Sally Hansen Miracle Gel Color Filters Top Coats Plus Hiatus News

I managed to resist (so far) buying the limited edition Complete Salon Manicure polishes from Sally Hansen that I shared in my last display post, as they were mostly cremes, and goodness knows I have plenty of those. Yet I did snap up the Miracle Gel Color Filters top coats because I love me some layering. Sure, I have plenty of shimmery toppers, too, but these might be not exactly the same as what I already own. Won't know until I try them.

Unlike the regular clear Miracle Gel top coat, these come with a rectangular paperboard hat covering the cap, showing what these are meant to do (transform a base color). Left to right: Strobe, Smoulder, and Diffuse. They also have a colored background on the label on the bottles, unlike the black of the regular top coat.



When you take off the hat, you see the caps have colored rings, too, to further distinguish them from the regular clear topcoat, which has a black ring. (And yes, I did switch the order for this photo, to put them numerically, from 004 Diffuse to 006 Smoulder.)



I don't have a lot of the Miracle Gel shades, so for base colors to try these out, I used regular polish, starting with Sally Hansen Complete Salon Manicure in Cherry Cherry Bang Bang. Top to bottom below: three coats of Cherry Cherry Bang Bang unadorned, topped with Diffuse, topped with Strobe, topped with Smoulder. I used one coat of the toppers. Diffuse is a white shimmer; Strobe is pink, and Smoulder is blue shimmer in a charcoal base. The shimmer in Diffuse and Strobe is more dense than that in Smoulder, which does most of its transforming with its dark tinted base rather than its shimmer. Strobe is the only one that shows hints of shiftiness, with some hints of purple or blue peeking out when viewed at some angles.



Strobe was my favorite on this deep pink base, with Smoulder coming in second.



In direct light, Diffuse threw off an almost golden glow, which was interesting.



I wanted to see how these would do on a cool base, so I put on one coat of Sally Hansen Insta Dri in Cerulean, then added the Color Filters. Top to bottom: Cerulean alone, topped with Diffuse, topped with Strobe, topped with Smoulder. This time, I used two coats of the toppers; I had some issues getting Smoulder to behave with the extra coat, probably because I didn't give the first enough dry time.



I liked Diffuse more over this blue than I had over the pink, but Strobe was still my favorite; the pop of pink it added made the blue more interesting. Smoulder had the most dramatic effect in this case, making the sky blue into a navy.



At certain angles, Smoulder looked to have some copper shimmer in it. I hadn't seen that on the pink base, so was surprised.



Here's how these looked in direct light:



Having done warm and cool, I next went for a darker base, Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Out for Oxblood. Top to bottom: two coats of Out for Oxblood, topped with Diffuse, topped with Strobe, topped with Smoulder. I went back to one coat of the toppers, as doing two on the blue didn't seem to change the effects.



Smoulder was my favorite this time; its dark base paired well with the darker creme underneath, and the darker creme underneath helped the shimmer in Smoulder pop.



In direct light:



For the last base, I went really warm with Sally Hansen Complete Salon Manicure Fruitti Petutie, a coral orange creme. Top to bottom: three coats of Fruity Petutie, topped with Diffuse, topped with Strobe, topped with Smoulder (all toppers one coat).



The orange underneath really brought out the golden side of Diffuse, and made the pink in Strobe pop. Smoulder turned the orange to a deep red. Of all the base colors, this orange worked best with the trio of toppers as a group.



Direct light shot:



I like these Color Filters. Unlike other shimmer toppers, these don't need a separate clear top coat, as they are top coats. If I could only have one, I think it'd be Smoulder, as the dark tint makes it different than most of my shimmer toppers. Strobe is a close second. Until I put it over the orange, I was ready to say Diffuse was skippable, but now I'm not so sure. It's probably best to get all three to keep one's options open.

Finally, the hiatus news promised in the post title: I'm planning to take the next three weeks off from blogging, give or take a couple days. Mr. K and I will be doing some travelling and while I might get inspired to sit down and work on my laptop, based on past history, I'm guessing I won't. I do hope to do some serious display hunting, though, so hope to return with at least pictures of pretties from several states if not actual polishes.

Wheel I10: Glitters from Pahlish

Another memory lane edition of Nail Wheel Wednesday, back to the days when indies did bunches and bunches of glitters. The ones I have today are all from Pahlish, in crelly bases (mostly; one or two I could see a case for saying the base is shimmer or something else non-crelly).



(all two coats plus topcoat)

1. Pahlish Through Still & Storm
2. Pahlish Drink Me
3. Pahlish Sea & Sky
4. Pahlish Ophelia
5. Pahlish Your Silver Lining [some of the large glitters didn't want to come out of the bottle anymore]
6. Pahlish Singing in the Garden
7. Pahlish We're All Mad Here [this was purple when it was new; apparently that pigment wasn't stable—it happens]
8. Pahlish An Evergreen's Taunt
9. Pahlish Lady of Raynham Hall
10. Pahlish Badwater Basin
11. Pahlish Beautiful Little Fool
12. Pahlish Painting the Roses Red
13. Pahlish Hello Goodbye
14. Pahlish Tissue Paper Flowers
15. Pahlish Shadows Grow So Long
16. Pahlish Fleur de Sel
17. Pahlish Sugar Venom
18. Pahlish Mauna Loa
19. Pahlish Little Bread & Butterflies
20. Pahlish Squeaky Swings & Tall Grass


Bottles 1 through 5:



6 through 10:


11 through 15:



16 through 20:


















You may have noticed a few of the bottles looked not quite right ... they were involved in the great polish crash of 2014 (see more on that here, scroll down). Here's one before cleanup:



The Fleur de Sel swatched here is a replacement for the one that broke in that crash. I also lost Most Sincere Pumpkin Patch, which was part of a monthly duo so hard to find after the fact. Ah well, these things happen.

SinfulColors Lucked Up

A rare Saturday post here because it appeals to me to share St. Patrick's Day polishes on the actual holiday. And also because yesterday was my birthday, and I was busy celebrating. I had cake at breakfast and pie at dinner and presents and Indian food (a rare treat here where it's only available the six hours a week the food trailer next to the humane society is open ... did I mention I live in a small town?) and skiing.

On to the polishes! I grabbed the three new shades from the holiday display: Sassy Lassie, Cloverdrive, and Lucked Up.



Sassy Lassie is a lime green shimmer that was opaque in two coats. The SinfulColors website calls this a metallic: I'd say it's somewhere between a foil and a glass fleck with just a hint of frost underneath. I quite liked how bright this was, even though this shade it doesn't do wonders for my skintone.







Cloverdrive is a topper with blue green flakies and silver holo clover shaped glitters in a transluscent base.



I tried Cloverdrive over Sassy Lassie and was underwhelmed. Fishing for the clovers was so tedious I only had the patience to get one out, and the flakies got pretty lost on the bright lime background of Sassy Lassie. The clovers did seem less likely to catch on things than the hearts in the Valentine's topper, being somewhat narrower, so that's a plus. I did put topcoat on here to smooth things over nonetheless.





On to better things: Lucked Up is a green shimmer, opaque in two coats, and so pretty.





I pushed my patience button and fished out one clover glitter from Cloverdrive for each finger this time. The flakies didn't really show up much better on the darker green of Lucked Up than they had on the lime. Sad.



I didn't use any clear topcoat this time, and you can see that wouldn't be a good idea for a full mani; the clovers do need that extra smoothing so as not to catch on things.



Frustrating as it was to get the clovers out, they were entertaining as they shifted colors on my nails.



I just had to see those flakies in Cloverdrive, so I put black creme on one nail then two coats of Cloverdrive (no fishing for glitter this time). Ah ha, there the flakies are! They just need a really dark base to show up.





I really like both the greens; the topper is fiddly but I'm still glad I have it, and glad SinfulColors is still doing special seasonal polishes.

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Mid-March Displays

This will be a shorter display post than usual because I just haven't come across as many new things since my last display post as I'd hoped. I've been to the same stores, even a few more locations of the big chains than I typically stop at, but the trend of fewer releases from mainstream brands seems to be continuing. Still, there were some new things.

Sally Beauty had fake nails from Bella; some had interesting finishes like metallic and duochrome.



There will be no new releases from Bliss, at least not at Kohls, where everything from the brand was on clearance last time I was there. I'd be more sad about this if they'd had more interesting polishes. I liked the bottles but so many of the colors were cremes in shades I already had.



I first saw Essie Spring 2018 at Rite Aid but have since spotted it at other places like Fred Meyer and Walgreens. Left to right: Bon Boy-age, Perfect Mate, Anchor Dawn, Pass-port to Sail, At the Helm, and Stripes & Sails. This display also has Speed-Setter Ultra Fast Dry Top Coat.



Some stores have a floor display for Bon Boy-age:



Also new from Essie is the Gel Couture Wedding Collection by Reem Acra. Left to right: Handmade of Honor, Getting Intricate, Picture Perfect, Moments to Mrs., You're Golden, and Forever Family. There's also the matching top coat.



I've seen online that some folks are finding Color Club holo polishes at Walmart, so I braved a visit. I didn't find the Color Club, but I did find they still have the Coconuts nail polish strips from Incoco. This store had twelve designs. Starting at top left: Peach Punch (soft orange with orange lines), Right this Way (mint with green arrows), Sweet Style (white with black dots and pink roses), Sea Goddess (silver with turquoise and pink gradient), It's Love (silver with black dots and hearts), Stone Cold (white/black marble), Make the Cut (white with tan lines), Steal the Show (gold animal print), Treat Yourself (white with mint and pink donuts/sprinkles), Alter Ego (white/pink/ornage/purple watercolor), High Point (white with coral/teal geometric), After Party (black with blue glitter).



Walmart also had a few designs of the non-Coconuts Incoco strips: Bling Bling (silver microglitter French manicure), Invite Only (taupe with gold glitter), and Cloud Nine (white French manicure).



During my time in Walmart, I saw some interesting fake nails from LA Colors called Pixie. Left to right: Pyro (metallic stiletto), Peaches 'n' Cream (short iridescent), Outer Space (duochrome stiletto), Bubble Gun (pink iridescent), Mermaid Princess (turquoise iridescent).



The LA Colors Color Last Metallic Finish polishes also caught my eye at Walmart; I don't remember seeing these anywhere else. There were slots for eight shades: Opal White, Champagne Sapphire (sold out), Pink Diamond, Ruby (sold out), Amethyst, Emerald, Chrome, and Obsidian.



I shared OPI Libson last time; at that point I'd seen it only at NW Beauty and Ulta. I've spotted it at Sally Beauty since, where in addition to the colors I'd already seen in a two-section display with both regular and Infinite Shine, though the latter was stocked with random shades), they had a smaller display with three Sally exclusive shades. I don't recall that happening at Sally before; Ulta, yes, but not Sally. The exclusive colors are Set Apart by Tile Art, Hittin' the Portuguese Pavement, and I Absolutely Amador Ya.





I also saw some OPI at Walgreens, which doesn't usually have OPI (at least my stores out here don't). This was a mix of shades from different collections: Funny Bunny, Gargantuan Green Grape, Check Out the Old Geysirs, I Just Can't Cope-acabana, Can't Afjord Not To, Feelin Hot Hot Hot, Charged Up Cherry, Teal the Cows Come Home, Flashbulb Fuchsia, and Suzi and the 7 Dusseldorfs.



The Pueen section of the nail aisle at Walmart was pretty bare, but it did have a plate and clear stamper I'd not seen there before (granted it's been a while, so these may be old news). The plate is labelled Theme Park Collection Marble Paradise 01.



I didn't find the Sally Hansen Color Therapy Valentine's Day display, I Treat Myself, until quite late, and it seems to have core colors in it, nothing new, but I'm including it because I liked that they went to the effort to make a special display for the holiday with a heart shaped section the polishes sit in (there's also Top Coat and Cuticle Oil to the side). Shades here: Burnished Bronze, Sunrise Salutation, Rosy Quartz, Mauve Mantra, Ohm My Magenta, Red-y to Glow.



It's not all repromotes from Sally Hansen, though. They've released three new top coats in the Miracle Gel line called Color Filters. The display I saw at Walgreens has core shades to use as bases, the new top coats, and the regular top coat. Top row: Shhhh-immer, Adrenaline Crush, Regal Rose, Mauve-olous, Diffuse (new top coat), Strobe (new top coat), and Smoulder (new top coat). Bottom row: Pinky Promise, Tipsy Gypsy, Street Flair, Hunger Flames, Let's Get Digital, Get Mod, and Top Coat.



The Color Filters display at Fred Meyer had the same three new top coats but a different assortment of base shades. Starting at back left: Creme de la Creme and V-amplified with Diffuse Top Coat, Birthday Suit and Sstree Flair paired with Strobe Top Coat, Pinky Promise and Get Mod with Smoulder Top Coat.



There are even some limited edition shades out now from Sally Hansen: a capsule collection of Complete Salon Manicure colors created by Madeline Poole. Front: Slime Scene and Mallratz. Middle: Material Pearl and Say It Lycra Mean It. Back: Vinyl Tap and Call Me on My Shellphone.



Good old SinfulColors has a St. Patrick's themed display out called Lucked Up. Sure, most of the shades are repromotes, but there are some new ones, and I give them all the credit for not giving up like so many brands seem to be doing these days. Front: Jade Kat, Cash Out, Lucked Up (new), Sassy Lassie (new), Cloverdrive (new). Back: Green Ocean, Rise & Shine, Cloverdrive (still new), Gold Medal, Clear Coat.



And lastly, a sigh for what might have been ... Fred Meyer had a Wet 'n' Wild Goth O-graphic display with "Spring with a Holographic Edge" as its tagline. In prior years, this would have had polishes in it, pretty holo polishes. Or we would have gotten a separate display of just polish. This is just makeup. I like makeup, sure, but I like polish way more, and Wet 'n' Wild seems to have stopped putting out new ones. Sad.