Illamasqua offers free deliveries this weekend!

This weekend Illamasqua offers free delivery within the UK!

 

Also free international deliveries on orders over £45!

Normally the international orders are free if they are over £75. 

So if you want any Illamasqua polishes, order them this weekend! :D

I warmly recommend Rare and Phallic!!

Swatches and reviews can be found under Illamasqua in my gallery to the left.

For more info go to http://www.illamasqua.com/

Color Club Gingerbread

Prepare for a gold holo glitter shock when watching these pictures below!!! :D
I know this is from last years' Christmas collection but I don't think it's that christmasy, do you? ;)

In sunlight

Close up in sunlight

In artificial light

Close up in artificial light. In this picture you can really see why it's called Gingerbread ;)

In daylight

Close up in daylight

Full hand in daylight

I layered over Orly's Luxe. This i one coat! Love it!

GOOD TO KNOW:

Type of polish: Holo glitter.

Colour: Gold holo glitter in a clear base. The glitter is small and I can se mostly gold, of course ;), but also red, green and holo glitter.

Collection: Holiday Splendor 2011.

Opacity: Quite sheer unfortunately. This is three coats over Orly's Luxe.

Drying time: Fairly fast :)

Formula: Really good! Neither thin or thick.

Brush: Good! No complaints.

Durability: Very good!

Shine: It shines and glitters like crazy!! :D But since it's a glitter polish it gets a rather rough surface so at least one coat of top coat is needed. I have one coat of Seche Vite in these pictures, but they are still not super smooth.

Accurate colour, photo vs IRL: Accurate, but live it's MUCH more sparkly and glittery, especially in sunlight! :D

Grade: 5/5 :)

What can I say? It has it all: holo, glitter, gold AND a nice formula!

Do you think I'm crazy to wear a Christmas polish in August...? ;)

The history of nail polish - part one

Today I will start my series of posts of the history of nail polish. There will be five short posts and this is the first part which starts from the very beginning in India over 5000 years ago!

We laquer heads use polishes almost every day and wears them all the time so I thought it could be fun to know how it all started and how polishes have evolved from over 5000 years ago up until today. It's been quite a ride I can tell you! ;) Are you ready to hear about it? Let's start! :)

Nail colouring in the very beginning

The concept of the manicure began in India well over 5000 years ago with the use of henna as nail paint. This practice spread and was adopted by other cultures.

 

At one time black was the favourite colour applied to fingernails, and men, not women, wore it. (Here I immediately picture Marilyn Manson in my head :-)) A warrior of Babylon who was about to go to war often spent several hours having his hair lacquered and curled, his nails manicured and coloured, and his lips tinted to match.
 
Excavations of the royal tombs at Ur in Southern Babylonia revealed an engraved, solid gold manicure set. The gold set and the nail colouring, called kohl, were well preserved. Experts say it was used in 3200 B.C. The kohl is green and black. The use of colour indicated your status. Black was for the important people and green for people of the lower classes. This status symbol prevailed for many years.

A Babylon warrior

Now, let’s go to 3,000 BC in China. The Chinese viewed nail color as a way to indicate wealth and social status. They did not use henna or gold, but instead they created a base mixture of egg whites, gelatine, beeswax and gum Arabic. 
The shades were created by adding rose, orchid and impatiens petals. It wasn’t an easy process and the nails had to be soaked in this mixture for a few hours for the color to set. According to a 15th century Ming manuscript the colours used most often were different shades of red and black.

As the years passed, the Chinese began painting their nails with the colours of the ruling dynasty. During the Chou Dynasty (ca 600 BC), gold and silver dust was used to create the colours worn by the upper class. The nail was also decorated with precious stones and complex cloisonné designs. Nail colour was strictly reserved for royalty in those days. It’s said that if a member of the lower class was caught wearing nail polish they would be sentenced to the death penalty.

Imagine if only presidents and royals and such were allowed to wear nail polish today?! What a bummer that would have been!? ;)

Exampel of cloisonné work

Hope you found this at least a tiny bit interesting! :)
Please feel free to leave a comment with your thoughts!

Stay tuned for part two of the history of nail polish! :)
Part two will be about the nail colouring in ancient Egypt and the birth of the iconic blood red nail polish ;)

Orly's Fired Up Collection 2012

This is Orly's Fired Up Collection Fall 2012!

As always in the Autumn it's quite dark colours, but Orly has made a twist of it and included a nude and a gold polish. I like that because then you can do cool nail art combinations with them! :)

Here in Sweden these will be released during week 36. You will be able to find them at Åhléns City for example. Now no more talking! ;) Here they are:

Six new shades!

Orly Flare. A gold shimmer metallic.

Orly Flicker. A rusty shimmer.

Orly Glow. A pink-ish nude cream.

Orly Ignite. A redd-ish jelly.

Orly Rapture. A chocolate brown cream.

Orly Smolder. A shimmery mauve.

Three shimmer polishes and three creams. I mostly look forward to trying Ignite and Smolder.
Orly is normally good at formulas and I hope these keep up with the good reputation. I also love the special gripper caps of Orly's bottles! They're always easy to work with and they make the bottle very easy to open.

Orly's nail polishes are 3-free.

Further more I thought I recognized Flare and when I looked through my collection I found Orly's Luxe, also a gold shimmer polish. Are the dupes I wondered...? But at a closer look I don't think they are. Flare seems to be a warmer kind of gold but still - they are both gold polishes. I really love Luxe for i'ts excellent qualities! I don't think I need both Flare and Luxe.

Orly Flare (left) vs Orly Luxe (right)

Will you try any of these polishes from the Fired Up Collection?

Have you already tried one? What did you think of it/them?

Star nail art nails

I'm actually quite pleased with this star nail art manicure :)
Blue and silver is actually a stunning combination! :D
On some nails it, by chance, looks like the dark blue stars are the shadows of the silver stars :) Look at the index finger!

In artificial light

In sunlight

In daylight

Close up in sunlight

Full hand in daylight

Polishes and tools used for this manicure

I used H&M's Blue my mind as a bright blue base. Then I stamped on the dark blue stars with MAC's Spirit of truth and Bundle Monste plate BM202.
I used Depend Silver polish #223 to make the silver stars. I turned the plate 180 degrees to get a better spread of the stars.
When needed I added a star here and there :)
I finished off with one coat of Seche Vite.

What do you think of this nail art?

Do you think it looks like stars or do you see something else in the pattern? Splashes of paint perhaps? ;)

New polishes arrived today! :D

Today I received a parcel full of nail polish candy from USA! I can't wait to try them on!! Just look at these cuties!! <3

China Glaze Purr-fect plum. A plum coloured cream.

Misa - Hot people like you. Neon pink with cerise shimmer.

Color Club - Gingerbread. Holo gold glitter.

Color Club - Beyond the mistletoe. Holo blue/green glitter.

Essie - Blue rhapsody. Light blue metallic.

Misa - I will survive. Black opaque cream.

A vast mix of old and new polishes! ;)

Which one would you like me to try first?