SWATCHES: W7 // Stargazer & Blood Moon

Ah W7...it's been a while since I've purchased some of these OPI wannabe polishes, mainly because the last time I did I opened the bottle and felt my eyes melt; it contained formaldehyde.

Stargazer // Forest Green/Bronze Metallic Shift
Collection:??
Release Date:??
Coats: 1 with Black Base, 2 by itself

Now I don't have this polish with me (I'm still at my parents, our office doesn't seem to be re-opening any time soon...) but I have a Barry M shade also called Stargazer and they are exactly the same shade. I swear there is no difference. Only the ingredients in the Barry M one are less sketchy. These 2 do not smell great and the teeny tiny ingredients list is one of those multi-page peel ones. It took me a good 5 minutes to get the final layer which is where the actual polish stuff was (not just the colours used). These two are at least 3 free but I don't trust them.

This shade though is quite a green/brown earthy metallic duochrome. It's ok, it has some brush stokes and dries with a satin finish. The shift is more pronounce on a black base but it's not too bad by itself. The bronze tone is mainly dominant. I ended up adding some rose gold sparkles to the tips and it turned into quite a nice Christmas party look:

Blood Moon // Purple/Bronze Metallic Shift
Collection:??
Release Date:??
Coats: 1 with Black Base, 3 by itself

This is my favourite out of two; mainly because I do like a nice purple. This feels more like a November/December polish to me. On a black base it's mainly purple with the gold coming through at certain angles. I also like it on clear false nails as it has more of shimmery pink vibe and goes well with pink cremes. 

// Verdict

I think it's safe to say I will not be purchasing anymore W7 shades in the future. The brushes were clumpy with bristles bent out and the formulas are awful. I paid £1.99 each but that was from an outlet store; they cost the same as Barry M or H&M normally! An absolute rip-off. I was lured in by how pretty they look in the bottle. Overall they're somewhat pretty but the ingredients are very sketchy.

SWATCHES: Avon Mark Nail Style Studio Cosmic Lights Collection

Alright, one second lemme just

For me Avon is perhaps my favourite polish brand. It currently takes up around 40% of my polish collection and it just keeps growing every month when my Avon lady brings a new brochure into work. This collection debuted in the August book and how on earth could I say no? Look at them:

The name is absolutely ridiculous; but then all Avon polishes are. Everything is Avon mark by avon nail studio mark Avon True Colour Mark nail enamel Avon....it reminds me of the cheaper Marc Jacobs line that (ironically) have his name plastered all over:

But anyway, names aside these shades are meant to represent 'oil slicks' or when oil mixes with water and crazy insane colour shifts start happening. You can already see it happening in the bottle and in these photos they legit look like bottled space:

Put these things in a museum now. With all of them I tried them first on some nail swatch sticks to find the best base, which shocker; turned out to be black. I was also a little shocked to find just how runny they all are and on their own they need around 3-4 coats to become opaque so they're almost a jelly polish; look at Avon getting in on the Nail trends.

All the swatches in this post were taken under two daylight toned light boxes.

I'll start with the best of the bunch; Cool Slick. This thing is certainly cool; so cool it's almost sub-zero; just like space! Oh turning it round! So anyway, this shade is a beautiful deep cool blue that shifts into purple and green. It's really hard to see that shift on the nails in photos but it's truly beautiful. I can't wait to do some space nails with this polish.

Next up is Oil Slick;a mermaid teal to purple shade. This one is no where near as mesmerising as Cool Slick but it's still a pretty shade and will work well with mermaid nails. I've just purchased the new Sailor layering plate from MoYou and think some layers on top of this would work well.

Now we have Warm Slick which I didn't love at first but now I've warmed up to it (ba dum tiss). It's a stunning burgandy/brown metallic shade with a deep gold shift; perfect for the autumn nights drawing in now. I really loved wearing this one and I think it's going to become a staple Christmas polish for me this year.

And then last is Magic Slick; a burgundy to purple shifter. I now vote we call duo-chromes shifters instead because it sounds cooler; also it reminds me of this cheesy Sci-Fi TV show from way back in the 90's called Sliders which unfortunately jumped the proverbial shark towards the end. Like that TV show though, this polish in the end was disappointing. It doesn't seem to shift at all and whereas it's a lovely shimmery and high-shine burgundy shade; it's just that. It has no shifting properties on the nail at all.

In all I highly recommend Cool Slick followed by Warm Slick but the other two are optional based on your tastes. But hats off to Avon for coming out with something new and hip. When searching for swatches of these online I actually came across some old Avon Cosmic polishes; PolishAholic did an entire post on them here. And I know for a fact I've been ordering Avon since 2010/2011 so I'm annoyed I don't own any of these or even remember seeing them; perhaps they weren't released in the UK? Either way, I'm glad I got my hands on this new selection and I may even purchase another bottle of Cool Slick because hot damn.

Avon Mark. Nail Studio Cosmic Lights

10ml Full Size || £6 each

Cool Slick (blue to pink, gold & green)

Magic Slick (burgundy to gold)

Oil Slick (emerald to blue and purple)

Warm Slick (red/brown to gold)

Days Like These... // Birchbox October 2018 Beauty Box Nails

Time for another Beauty Box nail design! Birchbox is quite possibly one of my favourite beauty boxes on the market (I'm subbed to 4 currently...) due to it's beautiful design each month and interesting products. I've been subbed for a year now and never had a repeat product in my boxes and it's the subscription that I've bought the most full sizes from after trialling.

This months design embraced autumn with a beautiful light blue/grey lined box decorated with orange, red and blue leaves. Ever since I saw the design I couldn't wait to try and recreate it however, I came up short with the leaves. I have about a bazillion flower decals but only a few were the orange shade. I currently have a set of autumnal decals in my cart on eBay but I've spent my beauty budget for this month so they'll have to wait for next month. 

Instead I had to make do with some oranges and tropical/esque leaves.

Compared to the box, it doesn't look like too much of a change and the lines turned out perfectly. Rain Washed was such a good match and because it wasn't a stamping polish it's softer and more pastel; just like the box design.

Those decals were an absolute bugger though and so fiddly. This look took me way longer than I expected due to the decals sticking to each other or just refusing to stick to anything. Sometimes they would break up as I was trying to slide them off, however they did cost around 75p per sheet so it wasn't exactly breaking the bank.

This is definitely one of those looks though where I wish I could've been bothered to do it on the other hand.

Polishes/Tools Used:

- Essie // Blanc (white)
- Revlon // Quick Dry Top Coat
- Avon Mark. Gel Shine // Rain Washed (light blue pastel)

- Barry M Molten Metal // Bronze Bae (metallic gold)

- Revlon // Colorstay Diamond Top Coat

SWATCHES: Morgan Taylor // Sweetest Thing, Ella Of A Girl & No Way Rose

Look at those magnificent pink beauties. I'm currently subscribed to a beauty box called Latest In Beauty where you can choose 9 items a month for £18, and this month these 3 polishes were added to the selection and well I chose them faster than you can say "it's not a problem anymore". (I am thinking of cancelling this sub though for Mani & Lola which is a nail polish box instead of mixed beauty products).

I've never heard of this polish brand before, but they look fancy AF, I love pink and well, just LOOK at that rose gold sparkle:

Let's start with the most basic; Ella Of A Girl.

She's your basic pink. I was expecting this to be slightly more sheer and pastel-y than the solid Barbie pink colour it is. I think it'll make a great base colour for other pink sparkles however it's not really the kind of shade I would wear naked. It also takes about 17 years to dry, even with a quick dry polish.

Next up is No Way Rose:

This is a beautiful metallic rose gold shimmer. It dries with no streaks (unlike some other metallic polishes I've come across) and one coat is pretty good (but I like two anyway). I'm in love with this shade, it's more on the pink side of rose gold which is perfect as I have a few that are more gold/copper but this captures rose gold perfectly.

Then last is Sweetest Thing:

Look at that! JUST LOOK AT IT! Sorry for the caps but it's frankly a sight to behold. It strongly reminds me though of some pure cut glitter I have called Sweet Pink.

Similar right? Because this is in a polish though, I used the sponge technique to get that ultra sparkly, opaque look however it does come at a price as it isn't a smooth as burnishing pure glitter onto your nail. It's still a great polish though and out of all them this is design I didn't want to peel off. The accent nail using the other two polishes didn't quite turn out how I wanted as I forgot to apply a base coat, so the light pink is more of that "inverse" nail trend but they did blend together quite well. Oh, as a bonus, here's Sweetest Thing under some indoor lighting:

Look at that holo come to life. 

The actual Morgan Taylor website doesn't seem to have prices on it however I found all these polishes stocked on NailPolishDirect for £6.95 each, winning! I also found out that polishes are circa 2015; Ella of a Girl is from their Cinderella collab with Disney for the release of the film. These used to retail at £11, so go grab yourself a bargain.

Polishes:

- Ella of a Girl // Light Pink Creme (nailpolishdirect)

- No Way Rose // Metallic Copper Rose Shimmer (nailpolishdirect)

- Sweetest Thing // Pink Duochrome Glitter (nailpolishdirect)