This mani is straight off of MUA's Nail Board. Nail Board rocks!!!

Two lovely girls (nrahman1993 and MeganChair) came up with this combination of polishes, so a huge shout out to them for their genius! :)

I started with a coat of the purplelicious jelly wonder that is Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Purple Pizazz.

Then I added a coat of OPI Last Friday Night.

Next, another coat of Purple Pizazz.

Then, a coat of the magical Clarins 230.

I finished with two coats of Poshe (it wasn't drying fast enough with one).

I had, much to my relief and joy, NO VNL at the tips!!! Hooray!

I hate when the tips shrink back when I'm wearing jelly polishes. *shudder*

The picture above is one of my favorites, shown in a bit of shade outdoors.

I wasn't able to capture the uber cool green shimmer of Clarins 230, but it did show itself on special occasions for me.

If you don't own Clarins 230, don't despair! This combo looks really rad even just with Purple Pizazz and Last Friday Night - I promise!

I definitely think I'll be trying more jelly/shimmer/glitter combinations in the near future.

I really love how this looks and wearing it has made me so happy!

What has been one of your favorite manis or combinations you've worn lately? :)

I leave you with another favorite, last picture. ZOMG rainbow in my bottle!

» Read More...

I recently had a request for swatches of Clarins 230 over white. Great idea!! I actually tried this on a finger the other day and gosh, it came out a streaky mess, so I couldn't bear to take pictures of it. However, I decided to try again with a wheel, and added a few bonus ideas as well.

From left to right: Sally Hansen Complete Salon Manicure Lavender Cloud, Zoya Ginessa, Illamasqua Scorch, and Essie Pretty Edgy. They are all shown at two coats.

I've added a coat of Clarins 230 to each. These pictures are indoors, under my desk lamp.

I had a very hard time getting the Clarins to apply evenly, as you can see. Streaks. :(

The streaks are most apparent over Lavender Cloud and Scorch.

Above, in outdoor, indirect light.

The orange sparklies over Pretty Edgy are so flippin' hot!

They are all super pretty. I just don't know if I could deal with the streakiness for a real manicure.

Perhaps if I thinned the 230 it would behave better over light colored polishes.

The shimmer in Ginessa hides nearly all the streaks, so that is good.

» Read More...

Here are my pictures of Clarins 230 over various polishes. I made a swatch wheel earlier this week when I was trying to decide what to use for my second 230 combination mani. Enjoy!

The combination where I did one coat of Boosh, one coat of Sally Hansen Turquoise Opal, and then one coat of 230 turned out really cool and weird. I was definitely tempted by this one.

Absolutely Alice was a bit of a bust for me. Pretty, but not exactly WOW! Maybe top coat would have changed my mind?

Obviously I liked 15 so much that I gave it a try! (See my last post.)

They all look pretty nifty in their own way. Below are more pictures at a different angle, a little more close up.

Number 13: A supposed "dupe" under the real thing! Why not?! :)

I don't think the pictures featuring OPI LLM showed off the orange-red sparkle as much as it really shows in real life.

This was really fun to do. While I was looking for contenders in my stash, I had real difficulty not grabbing every single polish! I seriously want to put 230 over just about every color I own.

» Read More...