I'm Not the Villain Here!

As all you makeup addicts out there know, MAC Cosmetics is releasing a new collection on Sept 30, and if you have Pro Store access, you can even get it NOW. Obviously, I'm talking about the MAC Venomous Villains collection, which is separated into four color stories representing and emblazoned with the images of 4 Disney Villains...The Evil Queen from 'Snow White', Maleficent from 'Sleeping Beauty', Doctor Facilier from 'The Princess and the Frog', and Cruella de Vil from '101 Dalmatians'. I was going to go to the Pro Store today to check it out, so I did today's manicure in honor of it, but got sidetracked, and it's too late to go because I have to be somewhere else- so I'll go tomorrow! I want to buy stuff, but seeing as I JUST started my job, I'm still broke (and will be for a while), so just window shopping for me! :-P

I'm not in love with how these turned out, Cruella looked better when I did her for the 101 Dalmatians manicure a while back, but my hand was super shaky, so I did what I could. I also think that I need to get a new paintbrush! The only one I'm pleased with is the Evil Queen on my ring finger, I think she turned out pretty ok. :-P

I used:

Thumb: MAC logo

American Apparel Hassid as a base, with Sally Hansen Professional Lavender Cloud for the logo.

Index: Maleficent

American Apparel Hassid as a base, with Orly Gumdrop for her face, Barielle Grape Escape for her eye shadow, A Beautiful Life Poison for her lips, American Apparel Hassid to outline everything, and Essence Pointbreak to outline her horns. I also used Barielle Grape Escape for her collar.

Middle: Cruella

American Apparel Hassid as a base, with a mix of American Apparel Summer Peach, Sally Hansen Professional Lavender Cloud, and Eyeko Punk Polish for Neon Nails for her skin, Sally Hansen Professional Lavender Cloud for her white hair, Essence Pointbreak to outline her black hair. American Apparel Butter for her fur coat, China Glaze Flyin' High for her earring, A Beautiful Life Poison for her lips, Pure Ice Wild Thing, and American Apparel Hassid to outline everything.

Ring: Evil Queen

American Apparel Hassid as a base, with American Apparel Summer Peach for her face, Barielle Grape Escape for her eye shadow, Barielle Aura Angora for her crown, A Beautiful Life Poison for her lips, Sally Hansen Professional Lavender Cloud for her collar, and American Apparel Hassid to outline everything.

Pinky: Doctor Facilier

American Apparel Hassid as a base, with Color Club Best Dressed List for his face, then mixed with Barielle Unraveled Rust for his lips, Sally Hansen Professional Lavender Cloud for his eyes and teeth, Orly Snowcone for his pupils, MAC Rich, Dark, Delicious to outline, American Apparel Hassid for his hat, A Beautiful Life Poison for the sash on the hat.

Topped everything off with 2 coats of Seche Vite top coat.

What are you going to buy from this collection? I'm excited to see it, but I'm praying for lots of dupes to stuff I already have. :-P

ORLY Cosmic FX - Space Cadet: Sci-Fi on your Nails

Normally I would save the best for last, but I'm so infatuated with this polish I just had to show it first. Space Cadet belongs to ORLY's latest 6 piece collection for fall: Cosmic FX.

According to ORLY

ORLY introduces its latest addition to its portfolio of textured finishes with Cosmic FX. The new, limited-edition collection delivers multi-dimensional flashes of intense shimmering shine that is so electrifying your nails will explode with color! This lighting phenomenon is achieved by ORLY’s exclusive MINERAL FX technology.
The innovation infuses natural rock minerals, crystals, and glass to give nails a special optical effect with extreme luster, rich pearlescence, and a smooth, sparkling spectrum of concentrated color.

Space Cadet

Wow, is all I can say. Since I started blogging I've seen so many different colors and finishes, oversaturation is inevitable. It takes a lot to leave me stunned like this.
Space Cadet is a very sparkly foily multichrome. It flashes an incredible array of colors, there is purple, orange, golden green and mauve all chucked together in a teal-ish base. In times like these I'd wish I had a video camera to capture the beauty of this polish. I think it's safe to say Space Cadet already made it to my favorites of all time. Damn baby.

scary macro shot

Application

Application was fine, 3 thin coats, which surprised me, somehow I expected I wouldn't be able to wear this polish on its own. The drying time was another surprise, it dried in a ZzZap! The wear was pretty good as well, stayed on for about five days with minor tipwear.

I will write about every single polish in this collection eventually, I could have made one post about all six of them, but I have more fun when I'm writing about them separately - if that makes any sense.

ORLY polishes from the Cosmix FX collection cost 10 USD each. You can get Space Cadet from eBay, TransDesign, Head2ToeBeauty etc.

Review: Essence Studio Nails - Nail Fashion Stickers

Essence Nail Stickers

Hi guys! With the change of seasons Essence likes to update their collection with tons of new colors and cool products. This September they added Essence Nail Fashion Stickers to their selection and I was really curious about them. I've tried the Incoco appliques before, and those really knew how to impress me. However, these Essence stickers are much less spenny! There are 14 different designs available and I picked up 3 of them: So hot!, Drama Queen! and Hollywood! (they sure shout a lot over at Essence).

Application

Before applying these you need to clean your nails first. I removed my polish and thoroughly cleaned them with alcohol. After that you select the correct size for each nail and place them on your nails. Some rubbing should remove or reduce wrinkles. Gentle file off the excess of the sticker and you're good to go! As you can see these are nothing like the appliques by Incoco, as they are made from actual polish. Essence Nail Fashion stickers should last up to 5 days. If you'd like you can seal them with a top coat.

Let's not sugarcoat this, these aren't exactly right for my nails. The sizes were pretty okay, but they were still a little bit too small and I don't have the broadest nails in the world to start with. I tried applying these as neat as I could but my nails are just too curvy, so I ended up with wrinkles everywhere.

Wear

So, these should last five days? Nuh uh. I applied top coat on one hand to see if it would make a difference but after an ordinary shower, the stickers decided to curl up around the edges, on both hands! It looked like a big mess so they didn't even make it through the day.

Overall

Considering the price (1.99 eur) these are not that bad. They're not fantastic either. I do love the designs, I think they're fun and the finish does remind me a bit of Minx Nails. I bet someone with flat, small nails would rock the hell out of these. It would have been great if there were more sizes to choose from! The wear isn't like they promised at all, but these would make a nice manicure for a party.

I'm not sure where these stickers are being sold, but you can buy Essence products at Kruidvat (NL), Rossman, Muller, DM Drogist (DL), Ulta (USA) and Shoppers (Canada). For more info check www.essence.eu