MAC Bad Fairy

Today I have swatches of MAC Bad Fairy from the Venemous Villians collection. I was not going to buy this one because MAC limited edition hysteria makes my head hurt, and I just didn't want to have to call around and find a counter that would put one aside for me and drive who knows where to get it. I did want it because I do like Disney, and while I had the dupes for the other two nail colors in the collection, no one had found a match for this one early on. I happened to be online the Sunday after the release when a kind person I know from the MUA nail board made a few available for sale on LiveJournal at what I thought was a very reasonable price, so I decided that was a sign and sent off a private message and crossed my fingers hoping I'd been fast enough. I was, and not too long after I had this beauty in my hands. It's a duochrome, so that means lots of pictures are necessary. The first four photos below are in varying levels of indirect indoor light, and the last one is outdoors in the sun, where Bad Fairy really glows. It's a bit sheer; I used three coats and still got some nail line showing in some lights.











The duochrome in Bad Fairy reminded me of a Sally Hansen Nail Prism I'd gotten in recent swap, Bronze Ruby. I knew the Sally Hansen wasn't a dupe because it lacks the foil-y grittiness of the MAC, but I thought maybe layering might help with that. I first tried one coat of Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Fireberry Red under two coats of Bronze Ruby on my middle finger. That combination was no Bad Fairy, though in the sun it did look sort of similar.


Top to bottom: Bad Fairy, Fireberry Red with Bronze Ruby, Bad Fairy, Bad Fairy.


Fireberry Red with Bronze Ruby (top), Bad Fairy (bottom).

Next I tried two coats of Orly Shine (a silver foil) under two coats of Bronze Ruby to try and get that metallic-y thing going. The texture of that combination was closer to Bad Fairy than my first try, but the color was still off. I did like the effect of the Prism over the foil, so I plan to do some more experiments along those lines to see what I can come up with.


Orly Shine with Bronze Ruby (top), Bad Fairy (bottom).

I've seen mentions of other polishes being dupe-y to Bad Fairy. OPI DS Perfection is one leading candidate (not that it's easy to find anymore), though All Things Nails found it to be not that close. Same story with OPI The Show Must Go On according to The Lacquerista. Milani Hot Flash from this past summer has a similar texture and base color but lacks the duochrome. Accessorize Pink Spice seems to be the current front runner in the dupe race, but some say it's not a perfect match either. Right now, I'm feeling glad I was able to get Bad Fairy.