Rescue Beauty Lounge Fan Collection IKB:2012 Comparison Post

Today's manicure is a giant comparison post of doom!  I got my new Rescue Beauty Lounge Fan Collection package (I ordered three out of the four).  Great bloggers have already photographed their manicures with these polishes, and blue is so friggin' hard to photograph accurately, but I decided to take all of the polishes that pundits had mentioned as possible dupes and throw them on for y'all.

I did discover that Wet n Wild Craze in Tagger (an HTF LE East Coast only Wet n Wild) and Nails Inc Baker Street are dead dupes, for what that's worth.

I don't believe that IKB:2012 has an exact dupe.  Royal Navy is close, but a bit more saturated and with the teal shimmer.  Barry M Indigo is noticeably deeper.  WnW Tagger and Nails Inc Baker Street are a shade lighter.  MAC Breezy Blue is pretty close, but is not a jelly and has more purple.  Nubar Blueberry is way more smurf-colored than any of these others (It made me think of the OCC Rx I once swatched, but didn't buy and thus can't compare).  But see for yourself:

All of these swatches are one coat of SpaRitual Lacquer Lock bc, one coat of CND Stickey bc, two coats of polish, and one coat of Seche Vite.

Photos taken outdoors in full sun:

Photo taken indoors in artificial light:

Photos taken outdoors in full sun:

Photo taken indoors in artificial light:

Butter London Spring/Summer 2012 Disco Biscuit

Today's manicure is Butter London Disco Biscuit. Disco Biscuit is a hot barbie pink jelly with blurple shimmer particles.
I don't have a million pinks, but I couldn't find anything like this is my collection. I actually really like it.
I actually hadn't heard the term Disco Biscuit before, but urban dictionary says it referred to quaaludes in the actual time of disco, and ecstasy today. I guess it shows how much I party...
This mani is one coat Spa Ritual Lacquer Lock bc, one coat CND Stickey bc, two coats of Disco Biscuit, one coat of Revlon Quick Dry tc, and one coat of Seche Vite.

Photos taken indoors in artifical light:




Photos taken outside in natural sunlight:

Tony Moly GT05 Jupiter

This mani is Tony Moly GT05 from the Galaxy Collection. As previously stated, Tony Moly is a Korean brand (not distributed in the US as far as I know). I ordered the whole collection on eBay for $10 a bottle. This is a purple jelly with orange and lavender glitter and blue iridescent hex glitter. This glitter was not as dense as GT04 for me. I don't know if it just needed more shaking, but I feel the coverage with two coats was inadequate and the purple jelly base dominated the glitter a bit.
This mani is one coat Spa Ritual Lacquer Lock bc, one coat CND Stickey bc, two coats of polish, and one coat of Seche Vite tc.
These pictures were taken indoors with artificial light.

Red Dead Vamps

Today I'm bringing you MAC Concubine from the Fall/Winter 2010 Nail Trend Collection and Loreal Femme Noir from the recent drugstore LE collection Midnight Muse (only one bottle per display). I was surprised to like Concubine because I went to the counter with the express plan of buying just Jade Dragon and Ming Blue and when I swatched this, I grabbed it too. It's a lovely deep red jelly full of pink shimmer and looks better than it photographs in my opinion. Femme Noir is a lovely lit from within blackened red, that looks black indoors. It's only in good lighting that you catch this shimmery majesty.
Both these manis are two coats of polish over one coat of Nubar Nu Nails and topped with one coat of Nubar Diamont and one coat of Seche Vite.
These photos were all taken indoors using an artificial light source.

A Tale of Two Purples

The first purple on the docket is Finger Paints Passionate Purple from the 2010 Love At First Bright collection at Sally Beauty Supply. This polish photographed way more blue than the polish actually appears. The last photo is the most color accurate, but this is an almost iridescent dusty purple shimmer. It's a one coater, but I did two.
This mani is one coat Nubar Nu Nails, two coats of polish, and one coat of Nubar Diamont.




This next one is technically two purples. I took two coats of the sheer jelly Lippmann Call Me Irresponsible, which is described on Lippmann's site as a vivacious violet creme. *shrug* I think it takes like 4 coats to build up to bottle color, so I decided instead to layer my new Butter London Jelly Stroppy that I bought on Revolve Clothing for less than retail with a code and free shipping.
This mani is one coat Nubar Nu Nails, two coats of Lippmann CMI, two coats of BL Stroppy, and one coat of Nubar Diamont.
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All photos are taken indoors with an artifical light source.

Strange Beautiful Volume 4 Series. Inspiration: Aged Chartreuse

Today's manicure is from StrangeBeautiful Color Volume 4.
It's the green one.
Jane's Inspiration:
Aged Chartreuse
I didn't clarify this with Jane, but I'm going to assume she meant Chartreuse, the high end herbal liqueur (made by French monks):

This polish is similar to the vivid orange jelly inspired by a turban that I showed last week in it's texture. It's quite pigmented and covers in one coat, but changes shade depending on how many coats are applied. It's less obviously jelly than the orange (since I don't have the whites to exhibit visible nail line), but I'm going to classify it as jelly having worked with it.
I can honestly say that I have no other green remotely like this. It's much lighter and more yellow-toned than Rescue Beauty Lounge No More War. It's a bit like a green olive jello. My husband says it looks more like diarrhea than the last manicure, so it has that going for it.
This mani is one coat Nubar Nu Nails, three coats of polish, and one coat of Nubar Diamont top coat topped with Seche Vite top coat.
This picture was taken indoors with artificial light in a lightbox:

This picture was taken outdoors in direct sunlight:

Strange Beautiful Volume 4 Series. Inspiration: Orange Turban

Welcome to my new project. I recently ordered the new StrangeBeautiful volume 4 set from Lucky Scent and plan to review all of the 8 polishes inside forthwith. Commence operation creme!

Today I bring you the burnt orange one (I call such colors rorange = red + orange)
The colors in the StrangeBeautiful universe don't have names.
According to the official party line: the colors are deliberately nameless
“I find it thought provoking and stimulating to remember and refer to each color by its reference or inspiration”
Jane's inspiration in this case is:
An orange turban in a 15th century Florentine portrait titled Matteo Olivieri

Credit where credit is due:
This painting is in The National Gallery of Art and came from unforth's flickr photostream.
This is my first StrangeBeautiful experience and it applied beautifully. This color qualifies as a jelly because it's quite pigmented, but you can see vnl in these pictures.
You can buy any Strange Beautiful products here:
StrangeBeautiful at luckyscent.com
and you can also get their Double Connector series polish duos from Anthropologie.
This mani is one coat Nubar Nu Nails, two coats of polish, and one coat of Nubar Diamont top coat.
These photos were taken indoors with artificial light in a light box.

Passport to Japan: Sonia Rykiel 15

A photo from my recent trip to Japan of dancers in Yoyogi Park in Harajuku.




Today's manicure is Sonia Rykiel #15.
Sonia Rykiel is a European designer who just happens to have a beauty line exclusive to Japan. When I was staying in Tokyo I picked up two bottles from the Rykiel counter in iSetan department store in Shinjuku. I believe this #15 is part of the core line. It's a sour apple green jelly with iridescent and silver glitter and larger round silver glitter pieces. It is sheer, but not streaky and applies pretty well. I think it may be rose or floral scented like Anna Sui - but it smells less nauseating to me than Anna Sui does. I couldn't buy any Sui there because of my aversion to the scent. Sorry, my cuticles are still gross.
This mani is one coat Nubar Nu Nails, three coats polish, and one coat Nubar Diamont; with the exception of the ring finger which has two coats of Wet n Wild Wild Shine Black Creme and two coats of #15 polish.
These pictures were taken indoors in a light box with artificial light.

Ciate Stiletto

Today's manicure is Ciate Stiletto. Stiletto is a green jelly-ish creme from their new Autumn/Winter 09 collection.
Pretty, but not entirely unique - it's close to Nubar Forest (Forest is a smidge darker) and BB Couture Poison Ivy (pretty dupe-y).
This mani is one coat ciate underwear bc, three coats of polish, and one coat ciate speed coat tc.

Ciate Power Dressing

Today's manicure is Ciate Power Dressing. Power Dressing is a new polish from Ciate's Autumn/Winter 09 collection. I have three more of the collection upcoming on the blog. This polish is a true blue jelly. I think it's fantastic - it's not a navy that looks black in most lights (I have a few blue jellies like this - Nfu Oh 119, Lippmann Devil in a Blue Dress). It looks blue in pretty much any light. It looks a mess with one coat, two coats is nice, but it takes three coats to achieve a perfectly even finish - but it's worth it for the effect.

Where to get Ciate:
Ciate is a UK brand. It can be purchased from many sources across the pond (it's on sale on Asos.com right now), but Asos does not ship to the US.
The 3 sources that I have ordered from and found to be reliable shippers to the US are:
1.Ciate's official site ciate.co.uk
9 gbp per bottle, 10 gbp shipping cost to CA
great deals on sets - you can buy the whole Autumn/Winter 09 collection (6 bottles) for 27 gbp - the price of three individual bottles (I wish that I hadn't ordered hastily, as I bought 4 of the 6 bottles before figuring this out)
Their new site still has a few kinks, but they do have good customer service.

2.ABC Beauty abcbeautyshop.co.uk
7.5 gbp per bottle, 12.95 gbp shipping cost to CA
great deals on sets - you can buy the whole Autumn/Winter 09 collection (6 bottles) for 25 gbp
They do not get individual bottles of new collections immediately.

3.HairHQ hqhair.com
9 gbp per bottle, 12.50 gbp shipping cost to CA

This mani is one coat ciate underwear bc, three coats of polish, and one coat ciate speed coat tc.