Essie: A Cut Above

I completely broke down and picked up two of the sequin top coats from Essie's Luxeffects line. I have been lusting after A Cut Above and Stroke of Brilliance for months now, but couldn't justify buying glitter polish when I don't wear it as often and I dislike the removal process immensely. However, both are so pretty in the bottle itself and the swatches I've seen make them both look so versatile, so I decided to end the cycle of denial and want, once and for all.

Here I have A Cut Above layered over Orly's Faint of Heart. Excuse the dryness seen, yesterday involved a lot of hand washing using soap that just draws all the moisture out of my skin. The soap was just too rough and there was no other alternatives.

A Cut Above is a rose toned pink glitter that consists of small round glitter plus hexagonal  glitter of differing sizes in a clear base. I only needed to use one coat to get the coverage seen in the photo. The application was nice although the glitter did move around a bit for me, but at least the glitter wasn't sparse on the brush. I also like the fact that the clear base wasn't a thick, gooey mess.

I don't go out of my way to choose Essie nail polishes most of the time because I don't prefer their formula or brush, but the Luxeffects collection has been really eye catching. I suppose it's about time I finally jumped on this bandwagon.

Essie: Shine of the Times

I'm a bit of a sucker for things that are iridescent and when Nails Inc. released their Special Effects collection with sets of two nail polishes, I was totally admiring the iridescent "top coats" as they call it. But then I heard Essie also released their own version as part of their Lux Effects collection and I personally prefer to wear this polish over light colors anyways so I went ahead and chose Essie's.

You get a nice range of irregular sizes of the iridescent flakes with this polish and it feels very smooth to the touch after it dries. The drying time is also rather fantastic since it doesn't take very long at all. This polish also has more of the orange toned glow and I'm happy with it. However, I'd like to note that Nails Inc. does have three different types of glow effects if you want some choice. I'm wearing this over Sally Hansen's Barracuda and used 2 to 3 coats of the Essie polish. The overall effect looks wonderful and somewhat appropriate for winter, or is that just me?  I also used my Sally Hansen Insta-Dri top coat over this just in case.

Essie: Smooth Sailing

This week's nail color for me is Essie's Smooth Sailing, a shade from their Braziliant collection this summer. Described as "a breezy lavender blue with a reflection of pearl," it definitely comes off as more of an understated and relaxed color instead of bright and loud.

This shade is just so very lovely and I love the periwinkle and lavender shimmer in it. I did have to apply 3 coats since this polish was a bit streaky for me. Apparently, this isn't the case for others that have used this particular polish. Still, the application wasn't too difficult and the drying process was fairly quick. For $8, this polish was a bit of a splurge for me, but it was worth it.