Tag Archives: Brands

Cult Nails – Manipulative: or the benefits of being organised!

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I think I was only just discovering the world of nail polish around the time that the pre-sale event for the Cult Nails Divas and Drama collection was happening. Being only just vaguely aware of the brand, and also having the polish palette of a 12 year old at that stage, the Divas and Drama collection didn’t hold any interest for me then. It was only a couple of months later that I started seeing a number of blog posts featuring shades from the collection that I threw caution to the wind and went ahead and ordered it.

I’ve had this collection for about a month now but hadn’t got around to wearing any of the polishes until recently. Being in the southern hemisphere, in inland south-east Australia, it’s winter and damn cold so I’ve not been hankering after summery shades. But if there is one thing that swatching your polish collection to swatch sticks is good for it is reminding you of what you already own. So it was that Manipulative came to mind when I was selecting a polish to wear last Saturday.

Cult Nails Manipulative

The pic of the bottle doesn’t really do Manipulative any justice as the camera hasn’t picked up the brightness of the colour that it has in person. The formula for this polish is great. I’ve worn three Cult Nail colours so far and so far it has been three out of three. They apply beautifully, are not too thick or too thin allowing you good control over the polish. And they are very fast drying. A win all round in my mind.

Cult Nails Manipulative

Anyway the other spin-off of swatching 280+ polishes to nail art sticks in one hit is that you can readily compare what polishes you have on the nail (the fake, swatch stick nail that is). I don’t know why I hadn’t realised it before, but this was how I cottoned on the fact that Manipulative was quite close in colour to China Glaze’s For Audrey.

Cult Nails Manipulative & China Glaze For Audrey

Now I had bought For Audrey on a bit of a whim in an ‘off-the-cuff’ order I did from Trans Design. I was helping a friend work out the postal costs so of course I had to demonstrate the entire checkout process didn’t I? For entirely scientific, researchy type purposes you understand. Anyway, For Audrey was one of those polishes that I kept on hearing people rave about and that piqued my curiosity. But I hadn’t worn it before I decided to compare it here.

Cult Nails Manipulative & China Glaze For Audrey

So which is which? You can probably spot it given the slight sparkle that Manipulative has.

Middle & Little Fingers - Cult Nails Manipulative; Index & Ring Fingers - China Glaze For Audrey

Manipulative is ever so slightly darker than For Audrey. For Audrey is a plain creme whereas Manipulative has that slight shimmer to it. Formula-wise, Manipulative is hands down the winner. As I said above, Manipulative is, to quote Goldilocks, just right. Whereas For Audrey is thin and quite runny in comparison. Still readily workable but just not as easy as Manipulative.

So which would I pick? For formula, ease of application and colour I’d have to say Manipulative. It’s slightly more complex in colour than For Audrey though they are both lovely colours. My polish palette must be developing at lightening speed as a few months back I would never have dreamed of wearing either colour. But now it’s a very different story. I loved having Manipulative on my nails and I can’t wait to wear it again.

Since taking these photos I’ve also acquired Color Club’s New Bohemian which strikes me as another polish very close in hue to these two. Any thoughts? Do you have any of these polishes? Which would be your pick?

xx

Late April Nail Mail

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I’ve been keeping the postman busy of late. Almost feel like I should leave out some biscuits and a pint of milk:). So I thought’s I’d do a quick post covering the new arrivals but with more pics than words for once!

First cab off the rank was not really nail mail as such, rather an emergency purchase on a recent work trip interstate. I’d been rushing to do my nails before heading to the airport only to wreck the mani beyond repair by the time I’d boarded the plane. So on arrival at Melbourne airport I snapped up some nail polish remover, a Revlon base & top coat and OPI Bogota Blackberry.

I put these on that night in the hotel room whilst I was working away but I didn’t take any shots before I removed OPI BB on my return Monday night. Safe to say it wasn’t my best effort at applying nail polish but it was better than the wreck mani it replaced. Love the colour of OPI BB but am just not patient enough when I don’t have a quick dry top coat handy:(. The Revlon Base+Top Coat is not something I’d normally buy as I’m not overly keen on Revlon polish but it was all that the chemist at the airport had. I have no idea how it fares with other Revlon polishes but the OPI BB reacted strangely to it and split like water from oil when I applied the first coat of OPI. I let it dry and then chanced a second coat. Still a couple of weird gaps where the OPI BB just wouldn’t take to the Revlon BC so I had to add a third and fourth coat. Hence a bit of marking on the mani as even several hours later by the time I finished working and went to bed, it still wasn’t completely dry. I will never both with the Revlon BC+TC. If you like it and want it, let me know. Going free to a good home. OPI BB was one that I’d had in my mind for a while but felt it was too similar to some polish I already have. But of the range available in that particular chemist shop it was the pick.

Ok next are a few Etude House polishes I picked up of eBay to try. EH BL505, Shimmering Blue and Satin Purple. Of these I’ve applied BL505 over an old mani on one hand so far and I’m looking forward to trying it on its own. In the bottle it has a beautiful blurple duochrome sheen but that doesn’t translate to the nail. Still stunningly bright and shiny though.

 

Next is Clarins 230. It was on eBay for what I decided was a moderately reasonable price given what I’ve seen it listed for in the past so I eventually caved and bought it.

Next was a third bottle of Max Factor Mini – Fantasy Fire. I’m loving it so much but those damn bottles are so so tiny that I wanted to make sure I had a reasonable supply.

 

Then Monday my next order of Nfu Oh polishes arrived. Squeee! Think these are what I was most excited to receive. I only got my first two Nfu Ohs (#51 and #40) a few weeks back but was so blown away by #51 that I knew from that point on I was addicted. So below we have #50, #56, #51 (back up bottle!), #52 and #59. IN LOVE!

 

Next are my first Butter London polishes. Left to right we have Chancer, Branwen’s Feather, Marrow and Scoundrel. Am tossing up whether to also get hold of The Black Knight, Lilibet and Knackered.

Sigh. It’s tough for the Butter London’s. Normally I’d be really keen to try them but many of the other nail mail I got this last week and a bit outstrips them rather. Speaking of which, I was very naught and gave into my lust for more duo and multichromes by getting both sets of Mari Moon from Hits Speciallita. Below from left to right are:

 

 

I’m ridiculously keen to try all of these. I love the slightly kitch packets they come in, there’s something slightly retro about the packaging that reminds me of things from my childhood, like my sister’s collection of teen mags she’d keep squirrelled away in a wee suitcase under her bed. We’re talking the Bay City City Rollers, Leaf Garrett and Kirsty McNicol.

But it doesn’t stop there. Last but not least my first ever Cult Nails polishes arrived yesterday. They come in fantastic packaging, some sort of natural fibre paper. I’ve no doubt these wont be the last purchase from Cult Nails. Am very keen to try them.

 

Left to right are Mind Control, Seduction, Time Traveller and Vicious.

Phew so that’s the nail mail. There’ll be some more to come next week but beyond that I’m going to (try) pace myself and just buy one or two polishes every now and again when I see something that I love. I’ve developed a good basic collection over a fairly short period of time so from here on in the pace of polish acquisition should ease up a bit. Should. :)

 

 

 

OPI Russian Navy and MaxFactor Fantasy Fire (or knowing one’s nail polish brand limits)

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I was thinking earlier this week whilst scouting through my twitter timeline ‘what are my limits when it comes to nail polish brands?’ What are the factors that put me off a brand such that, no matter how gorgeous or desirable a polish or a collection is, I wouldn’t touch it with a barge pole?  Is there any moral high ground when it comes to nail polish?

Of course it’s a fairly hypothetical question when the brand in question isn’t of any particular interest to me. And despite my overwhelming objective of hunting down and trying brands of polish from across the globe, there are a few brands that I look at and think ‘meh’. Cutex for example. I’m not sure if Cutex is a global brand or not but here in Australia it’s your bog-standard supermarket low-end brand. As a child and teen of the 80s I have memories of botched manicures with cheap, crappy bottles of Cutex in frosted pink and it isn’t something I wish to re-live. And I don’t think it’s just the price factor. I’m certain that there will be other not so low-end brands out there that I will just find uninspiring for some reason and will readily skip past.

So what are my ‘no-gos’ when it comes to nail polish? Well I found one the other day when I happened across a tweet from @bootiebabe and followed the link to the associated website bootiebabe.com and their Flicker page. Now I get that I’m not the demographic that they are aiming for. I’m assuming, given the colour range and the, erm, design of the bottle, that they’re aiming for teens and early twentysomethings who’s idea of sophistication is wearing underpants. But really? I’m never going to be attracted to a brand the signature marketing gimmick of which is a bottle shaped like a girl’s arse and fanny. To the point that I can safely say that I will never, ever purchase any product from that brand. Perhaps not surprisingly, the creative brain behind the brand is a man. Now given that I adore the brand Nfu Oh with it’s corset shaped bottle am I being a hypocrite? I don’t actually think so. My response is more complex than simply ‘I don’t do brands with anatomically shaped bottles’ because clearly I do. There is something that draws me in about the Nfu Oh design and the lusciousness of the brand, whereas the BootieBabe design just leaves me cold, if not a little queasy. Don’t get me wrong. Good on BootieBabe for having a go and getting their product out there. I realise how much hard work that takes. And I’m sure they’ll do well as the world is a diverse place and the same is certainly true of the sub-world that we nail polish lovers inhabit. But there’s no future for BootieBabe and me.

The other brand that, after the events of this week, leaves a distaste in my mouth is Ciate. Now if you’re a follower of nail blogs (or nail tweets) you’d be familiar with the Caviare Manicure furore. But for those muggles amongst you (and I know there are couple of you out there humouring me by reading this) I’ll recap as briefly as possible.

Over a year or more ago, a nail polish devotee or two developed a technique (if you can call it that) of basically dunking your freshly lacquered nails whilst still wet into a container of tiny beads, the object being to coat the nail with the beads. Now move forward to the second half of 2011 when Ciate releases it’s marketing campaign aimed at flogging squillions of wee packets of the tiny beads used in this manicure for £18 each. Presumably the Ciate campaign piqued the interest of numerous nail bloggers since there sprang up many posts instructing the reader how to achieve this look. Even me, being the relative newcomer and not overly interested in ‘nail art’, had come across blog posts of this nature. The chief point of which seemed to be where to source the beads for a fraction of the price (as with most other things nail polish-related, the answer is eBay). Anyway, about a week ago Ciate’s lawyers saw fit to email at least one of these bloggers (presumably others also) demanding that the bloggr cease and desist from referring to the technique as ‘Caviar Nails’ or ‘Caviar Manicure’ on the basis that Ciate owned the trade marks and was in the process of having said TMs registered world wide. The response from the nail blogging community has, in the eyes of this relative newcomer, been endearing to say the least. In order to show support for the blogger(s) concerned, a whole host of other nail bloggers participated in ‘Fish Egg Friday’ (PolishAholic, The Swatchaholic, and A Lacquered Affair to name but a few) which was a wonderful response to the issue.

But seriously. Ciate needs to get it’s lawyers and it’s public relations or brand advisers together in the same room (having preferably equipped the PR types with rather large bats). Who thought, in this era of online social networks where word, truthful or otherwise, can spread faster than the time it takes to boil the kettle, that threatening a blogger was a good move from a branding perspective. I get that they’re legally entitled to do what they did but really. There are times when asserting a legal right or remedy is not commercially astute response and I would have thought that an idiot could have seen that this was just such a time. There is no question that Ciate’s brand has been damaged by this. I for one, despite that Ciate looks like a brand that otherwise ticks all my nail polish boxes, wont be looking to purchase their polish. Such an ill-calculated move demands a consumer response. The innate association that I now have with the brand as a result of this incident isn’t a positive one and I certainly don’t think I’ll be missing out anything by bypassing them in my ongoing exploration of the nail polish world. As to how long term the damage done to Ciate’s brand is, well I guess that will just depend on the longevity of the nail blogging community’s collective memory. May we have the memory of elephants in that regard.

So those are the things so far that have put me off brands. What has led you to dismiss or boycott a nail polish brand? Are there principles that you just wont betray in the search for the perfect nail lacquer? Or does the desire for a particular colour or shade lead you to overlook your response to a brand? I’d love to hear your thoughts.

Ok so now on the nail polish porn. Yesterday I gave OPI Russian Navy a go for the first time. I’d bought it off eBay a few weeks ago and despite that I was really looking forward to it, hadn’t got around to trying it sooner. Well, can I tell you it was a humbling experience to apply. Not that that was anything to do with the formula. Rather my crap skills, or lack of. Just when I think perhaps I am beginning to improve in my application Russian Navy reminded me of exactly why I used to avoid dark shades of polish even outside of the office. Man it was the crappiest polish job I’ve done in some time and, I’m ashamed to say, took a lot of clean up. So I was quite disappointed with myself. I’m not sure what the problem was. Perhaps I was just impatient. My left hand (being left handed) was a particular mess as I was shaking quite noticeably whilst painting my left hand. Anyway, as originally planned I topped it with MaxFactor Fantasy Fire which turned up in the mail last week. That improved things somewhat but it is still far from a perfect job. Anyway, prepare for the pics.

Despite that OPI Russian Navy has left me a little heavy hearted, it is a beautiful shade. It looks closer to purple in the bottle but comes out a shimmering navy on the nail. MaxFactor Fantasy Fire is worth the money to get it from the UK. We get the MaxFactor Mini polishes here but the range doesn’t include this beauty. I may be forced to admit my nail polish addiction to my UK relatives to secure further supplies of this polish for a price approximating the £3-4 it retails for in the UK. It gives off the most gorgeous range of copper, claret and olive green hues depending on the light. I distracted myself driving to work this morning because the colour shifts were so pronounced in the sunshine. So despite that it is far from a perfect effort, the colour of this combination warranted the pic spam. Hope you don’t mind too much:)

xx