STAMPING PLATES: MoYou London // Tropical 37 Review

Another plate review! I wasn't going to buy this because I have to move soon and deposits...and IKEA trips but the tropical series from MoYou London is my favourite plate series and I'm slowly collecting all 37 (I have 15 of them so far). Also the elephant design on this one is so cute but I've noticed that their new plate price has gone up a £1. Combined with their ridiculous £3.99 shipping, 1 plate is now £11. That's insane. So I've started looking around for cheaper sources and I think I may start buying them from Hypnotic Polish from now on because their shipping is cheaper. 

This plate though is a nice mix of tropical/tribal style art and I love the flamingo and pineapple strips. 

I've not done much with it yet but I have had some difficulty getting clean lines. I don't think this is down to the plate but my polishes. I didn't want to use a black polish, but the only off-black stamping I have is Night Sail by MYL and it's garbage. It couldn't pick up any of the detail in the plate. I resorted to using my born pretty black shade and it struggles with the summer text; I did that about 10 times and it's still patchy. 

I like the direction they're going in with this series though and I hope they do more overprint designs or cut-outs. I'd especially like some reverse palm leaves so I could do a cool gradient and then stamp on a block colour with the leaves cut out. I think there are some uberchic plates that do that but they're £12 each...which is close to these now and they're much bigger as well. When I change jobs perhaps I should just get the uberchic ones. 

I sorely need to practice stamping lines though because mine are so wonky, I noticed that the rectangular stamper picks them up with more of a curve compared to the large round ones. So there's a nail hack lol.

If you're looking for something similar but a lot cheaper; the new Nicole Diary plates are looking suspiciously similar to the tropical series. Considering MYL import all their designs from China I wouldn't be surprised if the Born Pretty factory makes everything for them.

I also love the Tropical Punch series from Born Pretty which have some nice individual designs:

And you can get these for a fraction of the price but it all depends on what kind of designs you're looking for.

Polishes/Tools Used:-

- Ciaté // Pretty In Putty (light beige)
- Born Pretty Polish // #3 (black), BPU03 Pink Planet (gold/pink), 
- MoYou London // Snowflake (light grey)

- Barry M // Plumpy Hi-Shine Top Coat
- MoYou London // Tropical 37