Quick Swatches: Color Club Fall 2008 Glitter Vixen and Dance To The Musique

The Polish Addict already has awesome swatches of these, so I just did some quick 'skittles'.




Glitter Vixen collection (not pictured: Sultry Diva, pure gold glitter. Not enough fingers!)
Thumb to pinkie: Tru Passion, Object of Envy, Magic Attraction, Sexy Siren, Art of Seduction. Bottle is Sex Symbol.

My thoughts? HOLY CRAP I LOVE THESE! These are super-sparkly WOW BAM IN YOUR FACE glitter... Once you step outside wearing these, you're liable to blind someone!
Application was quite nice, Tru Passion was a little thick, but nothing a little bit of Seche Restore won't fix. They are fairly gritty- I'd say medium grittiness- but a coat of Seche Vite took care of that problem immediately. These dry very quickly, and have full coverage in two coats. This is some of the densest glitter I've ever seen. I won't lie- they're a pain in the arse to remove, but that comes with the territory. My glitter removing technique is pretty effective on these: Soak your cotton ball in acetone or remover (remover that contains acetone works better than non-acetone remover) and press it on top of the nail. Let it sit there for 10 or 20 seconds, and then with firm pressure, wipe toward your fingertip. There will be some glitter left on the nail, but once the bulk of it is gone the leftovers are easy to remove.

Now, on to Dance To The Musique:



Thumb to pinkie: Feel The Beat , Slow Jam, Electronica, Groove Thang and After Hours. Bottle is Velvet Rope.

These applied like a DREAM. Perfectly smooth, no bubbles, no pooling, just complete perfection. Color Club's formula is amazingly good.

Feel the Beat is a slight duochrome that reminds me a little of Misa Bojangles. Orange and red type duochrome.

Slow Jam is a fantastic autumn burgundy-brown with lots of depth and shimmer.

Electronica is a gorgeous blueish purple with amazing multicolored shimmer. It looks stunning in the sunlight!

Groove Thang is really cool. It's a beetle-like color, dark blue/black/purple with greenish gold and purple sheen and shimmer. Reminds me of OPI Black Tie Optional, but darker.

After Hours is a charcoal grey with loads of colored shimmer. Far away it looks like just a plain charcoal shimmer, but if you look up close you'll see the multi-colored flecks in it!

Velvet Rope is a red shimmer. Yep. I think I'm really bad at hiding the fact that I'm not a fan of plain reds...


Everything about these collections is perfect. Not only do I love the polishes, but I love all the artwork and promotional imagery used on these collections. The makeup on the models is gorgeous, hell, the models themselves are gorgeous! Color Club really did a great job on these collections- definitely different than what I expected for fall and that makes me really happy!

Also, for Canadians looking for local retailers of Color Club polishes, I was given this information:
Jessica's Cosmetic Nail And Beauty, 39 Orfus Road, Toronto, Ontato. Phone number (647) 435-3856. If you call them they can tell you where to buy Color Club polishes in your area.

And just a little reminder, my Zoya promo code SCRANGIELUV expires tomorrow, so if you have your eye on any of those collections (Pulse, Vibe, Downtown, Uptown) it's a great chance to get some awesome free nail polish!!

Thanks, Color Club!

Awesome Promotion from Zoya! Free Downtown or Uptown Sampler with purchase!

So, you all know by now how much I LOVE Zoya's Downtown collection, right? Well, Zoya loves it too and they want you to have it for free!

Zoya is offering an exciting two-part promo only for my readers!

If you've had your eye on the new Zoya Fall Collections - Pulse and Vibe- here's your chance to get an awesome deal when you order them.

If you order a Pulse collection sampler, you'll get a Downtown collection sampler for FREE!

If metallics and shimmery colors aren't your thing, you can order the Vibe collection and get the Uptown collection free!

Or, if you're like me and love it all, you can order Pulse and Vibe and get BOTH the Downtown and Uptown collections for free!

How sweet is that? All you have to do is add the Pulse and/or Vibe to your cart and use code SCRANGIELUV in the promo code field.

All of these collections are perfect for fall. You get the rich vampy goodness of Pulse and Vibe, the edgy uniqueness of Downtown, and the chic sophisticated colors of Uptown. A lot of variety, and that's definitely a good thing.

Here are the official details:

Exclusive ZOYA OFFER

for Scrangie readers only!

Purchase a Zoya Pulse Sampler (6 - 0.5 oz bottles)…

get a Zoya Downtown Sampler (6 - 0.5 oz bottles) FREE!

Purchase a Zoya Vibe Sampler (6 - 0.5 oz bottles)…

get a Zoya Uptown Sampler (6 - 0.5 oz bottles) FREE!

Get one or both – you decide.

Free items will automatically be added to your order based on your selections.

CODE: SCRANGIELUV

Limit one free uptown and downtown per order.

Offer expires 5PM (EST) Friday, August 22^nd.

Offer not valid in conjunction with other discounts

Special thanks to Zoya for this awesome promo!

Zoya Downtown Collection

This was my first Zoya purchase, and I've been hooked ever since. It's still my favorite Zoya collection, and for good reason. Just look at these fantastic colors! I don't think there's a weak point at all in the collection. I've worn every single one of these colors enough to make a big dent in the bottles, and that's saying something.



Freja. A lovely shimmering charcoal. This is one of those polishes I would have bought just for the name, but the color was so beautiful I didn't have to!


Indigo. A deep, dark midnight blue with just a hint of multicolored glitter. I wish there was more glitter in this one, but it's still beautiful.


Kotori. A very sparkly blue shimmer on a blackish base. It takes three coats to achieve bottle color, but it's worth it. This color is slightly washed out, but it's the best way to show the shimmer. It's a little bit darker in real life.


Lael. The only creme in the collection. Such a wonderful color. Purple creme! There aren't very many purple cremes, but there need to be more. Purple cremes rock.


Rea. Metallic, shimmery, silvery purple. A little bit of a chameleon, it changes from more purple to more silver depending on the lighting.



Suvi. This is a must-have color. A semi-sheer blackened forest green. It takes three coats to achieve bottle color. I can't think of many (if any) dupes for this color.

Every color in this collection is perfect. Application is great, no thick formulas, no messed up brushes, no bubbling. Just pure, dark sparkly awesomeness.

Reader Requests!

Well, it's midnight and I can't sleep, so what better thing to do than to catch up on some awesome reader requests?

Here we go!

For Alison:

One coat of OPI Alpine Snow for tips and one coat of OPI Bubble Bath for the main color. A teeny bit streaky, but you can hardly tell, right? Both of these dry really quickly. This is a very easy look to do!

For Grace:


Thumb to pinkie: Zoya Snow White (3 coats), Rescue Beauty Lounge Underwear (one coat), OPI Alpine Snow (2 coats) , Essie Marshmallow (3 coats), Essie Moon Struck (3 coats). All of them are fairly bright. The brightest is Underwear, followed by Alpine Snow, then Snow White and the least bright are Moon Struck and Marshmallow. Moon Struck almost has a greyish cast to it, and Marshmallow is a nice, soft, squishy 'jelly' white.


Here's one coat of Rescue Beauty Lounge Bikini Bottom over those whites in the same order.
I really like how it looks over Marshmallow. The translucent look of Marshmallow gives Bikini Bottom a watery quality that's really pretty.


Here's Rescue Beauty Lounge Square Pants over the same whites. So soft and lovely! Man, these colors make my hands look like lobster claws or something... Do they look bright red to you?? Freaky.


Here's a shared request- a few different people were asking for these so I decided to do them all at once!


Thumb to pinkie: OPI Parlez-Vous OPI?, Sephora By OPI Don't Go There, Sephora By OPI Domestic Goddess, Rescue Beauty Lounge Purple Haze, OPI Do You Lilac It?

Why do my purples always photograph so BLUE? Well, imagine that these colors look the same, only, uh, purpler. Purpler. I think I like that.


Thumb to pinkie: OPI You Don't Know Jacques, Sephora By OPI Metro Chic, Rescue Beauty Lounge Grunge, OPI Parlez-Vous OPI, Sephora By OPI Call Your Mother.

OMG. I think this could be my favorite mani of all time!! These colors look like they were made to go together. It reminds me of river rocks or something... I am going to wear my nails like this tomorrow!


Currently in the works: OPI Creme de la Kremlin, Silent Mauvie, China Glaze OMG and Kaleidoscope, "car paint" polishes, Konad tutorial, Half-Moon Mani, Red Stallion and Bitches Brew dupes, Rodeo Diva and Downtown comparisons, duochrome mania, Nubar Moodies, China Glaze In The Mood, New York Summer and Sally Hansen Nail Prisms and my favorite polishes.

If you don't see your request in that list, please let me know! And if you have a request, by all means, drop me a line or leave a comment!

Sephora By OPI Swatches!

So the UPS man just surprised me with a box of nail polish from Sephora! I didn't even get a tracking number, they just mysteriously showed up! Hooray, another pleasant surprise!

Swatches first:


Brainiac. Sephora described this as "spiced pumpkin." Whenever I see the word "pumpkin" it's like an alarm goes off inside my brain that says BUY BUY BUY BUY BUY!!! Unfortunately, this doesn't look very pumpkiny to me. It's like a weird muted salmon-coral, or pinkish burnt orange. I still like it, but it's NOT PUMPKIN :(


Cab Fare. I love the color- a bright yellow with yellow-gold shimmer, like Orly Live Wire but not as bright. However... This polish was extremely thick and impossible to work with. See how thick it looks on my nails? That's two coats and it's uneven and lumpy. This was even, dare I say, stringy?


Call Your Mother. Oooh, I like this. Another muted purple. I'm happy that these colors are appearing more often. They're very unusual and I find that exciting!


Charge It! If you don't want to spend $30 on Chanel Gold Fiction, get this! It's not an exact match but the finish is the same. It's a bright, shiny, metallic, polished gold. Love this.


Domestic Goddess. Bright purple creme, woot!!


Don't Go There. Brighter than Call Your Mother, but I don't like it quite as much. It just doesn't do anything for me. Pretty, but meh.


Metro Chic. Another one of these weird colors! I love 'em! Quite similar to You Don't Know Jacques, and I'm perfectly fine with that.


Never Enough Shoes. Not exactly what I was expecting. I had expected more obvious glitter, but this is actually really subtle. I can see red, gold and silver glitter, but it's super-tiny microglitter. I was hoping for something like Petites Black Star.


Run With It. WOO! This is wicked cool! I think they should have named it 'wet cement' because that's what it looks like. It's a muted light grey with the tiniest tinge of red, it looks like. It has a fine shimmer running through it that gives the appearance of concrete- all those little sparkly crushed stones. I really, really love this. A lot. I hope this isn't limited edition!


Truthfully, I wasn't impressed by the quality of these. The main problem I had is that every creme shade I bought has ribbons of unmixed pigment running through it. I normally don't have a problem with this, a little shaking is enough to take care of it most of the time. But, even after a moderate amount of shaking, the ribbons were still there, and worse, created pigmented streaks on the nail!

Formula-wise, about half were good and half were a horrible, thick, gooey, streaky mess.

The brushes are nice, a nicely shaped standard nail polish brush, no Pro-Wides here. I am not a fan of the bottles for three reasons: One, they look like they'll be insanely hard to open if a little bit of polish dries in the threads. Two, they look cheap. And three, they look more like something you'd find in an, um, adult store than a bottle of nail polish.

I'm happy with all the colors I ordered, even if they weren't exactly what I was expecting.

Better pictures: Zoya Pulse Collection

I felt embarrassed about the crappy pictures of the Zoya Pulse collection that I posted, so when I had some sunlight the other day, I snapped a better picture.




Here's Jacy. I think I captured the shimmer a little better this time. If you click the picture, I think you'll be able to see the pretty pink sparkles.


And, the rest:


Thumb to pinkie: Blair, Colbie, Sloane, Rihana, Mikka.

Aren't they gorgeous?

And, a sidenote: I'm working on all of your requests. I know I've been behind in posting lately, but I really love your requests and I'm picky about getting the perfect picture for you! Always feel free to email me (with the word 'request' somewhere in the email or subject line, cause it makes searching my email a little easier ;-) ) or leave a comment with a request. I may not be able to post it right away, but I really enjoy doing them.

If you feel like I've forgotten you, or I'm taking too long, let me know! I don't want to forget anyone! You guys are the best :)

Orly Fall 2008: Gems Collection Swatches

This collection was a surprise to me! I heard nothing about it until I saw it online when I was ordering my France polishes. It's a good surprise, though, it's an awesome collection!

I realized that I don't feature Orly (YARLY.) very much on here... It's not intentional! I really do like Orly, they just don't seem to release new collections as often at the other polish companies. If you can't tell, I'm a sucker for 'new'. I'm always curious about new and exciting polishes, makeup, fragrance, hell, anything 'new'!

The only thing I don't like about Orly is that they take for-ev-er to dry. I always seem to ruin my nails when I'm wearing Orly because I can't wait for them to dry.

Anyway, on to the gems.


Here they are, all lined up. Look, they come with cute rings! They don't fit on my tiny fingers, but they fit the bottle nicely. Star of Bombay, Golden Maharaja, Mandalay Ruby, Sea of Light, Golden Jubilee, Midnight Star.


Golden Jubilee. Bright orangey gold shimmer. Very bright. Sparkly. Mmm.


Star of Bombay, Super deep dark blue with the faintest hint of shimmer. The shimmer is almost invisible on the nail, except on very bright light.


Sea of Light. A peachy-coral-pink kind of color with a blueish-purple shimmer overlay. Almost duochrome, but not quite.


Golden Maharaja. My favorite out of the collection. Gorgeous rich brown with golden shimmer. This bubbled badly seconds after applying. I'm not sure why. Must be an Orly thing.


Mandaly Ruby. Medium red creme. That pretty much says it all.


Midnight Star. Very pretty frosty deep purple. It's like a purple/silver fusion. This one also bubbled very badly just seconds after application. What's up with that?? I bubbled before I could even take a picture of it. Lame! Still an awesome color, though.

Hooray for nice surprises!

On a totally unrelated note, have any of you been having trouble with your China Glaze polishes lately? Every time I try to wear a China Glaze polish, it takes hours to dry. This is happening with old and new formula polishes. The other day I tried to wear Passion In The Pacific with Seche as a topcoat, and eight hours later I could still dent the polish. Same with Side Saddle on my toes. Is it just the weather, or do they really take that long to dry? I didn't have this problem with any of the Ink collection, but every other collection seems to be doing it now. Hmmm...