SWATCHES: Ciaté // Mango Martini, Holiday Blues & Strictly Legal

One of my favourite things about buying nail polish from TK Maxx is that they're, more often than not, really old shades. I was attracted to these beautiful Ciaté shades for the brightness and shimmer and then stayed for the £1.99 price tag. When I got home and researched them a little I was shocked to find out how old they are!

Mango Martini // orange jelly
Release Date: July 2013
Collection: Suncatcher Collection

This is a true jelly shade which means it applies with no streaks, even though it's sheer. That means you can either wear one coat for that transparent glass effect or build up the coats for a glossy mani. I'm wearing 3 coats in the swatch and even though it looks like quite a bright orange in the bottle, it's actually more muted on the nails and isn't "in your face". The shade reminds me of cocktails and lying on the beach; clearly it captured the "Suncatcher" theme. It's been a long time since Ciaté have released a polish collection though apart from random shades every now and then! When researching this collection I was shocked to find I now only need 2 more shades to complete it! I'm missing Afterglow (a glow-in-the-dark white) and Palm Trees (lime green).

You can find out more about the collection in a post here: http://nailcandy101.com/launches-ciate-suncatcher-collection/

Holiday Blues // blue jelly
Release Date: Spring 2012
Collection: ???

This isn't my favourite blue; it's a bit too dark. It also has a warm undertone and I have a feeling this will stain your nails real bad if left on for more than a couple of hours. It's also a streaky jelly and needs at least three coats. By the time the coats have built up the colour changes slightly to an ocean blue. This is definitely a holiday shade though.

Strictly Legal // metallic grape purple
Release Date: 2009?
Collection: Metallics

This is going so far back in Ciaté's history that I can barely find any info on it. The early days of blogging! I had never seen the old Ciaté logo, it looks so weird! Unfortunately this is not an original from 2009 as it has the new logo but it's still pretty old as it has the old thin brush as well. It does apply pretty well but it's getting a little thick. This is a great shade for Autumn and Winter and I can see it with some gold designs on top for Christmas parties. It's also ready in one coat...although that could just be because it's gotten a bit thick.