Wheel I13: Glitters from Happy Hands

Today for Nail Wheel Wednesday I've got glitters from Happy Hands, an indie brand that debuted in 2012 during what I think of as the golden age of indie glitters. These are mostly toppers ... I did a wheel with crelly glitters from Happy Hands early last year (and still have at least a few more to swatch on future wheels). I don't remember when Happy Hands closed up shop; I think it was sometime in 2014.



(all have cleart topcoat in addition to coats noted below)

1. Happy Hands Tricks Are Something a Whore Does for Money ... or Candy (3 coats)
2. Happy Hands The New Year (1 coat over peachy skintone base)
3. Happy Hands Motherboy (3 coats over peachy skintone base)
4. Happy Hands Flowers on the Highway (2 coats over peachy skintone base)
5. Happy Hands Easy Bake Coven (2)
6. Happy Hands Tiger Pride (2)
7. Happy Hands Morgan (3)
8. Happy Hands I Am Jack's Broken Heart (3)
9. Happy Hands Metal Heart (3)
10. Happy Hands Art is Hard (3 coats over peachy skintone base) [now that I see this again, I think a black base would have been better to let the tiny iridescent glitters pop more and to show off the jewel tones in the larger hexes]
11. Happy Hands I Just Blue Myself (2)
12. Happy Hands Go Bucs (3) [probably would have benefited from a dark base to let the silvery/white iridescent glitters show up]
13. Happy Hands Ditto(3 coats over peachy skintone base)
14. Happy Hands Ditto v2(3 coats over peachy skintone base)
15. Happy Hands What's This(3 coats over peachy skintone base)
16. Happy Hands For British Eyes Only (3)
17. Happy Hands Egg Hunt (3)
18. Happy Hands Am I Not Yours (3)
19. Happy Hands Silent Night (2) [this one has changed color; it had a blue base when it was new]
20. Happy Hands Moosh (3 coats over peachy skintone base)


Bottles 1 through 5:





6 through 10:






11 through 15:





16 through 20:

Wheel I11: Happy Hands Crelly Glitters

Happy New Year, everyone! Nail Wheel Wednesday has been renewed for another year—today's episode features crelly glitters from a brand I miss very much: Happy Hands. Some of these do stretch the definition of "crelly" when you see them swatched, but they do look compatible in the bottles.



(all have topcoat in addition to coats noted below; most laid pretty flat on their own, though)

1. Happy Hands Krustofsky (2)
2. Happy Hands Banana Stand (2) [this is the bottle and label style the brand started with]
3. Happy Hands Nursery Rhymes (2)
4. Happy Hands Mayonegg (3)
5. Happy Hands Fairy Tale (3)
6. Happy Hands For You My Love (2)
7. Happy Hands Feliz Navidad (2)
8. Happy Hands Sandcastles in the Sand (2)
9. Happy Hands Mint & Roses (3)
10. Happy Hands Z for Zombies (2)
11. Happy Hands Reptar's Revenge (2)
12. Happy Hands Sector 7-G (2)
13. Happy Hands Afternoon Thunderstorms (2)
14. Happy Hands B for Butterflies (2)
15. Happy Hands Sweet Dreams (3)
16. Happy Hands Springs (3)
17. Happy Hands The Worst is Over (3)
18. Happy Hands The Sweetest Yet (3)
19. Happy Hands The Sweetest Yet (3) [pink version; I no longer remember the story behind the two different versions, which is sad]
20. Happy Hands Lady Goodman (2)

Bottles 1 through 4:



5 through 8:



9 through 12:



13 through 16:



17 through 20:

Happy Hands Feliz Navidad

Since I last shared polishes from Happy Hands (the Ready for Fall collection), Kristi has changed her labels and bottles. I like the new look a lot! Today I've got one of the colors from the Winter collection: Feliz Navidad. This is a pale pinky peach with pink and gold glitter and shimmer. I used three coats plus topcoat for these swatches. Any lumpiness is my fault; at the point I was still trying to nurse along some damaged nails and thought thicker coats of polish would help disguise the patches.









This is a very pretty polish, and against my pale and rosy skintone pretty much qualifies as a neutral, so it can go where bolder glitters might attract too much attention. Also, since it doesn't yell "Christmas", it can be worn year 'round.

Happy Hands Ready for Fall Collection

It's no secret that Happy Hands Nail Polish is one of my favorite indie brands, so I was happy to accept when Kristi, the talent behind the brand, offered to send me her Fall 2012 collection to swatch and review. Ready for Fall is four polishes with autumn/Halloween themes: Z for Zombie, Stuffed, Danse Macbre, and Easy Bake Coven. (I'll show you the backs of the bottles so you can see them better.)



Z for Zombies is a pea soup green base with lime hexes, salmon pink squares, and red shards. I used three coats plus top coat. Some of the coats are thicker than ideal because I was distracted by how perfectly weird this combination is. I love unusual polishes like this.





Z for Zombies is perfectly able to be worn alone, but I did not let that fact stop me from trying some layering with it. I put on Zoya Shawn with an accent nail of Barry M Lime Green, then added one coat of Z for Zombies on top (okay, more like one and half coats on some nails because I wanted more red shards).





I think the lime green makes a great base for Z for Zombies. The olive green of Shivon, not so much, since it's so much darker than the base color of Z for Zombies that it highlights any thin or thick spots in the glitter coat. However, zombies aren't pretty, so maybe Shivon is actually a perfect base for a Halloween mani with Z for Zombies.

Stuffed is a clear base packed with a variety of glitter shapes, sizes, and even textures (matte and shiny) in autumn tones of brown, orange, green, gold, and red with white accents. For my base colors, I chose the brown creme OPI Suzi Loves Cowboys with the rusty red shimmer China Glaze Foxy as an accent. On top of those, I put two coats of Stuffed plus topcoat. Stuffed is a perfect name for this—look at all that glitter with just two coats.





I can make a case for the big white hex glitters in Stuffed (they're mashed potatoes, like at Thanksgiving dinner) but wanted to see about toning them down with a jelly sandwich, so grabbed OPI Y'all Come Back Ya Hear to experiment. Three coats of the OPI, one of Stuffed, then one more of the OPI added up to this, which I quite like:





Danse Macabre is a clear base with mixed sizes and shapes of black glitter plus purple, orange red, and pale green glitter. I used two coats of it plus topcoat over Piggy Polish You Sleigh Me, a deep red shimmer.







Easy Bake Coven is a clear base with black, purple, orange red, and green glitters in a variety of sizes and shapes—some of the green pieces are crescent moons, but I don't seem to have gotten a clear shot of any of those. I used two coats plus topcoat over Sally Hansen Complete Salon Manicure, a medium purple shimmer.







I think this is a great collection. My favorites are Z for Zombies—so ickily appropriate for Halloween—and Stuffed—I've never seen a Thanksgiving polish before. You can get your favorites at Happy Hands etsy shop for $8 per 15ml bottle. Easy Bake Coven and Z for Zombies were in stock last time I looked; Kristi usually does a restock at 5 p.m. on Saturdays (Eastern U.S. time), so the other two should be back soon. Happy Hands is also going to be available on Harlow & Co. in the near future. If you want to see more swatches before you decide, cilucia did some great ones at Spaz & Squee.

The polishes shown in this entry were provided free for review purposes. The content of the entry was not dictated by the provider, and I get to keep the polishes for my own use.