Essie Resort Collection 2013 Swatches and Comparisons

I love it when there are only four polishes in a collection, like Essie's Resort 2013 grouping, because then it's so much easier to put swatches and comparisons in one post without ending up with a crazy number of photos (I like to save that sort of thing for my display posts). I took my bottle shot from the top this time because I love how the lettering on the labels on top in these retail bottles matches the polish color. As you can see, shades are called First Timer, Under Where, In the Cab-ana, and Come Here. All four are cremes.



First Timer is a vibrant mint-leaning green. I used two coats plus topcoat for this swatch. Normally, I wouldn't topcoat a creme polish for swatching purposes, but my nails seemed unusually ridge-y the day I sat down to do this collection, so I felt like topcoat would be a good idea to smooth things out. (I would have gone with basecoat instead if I'd noticed the ridges before I put on the color. And I didn't want to switch to basecoat for the later colors in order to keep things consistent for the whole collection.)





I wanted to focus my comparisons on other Essie polishes, since a lot of times when I see an Essie display, I think "don't I already have that Essie?" For First Timer, I grabbed Mojito Madness from the Summer 2012 collection. I used two coats of each color, and this is without topcoat. Maybe you can see the ridges that were bothering; maybe not. Maybe they looked worse in person. No maybe about Mint Mojito not being anywhere near a dupe for First Timer. Mojito Madness is darker and more yellow-toned. Left to right below: Mojito Madness, First Timer, Mojito Madness.



Under Where is a warm light purple. Again, I used two coats plus topcoat for my swatch.





For comparison to Under Where, I grabbed Essie Bond With Whomever (from Spring 2013—really seems like I should have to reach farther back than that to find something I think is close) and, since it was close at hand in my to be swatched box and looked similar, L'Oreal Lacey Lilac from this spring's Versailles Romance display. As it turned out, neither was a match for Under Where. Bond With Whomever is the same value, but more cool-toned, while Lacey Lilac is about the same hue as Under Where, but lighter in value. Left to right below: Bond With Whomever, Under Where, Lacey Lilac. All are shown at two coats, no topcoat.



In the Cab-ana is a turquoise-leaning bright blue. This is very pigmented; my swatch is two coats plus topcoat but it was very nearly a one-coater.





I had to reach a bit farther back than Spring 2013 to find an Essie comparison companion for In the Cab-ana; I ended up with Where's My Chauffeur from Winter 2012. I also grabbed L'Oreal Not a Cloud in Sight from their other spring display this year, the Trendsetter one. Neither of those ended up being a dupe for In the Cab-ana, as they're both more green-toned, though they are a pretty close match for each other, with Not a Cloud in Sight being perhaps just a touch lighter than Where's My Chauffeur. Left to right below: Where's My Chauffeur, In the Cab-ana, Not a Cloud in Sight. All two coats, no topcoat.



Here's bonus awkwardness of me trying to get the two greenish blue cremes close to each other to judge their dupey-ness (Essie on the left, L'Oreal on the right):



Finally we come to Come Here, a bright orange red. I had trouble with this one formula-wise that I didn't have with the others in the collection; it seemed thinner and harder to control. This swatch is three coats (no topcoat, because the three coats took care of the ridges I thought I was seeing), and you can probably see I had some cuticle flooding issues that I only partially managed to clean up.





As with Under Where, for Come Here I turned once again to Essie's Spring 2013 collection for a comparison buddy, Hip-anema. They're both bright and reddish orange, but Hip-anema is a touch darker and more red. Left to right below: Hip-anema, Come Here, Hip-anema. Hip-anema



Overall, I'd say these are worth getting if you're in the mood for something bright for spring and don't already have similar colors in your stash. First Timer stands out to me as being the one to get if budget or space constraints are an issue. I do wish these had some shimmer to them like Madison Ave-hue from the spring group; that would make them more interesting.