked with either a batch number or handwritten label, so I'm not at all sure if this is a one-of-a-kind or if there were several of this color made.  window-filtered daylight It's a deep slate blue, slightly green-leaning, but really more grey-leaning, filled to the brim with red-to-green aurora shimmer.  In a lot of lighting, the shimmer is heavy enough to give the polish an overall metallic look, like a beetle's carapace. indoor, bright CF lighting  This was fully opaque after two coats, which I find super unusual for how shimmery it is - typically, polishes with this much sparkle need to be more sheer to prevent the base opacity from drowning the shimmer.  w...