Wheel D11: Black Light Polishes

Since I had the LA Colors Glows bottles out to swatch, and fifteen is almost enough for a full wheel, I went ahead and found some more black light polishes and painted one. Except I could only find four more, so filled it out with a glow in the dark one that was in the vicinity. That was not my best decision ever but I can give that polish another shot on a different wheel someday, surrounded by other glow in the dark shades.



Under black light:




1. LA Colors Color Craze Glows Energy (3 coats)
2. LA Colors Color Craze Glows Vapor (3)
3. LA Colors Color Craze Glows Gleaming (3)
4. LA Colors Color Craze Glows Luminous (3)
5. LA Colors Color Craze Glows Ionize (3)
6. LA Colors Color Craze Glows Radiation (3)
7. LA Colors Color Craze Glows Fluorescent (3)
8. LA Colors Color Craze Glows Lucent (2)
9. LA Colors Color Craze Glows Nuclear (2)
10. LA Colors Color Craze Glows Wave Length (2)
11. LA Colors Color Craze Glows Ultra Violet (3)
12. LA Colors Color Craze Glows Electric (3)
13. LA Colors Color Craze Glows Radio Active (2)
14. LA Colors Color Craze Glows Spectrum (2)
15. LA Colors Color Craze Glows X-Ray (2)
16. Salon Perfect Glow All Out (3) [yeah, I don't know what I was thinking putting this on here, but I guess I now know that black light does nothing for glow in the dark polishes]
17. NYC New York Color Demon Glow Top Coat (2 coats over white and black bases)
18. Ulta Color Enhancing Top Coat (2, over white and black bases)
19. Cabaret Black Light Magic (2, over white and black bases)
20. Claire's Black Light unlabled purple glitter (3) [should have put topcoat on this one as it's a bit bumpy without it; seems to have lost any black light glow it once had]


Bottles 1 through 5:



6 through 10:


11 through 15:



16 through 20:




















I didn't take detail pics under black light ... my last post has all the LA Colors shades that way, and I think the black light wheel shot shows the others well enough (especially if you click to see it full size).

Halloween and Other Displays

I had some Halloween content from Sally Hansen and SinfulColors in my last display post (and some from Bonita way back in July), but today I have lots more, along with some non-spooky collections.

Bonita got their Halloween collection out a few months ago, but they also have a fall collection, Colorful Palette, out now. There are eight art-themed shades: Florence, Dali's Memory, Ballet Rehearsal, The Kiss, Monet's Garden, Da Vinci Code, Rembrandt's Muse, and Starry Night.



It'd been a while since I saw any new Color Club in stores, but recently the Seven Deadly Sins display has turned up at Bed Bath & Beyond. Shades here: Friends with Benefits, Under Your Spell, Fierce, Indulge Me, You're So Vain, Obsessed, and Dirty Money. This display is not clear, but I believe these are textured polishes.



Five Below had some DC Comics Girls polishes, which all come with capes. I just wish they hadn't included a pink; none of the pictured super heroes appear to have pink in their costumes, so the pink feels super stereotypical to me.



Fantasy Makers by Wet 'n' Wild is back with tombstone shaped polishes; this year they have skulls printed on the caps. I saw this display at Meijer. The 2014 shades are Ghouls Rush In (hot pink), Goosebump Suit (orange), Glo' Money Glo' Problems (glow in the dark), Roach Busters (lime), Witch Black, and Queen of Envy (green).



There's also a sidekick Fantasy Makers display with the tombstone polishes, holo glitter, and other makeup. The one below was at Meijer; there's a taller version I've seen at Walgreens



Fantasy Makers has fake nails designs for the holiday, too, in six designs: Queen of the Dead (colorful Day of the Dead skulls), Wildcat (tan/black leopard print), Devilish Queen (French mani with delicate blood spatter), Rock Starlet (bright stripes), Seeing Stars (galaxy), and Vampy Vixen (deep red). Some of these would be quite wearable post-Halloween.



There is no shortage of fake nails for Halloween at Meijer; they also had the Fing'rsPrints display of Ghoulish Glam designs. I was tempted by the spiders on lilac, but the nails looked a bit small for my hands.



The latest Fresh Paint collection at Five Below is called Karma. Four shades here: Lotus Begin, There's No Place Like Om, Yoga'nna Love It, and Namaste You Go.



Ulta had the Fright Night Claw Polish display. This year there are some new colors, which is good, but the coffin shaped bottles from prior years are gone, which does not delight me. Colors are Ghouls Night Out (microglitter), Howlin' for You, I'm Here for the Boos (glow in the dark), Gettin' Witchy with It, Where My Witches At, and Creepin' It Real. The bright orange, green, and purple are not colors I've seen before in the Claw Polish line.



These same colors/bottles also showed up at Meijer in a sidekick display along with other "costume accessories".



Fright Night has fake nails for Halloween, too; this display with six designs was at Meijer. Left to right: Blood Spatter Spider Webs, Vampire Bite, French Pirate, Blood Ooze, and Rise of the Dead. Spider Webs and Rise of the Dead are new; the others are repromotes from 2013.



Funky Fingers (available at Five Below) has a glow in the dark glitter collection out called Supernatural. These are priced at 2 for $5 rather than the 3 for $5 of the regular Funky Fingers. There are five shades here: Dia de Muertos, Pumpkin King, Oogie Boogie, Ghouls Night Out, and #Boo2U.



At Walgreens, I saw the Kiss Fashion Yourself Frightful display with four imPress fake nail sets, a set of Nail Tattoos transfers, four Nail Dress strip designs, and a set of Nail Artist stickers.



Later, I saw a display at Meijer with just the Halloween imPress designs, including a fifth one that wasn't in the combined display.



Meijer also had a separate display with the four Nail Dress designs, the Nail Tattoos, and the Nail Artist stickers, as well as two designs of Eye Tattoos.



Back to the imPress, CVS had a display with six Halloween designs.



In addition to all the Halloween stuff, Kiss also has nail art kits in the Disney Good vs. Evil display at Walgreens. There are four kits, two "good" (blue/pink, princess themed) and two "evil" (purple/black, queen themed).



I shared the tall Maybelline Fashion Rocks endcap display last month, but now some smaller shelftop displays are showing up at Meijer and other stores. This one had the I Got You Beige, Plum as You Are, and Greyz in Love limited edition polishes; I'm not sure where Fashionably Slate was, as there didn't even seem to be a spot for it.



One of the things I was looking for as of my last display post was the Milani Bedazzle display, and I did find it at Walgreens not too long after that. One of the eyeliners was already gone by the time I saw it, but all three Color Statement polishes were still there: Enchanted Sapphire, Enchanted Garnet, and Enchanted Emerald.



I'd never heard of the Miss Elegant Touch brand until I saw their Candy Dip display at Ulta. This has sets with double sided stickers and three pots of loose glitter, touted at "the fastest way to glitter nails" and "quick to remove". Colorways: Bubblegum (pink), Peppermint (blue), Lemon Sherbet (orange and yellow), Liquorice (gold/silver/charcoal), Blueberry Crumble (purple). According to the boxes, there are 18 stickers included, so not quite two manis worth, though there appears to glitter for much more than that. The illustrations on the display don't cover removal or why it's so quick; maybe they mean for you to peel the stickers off your nails.



The Fall Into Color display from Nicole by OPI, which I've seen at Ulta and CVS, has four shades in it: Berry the Hatchet (berry pink creme), Die He Wink at Me (periwinkle creme), Poised for Turquoise (medium teal creme), and Dazzling with Talent (Charcoal/holo microglitter). I believe these are new core colors.



At Rite Aid, I saw the NYC New York Color Fashion Queen display, which seems to be more Christmas/New Year's colors than Halloween. There are nine limited edition polishes here, the first six of them glitters: Rule the City, NY Princess, Fashion Queen, Blue Majesty, Queen's Jewels, Ruby Queen, Royal Chic, Crown Gold, and Queen of the City.



No Halloween season would be complete without pumpkin polishes, and they have once again arrived. Meijer was the first place I spotted any of the Phantom Frights displays, and I was surprised to see a new shape for the pumpkin bottles. Instead of being smooth round balls, this year they have vertical ridges like real pumpkins.



Other than the bottle shape, the big news in pumpkin polish this year are the skull and crossbones shaped glitters: black/white, hot pink/purple, and blue/pink.



In the other Phantom Frights display they had at Meijer, there were nail polishes with jeweled caps, either a jack o'lantern or a skull and crossbones design (with various polish colors).





Rite Aid has Phantom Frights displays, too—one for glow in the dark pumpkins, one for glitter and creme pumpkins, and one for the crystal cap polishes and other makeup items. Annoyingly, they're priced a dollar higher than at Meijer.





One thing Rite Aid has that I haven't seen at Meijer are the glitter shaker polishes in the center of the photo above. These have nail polish in the bottom and a snap top container of loose glitter on the top of the cap.

Walmart had the Spooktacular Style endcap display up the last time I visited. It's got Salon Perfect and Pure Ice in it, but the Salon Perfect is eyelashes, not polishes, and none of the Pure Ice colors looked new (there was a glow in the dark that I wasn't sure I'd seen before, but it looked no different than any other glow in the dark polish I have).



Bed Bath & Beyond was the first place I saw the SinfulColors No Text Red display, which has one shade, No Text Red, and topcoat. The idea behind this seems to be to paint your thumbs with red to remind you not to text while driving.



Walgreens appears to be the only place to find the Wet 'n' Wild Enchanting Halloween Looks display. This has both MegaLast and Mega Rocks polishes in it, though many are core shades being repromoted. In the Daring Downtown section, the LE polish shades are MegaLast Strobe Light Stunner (silver) and Happy Hour Hop (purple). In Haute Hollywood, LE polishes are Mega Rock Rising Star (gold/rose) and MegaLast Pot of Gold (gold). Eastside Enigma has two LEs: MegaLast Power Outage (black) and Roadwork (pewter). Venice Vixen polish LE is MegaLast Pleasure Pier (bright blue).



Finally, and I pulled these out of alphabetical order because I'd really rather deal with just one holiday at time, I have three Christmas/winter holiday displays I saw I Rite Aid in the last few days. The first one I spotted was SinfulShine Shining Lights. Unlike the NYC display, which is probably also for Christmas, this display can't even claim plausible deniability because not only does it have red and green, it has a Christmas tree lights motif. The big news here is a) Rite Aid has never had SinfulShine before (I've read it's been showing up at some Walmart stores and disappearing from Walgreens, too) and b) this display has the much sought after Prosecco. Shades here: Go Glossy, Rise & Shinier, Prosecco, Most Sinful, Amazonian, Mirror Mirror, Devious, and Wisp. None of these are new shades, though previously Prosecco had only been available in the somewhat hard to find Shining Bright Off the Runway display at Walgreens. I wonder if Prosecco was a late addition to Shining Lights, as the display card shows a gold and there is no gold in the actual bottle lineup.



The next Christmas display I came across is SinfulColors Holi-Dazzled (more red and green, plus a Christmas tree and Santa hat). The lineup: Sugar Sugar, Decadent, Let's Talk, Hottie, Out of this World, Twilight Twinkles, Pine Away, and Galax-Sea. Twilight Twinkles and Galax-Sea are new; the others are all core or repromotes.



The SinfulColors Holiday Wishes display has snowflakes and presents and a gold and blue theme. Colors here: Gilded, Gold Medal, All About You, Cinderella, Ice Blue, Endless Blue, Super Star, and Ice Dream. None of these are new, but Ice Blue was previously limited release so I didn't have it already and was happy to get it.



And now you know everything I know about nail polish displays around here at the moment. See anything you'd like me to grab for a future giveaway?

Various Summer Brights Comparisons

I did a fair few comparisons when I swatched the L'Oreal Neons last month but my swatching boxes still had some brights that weren't in that shade range, so today I've got a few more comparisons showing different brands' takes on summer cremes.

Starting with bright pinks, I've got Orly Neon Heat (from this summer's Baked collection) and OPI Girls Love Ponies (from the Mustang collection).



What looks like a small difference in the bottle becomes much more pronounced on the nail, with the Orly being much brighter than the OPI—though the Orly is not quite neon despite the name; you can see that it doesn't dry to a satin finish like a true neon would. I used two coats of the Orly and three of the OPI, no topcoat; the OPI would have been two coats if I'd used a base, as the only reason I added the third was to disguise the ridges on my ring finger. Top to bottom: OPI, Orly, OPI, Orly.



In the orange red category, our contenders are Butter London Ladybird (Lolly Brights), OPI Race Red (Mustang), and NYC Carnival Red (City Samba).



Left to right below (two coats each):Butter London, OPI, NYC. These are very similar to each other, with the NYC being just a touch brighter. I actually liked the formula of the NYC the best, and since it's also the cheapest by a large margin, I'm declaring it the winner in this group.



I only had two medium pinks and two corals in my summer swatching boxes, so I put them together: Sally Hansen Summer Lovin' (from the new shades that showed up at Walgreens), Wet 'n' Wild Beat of a Generation (All Access Beauty), NYC Tropicoral (City Samba), and Sally Hansen Beach Redy (also Walgreens).



No dupes here. Top to bottom below: Summer Lovin' (3 coats), Beat of a Generation (2), Tropicoral (2), Beach Redy.



For light oranges, I have Julie G Old San Juan (Cruise), Maybelline Coral Heat (Bleached Neons), Essie Serial Shopper (2014 Neons), and Wet 'n' Wild Love Me Some Muscles (All Access Beauty).



No dupes here, either. Left to right (three coats of each): Julie G, Maybelline, Essie, Wet 'n' Wild. Julie G and Essie come closest to being a match, but the Julie G is definitely more yellow toned.



Moving on to bright lime greens, I've got three: OPI Life Gave Me Lemons (2014 Neons), Sparitual Firefly (Explore), and Maybelline Lime Accent (Bleached Neons).



Left to right below: OPI, Maybelline, Sparitual. The Sparitual is the brightest and most yellow-leaning. The Maybelline has a slightly more creamy, pastel look.



There were some medium greens in summer collections as well. I have these three: NYC Palm on the Beach (City Samba), Butter London Sozzled (Lolly Brights), and Wet 'n' Wild Contact High (All Access Beauty).



These are not at all alike, other than they're all green. Top to bottom: Butter London (2 coats), NYC (2), Butter London, Wet 'n' Wild (4). The Butter London is what I'd consider a true green. The NYC is leans more toward blue and also looks to have a touch of white in it. The Wet 'n' Wild is more yellow leaning and really could use some undies.



I will wrap up with a nail blogger fail moment. I took bottle shots of this next group, but neglected to get any photos of them on my nails. Duh. Left to right: Maybelline Day Glow Teal (Bleached Neons), Essie I'm Addicted (2014 Neons), Essie Vices Versa (2014 Neons), and OPI You Are So Outta Lime.