Christian Dior Shadow Swatches and Comparisons

I was intrigued when I heard that Dior was releasing Les Violets Hypnotiques, a collection of three purple polishes. I am all for more purple in the world. The most interesting of the three seemed to be Shadow, the true shimmer in the group (the other two are "almost cremes", with a very, very sparse dusting of tiny shimmer particles), so I grabbed that pretty much as soon as it showed up on the Nordstrom website. Here it is in the bottle, looking gorgeous, with copper and pink shimmer in a brownish plummy base.



On the nail, the shimmer is less prominent. This is two coats, no topcoat. I'm thinking I should reconsider my "no topcoat for swatches" general rule, since I'm wondering if a shiny finish would have brought out the shimmer more (and I almost always wear topcoat when I do a full mani). I just wonder if I have the patience for that (and how much topcoat I'd consume).





Being me, I have about eleventy hundred deep plum shimmers, so I pulled out four of them to do comparison. Left to right below: Wet 'n' Wild Megalast Disturbia (old bottle, but I believe this made the leap to the new bottle style when they did the most recent relaunch), Sally Hansen Complete Salon Manicure Problem Child, Dior Shadow, P2 Color Victim Rich, OPI Teasy Does It.



Left to right below: Shadow, Problem Child, Shadow, Disturbia (all two coats). In indirect light like this, Problem Child makes a great substitute for Shadow. Disturbia is not as close, as its shimmer blends into the base more than the other two.



Flash brings out the differences in the base and shimmer colors. Shadow's base has a brownish dusty quality to it that sets it apart.



Here's a close up of Problem Child just because I think it's pretty, with the fine purple shimmer and copper mini flakies.



Left to right below: Shadow, Rich, Shadow, Teasey Does It (all two coats). Rich is darker than Shadow, with bright purple highlights in its shimmer. Teasy Does It is more a wine color than Shadow's plum.



Here they are in the glare of the flash:



Teasy Does It actually does look a fair bit like Shadow looks in the bottle, despite being redder in tone; it just needs more dense shimmer.



Shadow's base color makes it unique among my deep plum shimmers, but given that there are alternatives that are fairly close (and the fact that the Dior is $23) I can't say it's a must have. (Well, no nail polish is a MUST, but you all know what I mean.)

P2 Cracks Up

More non-U.S. goodies today, this time from amused Polish who was kind enough to swap with me again even though I've had not one but two packages sent to her in previous swaps go astray (though the replacements did make it, it's just my successful delivery rate is way, way lower for Austria than any other place for some reason).



Left to right: P2 Color Victim Vibrant, P2 Crackling Top Coat Black Explosion, Isadora Grafitti Nails Masterpiece Pink, P2 Energetic Blue, Isadora Grafitti Nails Subway Green, P2 Crackling Top Coat Silver Blast, P2 Color Victim Trouble.

The blue in the center is in the cutest bottle; pick it up and there's a flower!



It was very hard to decide which of these to try first. I settled on Vibrant, a green creme that reminds me of OPI Jade is the New Black. It applied like a dream and only needed two coats.





Pretty as Vibrant was on its own, you know that with so many crackle options at my fingertips I was not going to be able to leave it alone. I used one coat of the shimmery P2 Silver Blast over the almost dry green and it sure did crack. I had such fun watching it transform. When it seemed to have stopped cracking, I put some top coat on to shine it up and smooth it out just a bit.





I hope the resurgence of crackling top coats in other countries means U.S. brands will bring them back soon, because they're a lot fun.