Essie - Strut Your Stuff (Haute in the Heat Collection summer 2014) and comparisson

The weather has turned here in The Netherlands, it's getting colder and the rains have drifted in. I was in need of a bright and intense nail colour and rummaging trough my drawers I found Essies Strut Your Stuff.
Strut Your Stuff is an intense cyan colour with loads of pigment, very fitting for my mood and nicely compensating the weather! This should be the colour of the sky when your are riding around on your bike all day ;-)

Essie - Strut Your Stuff

Lovely isn't it?!
The formula was buttery and perfect; two easy layers and you're done.

Then I was thinking "do I have anything similar to this...I would think so?". Well, no dupes in any way and nothing even that was too similar, really.

Koh! No Worries has the same intensity but is more blue in tone.
The China Glaze Isle See You Later is very transparent (like water) has the same basic tone of colour but doesn't build up enough at all (this was 7 coats!!!).
Essie I'm Addicted is lighter and more turquoise in tone.
Orly Skinny Dip is close family to I'm Addicted but a distant cousin to Strut Your Stuff.

So no dupes in my stash >phieuw<
Perhaps I'm going to decant some SYS into the China Glaze (since the colour is almost identical) and hope this will improve the buildability of it and make it more wearable.

OPI - Today I Accomplished Zero (Coca Cola Collection summer 2014)

Opi's Today I Accomplished Zero is inspired by.....Coca Cola Zero....and I really do hate the taste of that one. It's like drinking liquid plastic or something >brrrrr< and the after taste is the worst >shivers<

And the polish? I wasn't too sure looking at the bottle, it looked murky and unattractive to my eye.
The first coat on the nail didn't change that perspective one little bit: it was streaky and transparent. But coat number two did the trick: there was depth and there was sparkle and glowing ambers in the dark. I love it and it is very wearable!

OPI - Today I Accompliced Zero

I won't start drinking Coke Zero, but I do love this colour and I am definitely going to wear this one very often this fall!
Naturally it reminds us of the Mariah Carey one Stay The Night (one of the first Liquid Sand polishes), but I think the reddish-pink glitter is a bit more red in TIAZ and there is more size variation in those glitters as well

left: Today I accomplished Zero & right: Stay The Night

OPI - Red Hot Rio (Brazil Collection, summer 2014)

I love myself a good and juicy R E D. And OPI provides them in abundance this year... Let's recap, it started with: 

Gwen Stefani for OPI: Over and Over A-Gwen

Brazil Collection: Red Hot Rio

Coca Cola Collection: Coca Cola Red

Ford Mustang Collection: Race Red

Fashion Plate MLB Collection: Short-Stop! and Love Athletes in Cleats.

Gwen Stefani Holiday Collection: Cinnamon Sweet, Fashion a Bow, Just Beclaus, What's Your Point-settia? and Red Fingers and Mistletoes.

Well that is 11 fairly straight forward reds in one single year (and I didn't count the almost reds, corals and neons...nor the Mariah Carey Holiday Collection 2013 that was consistent of just reds and golds). As much as I love OPI I think this is an overkill and a huge lack in creativity and imagination! Man they don't even try to make all these reds special or different it's only creme or crelly and (when in luck) a sniff of glass fleck of glimmer.

OK, that said: I bought this Red Hot Rio before the big red polish wave was on it's top....and I must admit I like the colour and the crelly formula of this one. It flows like butter on the nails, self levels like crazy and the red is a beautiful and quite chic blood red.

As is the case with most reds....it is impossible to get the colour right in the pictures.... It sort of is OK in these pics, but it is a bit deeper in real life. This was two layers, but next time I think I will do three to make it look even more squishy and deep!

Love this one, but OPI should stop the red overload: I have more then enough reds!!

Right?!

China Glaze - Heat Index (Summer 2013 Sunsational Collection)

There are those days that you are in need of a good juicy neon pink....today was one of those!
I reached for China Glaze Heat Index, of last years neon summer collection: a perfect neon pink that is a juicy jelly. The jelly makes it succulant and shiny and it makes the neon a bit less harsh. This was three coats and I had still vnl and it is not build-able to opacity I'm afraid BUT the colour was very intense.

China Glaze - Heat Index

If and when you are allergic to jellies and/or vnl, Heat Index is not for you. If you like squishy colour wash on your nails: try Heat Index, you'll love it!
A point to note is that these Sunsational jellies don't last long on the nails...the ones that I wore were heavily chipped after one day or so....perhaps I'm doing something wrong......I don't know?!

Essie - Funky Limelight (summer 2009 Neon Collection)

My white nails needed some punch, as I already declared in my previous post....
I choose Essie Funky Limelight to do the job and it does the job very, very well!
Funky Limelight is a extremely bright highlighter neon yellow, just the kind of neon yellow I am kind of obsessed about. When I was a child I found this tiny mini bottle of highlighter yellow nail polish in a even more tiny drugstore. It was watery and rubbery and lumpy stuff, but that colour....oh, I was in love! And I still am in love and on a never ending quest to find the best neon yellow polish there is :-)

The result I got with the colour blocking of Blanc and Funky Limelight was perfection.

Essie - Funky Limelight

I think the result is near perfection (saying so myself) and I came the the conclusion that I LOVE colour blocking like this.

CrowsToes - Bifrost (Nine Realms Collection, spring/summer 2014)

Indie polish today!
The first time I saw swatches of the new Nine Realms Collection (based on the nine words in Norse mythology) by CrowsToes I just n e e d e d Bifrost (and Huginn & Muninn), so I tried my best and got my paws on it. Bifrost is the rainbow bridge that connects Midgard (home of the humans) and Asgard (home of the gods) with each other. And a rainbow bridge it is!
Wow, all colours of micro glitter are present in this lovely polish which has a clear base!

Midgard and Asgard

Midgard and Asgard

CrowsToes - Bifrost

This was two coats of Bifrost and there are still some less dense spots on the nail, but they are more visible in the pics then in real life. There is just so much sparkle and colour that it is just not that visible.
I still don't know if there is holo micro glitter in the mix as well or that all the colours together mimic the holo effect......but in the sun I would swear that there is holo glitter lurking around in Bifrost :-)

OPI - My Paprika is Hotter than Yours! (OPI Euro Centrale Spring/Summer Collection 2013)

Wow, I can not believe I did not buy and wear this polish any sooner...it took me a whole year!
OPI My Paprika is Hotter than Yours! is a fab colour: it is a reddish orange or and orange toned red creme.....with slight pearl shimmer (in a good way). It is a very hot and happy colour, yet it stays very classy and chique as well. As mentioned there is some pearl visible in the bottle but on the nail it gives a sort of inner glow almost, no Frosty the Snowman or anything creepy here!!

OPI - My Paprika is Hotter than Yours

This was an easy two coats.
>love it<

Orly - Pretty Ugly (Mash Up Collection Summer 2013)

I am feeling blue today, so this polish matches my mood...
Orly Pretty-Ugly was just what I was looking for: an aquatic light blue with  pretty shimmer that is not too shy. I see the pretty in this...but the ugly? The only thing I can think of is that it was a little watery so I needed three coats to get my nails perfectly covered in pretty blue...but is that ugly?

Orly - Pretty Ugly

Still three weeks to go and then f i n a l l y the summer holidays, 6 leisurely weeks of vacation and chilling on the beach! I wish it was the 18th of July already!