Displays from a Few Summer Days in Canada

Today I'm finally wrapping up with the displays I saw on my early summer travels; these are the ones from Canada that I saw when I was there for IEC (and later for lunch and shopping in Windsor, which the border agent I encountered crossing back into the US seemed to find suspicious—travel to Canada twice in less than a week? what kind of American was I? Sigh.)

The first store I stopped at when I crossed the border was Rexall. There I saw a display for Cutex, specifically New Cutex Expert Care Manicure Solutions. Because I am old, I remember Cutex from back in the day, when it was a cheap drugstore brand that I bought with babysitting money. These new polishes are not cheap: 9.99 Canadian. The display I saw had slots for nine colors, eight of which were occupied when I got there. Front row: Walking on a Clound, Two Dozen Roses, Flower Pout, Pop the Prosecco. Back row: Lipstick Jungle, Passion Ignites, Fiery Temper. Much as I like to collect new brands and bottles, I skipped all of these on account of boringness. I have seen pictures of more interesting shades in this line, but I did not run across them on my trip. The rest of the display was filled with nail treatments, top coat, lotion, and remover.



I'm always happy to see an Essence display, even if all the polish is core shades, like in this Next Stop Summer shelf top I spotted at the Shoppers Drug Mart next door to the Rexall. Polish colors here: Sweet As Candy, Play With My Mint, Jeans On, #Lucky.



The GOSH display at Shoppers made me sad; three whole sections of makeup with one tiny tiny section for nail stuff, and not even any fun colors.



I haven't seen any new polish from L'Oreal in the US since last summer, so was extra happy to see the Le Vernis à L'Huile, which is oil polish (similar to the Sally Hansen Color Therapy, I'm thinking) in bottles that have a sort of quilted/segmented design, which is very attractive to my eyes. Wish we had these in the States, for sure. I first saw them in a shelf top display at a Shoppers. Shades here: L'Or, Café de Nuit, Moka Chic, Greige Amoureux, Gris Décadent, Vert Absynthe, Cobalt Indécent, Bleu Royal, Violet De Nuit. There were also Colour Riche Press-On Nails in the Moon About You design here; I thought at first they'd been just set there randomly, but there were slots in the display for those boxes, so apparently they belonged.



I'd mentioned seeing these to mrsrexy when we met up at IEC and she said there were more colors; sure enough when we popped into a Shoppers near the IEC venue, there they were in the nail polish aisle, tucked in among all the other brands. Top row: Crystal, Blanc de Lune, Nude Demoiselle, Dimanche Après-Midi, Jardin de Roses, Rose Ballet, Nymphea, Fuchsia Palace, Violet Vendôme. Second row: Coral Trianon, Chérie Macaron, Orange Triomphe, Rouge Sauvage, Carmin Parisien, Rubis Folies, Violet de Nuit, Grenat Irréverent, Noir Noir. Bottom row: Vert Epoque, Cobalt Indécent, Bleu Royal, Vert Absinthe, Gris Décadent, Greige Amoureux, Moka Chic, L'Or, Café de Nuit.



This Quo by Orly Color Amp'd display was mostly bare when I saw it, but I still thought it interesting to see the no-light gel was in this brand as well.



In the core aisle at Shoppers, I saw Quo by Orly Breathable polish, which seemed to be same shades we got in Orly Breathable in the States.



I was intrigued by the Revlon Spring Love by Maripier Morin display as it's been ages since I saw anything new from Revlon back home, but it turned out that these were not all new, and the ones I didn't recognize were not exciting. The caps did have pretty wraps on them, though. Colors here: Knockout, Valentine, Gray Suede, Urban, Eclectic.





I saw two Sally Hansen Complete Salon Manicure displays. First was for the Spring Collection 2017. Shades here: Stellar Style, Pink Pong (positions of these first two, World is My Oyster (marked new), What in Carnation, Dream Boat, Tropic Thunder. Display also had Dry and Go Drops.



The other was Beachside Bride, which had a different lineup than the ones in the States: Sweet Talker, Crush on Blue, Mauvin' on Up (marked new), Let's Snow, Gleam Supreme, Raisin the Bar. Also had Complete Care 7-in-1 treatment.



I've seen peel-off polish in the States before, and the Sensational brand, but not Sensational Peel Off polish, which again was a Shoppers find. Left to right: White Now, Wednesday We Wear Pink, The Okay Coral, Mermaid in the Shade, Lilac & Relax, Blue My Mind,



In a different Shoppers, I saw a different Sensationail Peel Off display; this one had more autumnal palette overall compared to the spring/summer look of the first one. Shades here: I Pink I'm in Love, Plum-p It Up, Winosaur (hah!), You Had Me at Merlot, Stop Metalling in My Business, Take Black the Night.



I was tempted by the Vitry Nail Repair Treatment at Rexall, as my nails too often look like the before photo, but I wasn't willing to part with $21 Canadian to take a chance that it would work better than all the other stuff I've tried.



I really I could make an effort to get up to Canada from Idaho; it's not that much farther than when I was in Michigan, but here there isn't a bustling place like Windsor on the other side, so pretty much I'd hit up the one Shoppers in town and be done with my nail polish hunting. Still, those L'Oreal L'Huile bottles are there, so maybe.

Revlon Sahara Escape Meeets Quo Art Scene

It always makes me happy when I look in my swatching boxes and see collections waiting that just seem to want to be together. Thus it was with Revlon Sahara Escape and Quo Art Scene. They each contain four polishes, the colors of which coordinate between the brands so well it was like they'd planned it.



Starting at the left of the photo above, I paired Revlon Wild Flower, a limited edition medium pink creme, with Quo Abstract. Abstract has a mix of white, pink, light orange, lilac, and perwinkle glitter that includes bars, squares, and very small dots in a clear base.



I did one thick coat of Wild Flower and topped it on three fingers with one coat of Abstract, adding clear topcoat even though the glitter wasn't especially bumpy. I did have to do a bit of fishing to convince the square glitters to leave the bottle.





Revlon Serene, a light brown creme new to the core lineup, got matched with Quo Contemporary, which has tiny white dots, small black hexes, black bars, and medium sized light orange hexes in a clear base.



Serene took two coats, then I put one thick coat of Contemporary on three nails followed by clear topcoat. The bar glitter in Contemporary is sparse enough that it could easily be avoided if you're not into that.





The next duo is Revlon Sizzling Coral, a limited edition light reddish orange creme, and Quo Graffiti. This glitter topper has black bars, small red and black hexes, and medium light orange and blue hexes.



I did three coats of Sizzling Coral and one plus a few dabs of Graffiti on all but the accent nail before adding clear topcoat. I should have forgone the extra dabs, as they made the glitter layer too thick for my taste. Next time I do two thin coats of Graffiti.





The last pair consists of Revlon Ethereal, a white creme new to the core line, and Quo Pop, which has small hexes in black, red, and pale wheaten yellow along with medium sky blue hexes and black bars.



Ethereal is a soft white rather than a stark one, more of a crelly than a creme. I used thee coats of it, bumped my middle nail and thought I'd repaired the smudge well enough that the glitter would cover it for photos (wrong), and added 1 thick coat of Pop plus clear topcoat.





Once I knew Ethereal was on the sheer side, I had to try making some glitter sandwiches with it. I laid down two coats of Ethereal, then added one Quo glitter to each finger, finishing with one more coat of Ethereal.





I'm glad I had the Quo glitters to match up with the Revlon, as taken on its own, that quartet is too plain for my taste. I do like Ethereal, as it's well behaved for a white crelly, and can be worn on its own or layered so I'll get more use out of it than the other three which are just plain cremes. I get wanting to add a neutral like Serene to the core line, but why make the two limited edition colors here basic shades? Surely a shot of golden shimmer in Sizzling Coral would have fit with the Sahara Escape theme and made the look much more interesting. Then I'd ditch the pink entirely and do a juicy blood orange glass flecked shimmer instead. And then probably the collection would sell even less well than it has (I saw a full display when I was out at lunch today despite this being a spring collection) because the masses want pink.

A blood orange shimmer wouldn't have made a great base for Quo Abstract so maybe it's just as well Revlon went for pink, at least for the purposes of this post of mine. Of course I have tweaks I'd like to make to the Quo quartet as well. It surprised me that my favorite was Abstract, which has the most bar glitter, which I'm still not a huge fan of. I think there's just so much of it that it blends together, and the way the squares have the same strong angles probably helps, too. Contemporary has a slight Halloween vibe to it with the orange and black, but I don't know what other color I'd put in place of the light orange. I like the color mixes in Graffiti and Pop but do not care for the bar glitter in them. It's so long that it's verging on being string glitter, my least favorite kind of glitter. If the bars were shorter, I'd like them better.

Nail Polish Displays Across the Border Edition

Despite living less than an hour from Canada, I hadn't been over there in a long time until this past Saturday morning, when I headed south (yes, south; to get from Detroit to Windsor, Ontario you head south; those particular Canadians are not in fact my "neighbors to the north") to meet up with mrsrexy (a.k.a. the Canadian Nail Fanatic) and nailXchange (whose blog is on hiatus, more's the pity). We converged on Leamington for a craft show at which there would be nail polish, Girly Bits, to be specific. I arrived a little early and in the process of looking for an ATM drove by the big Heinz plant and the welcome to Leamington sign which proclaimed it as the Tomato Capital of Canada.



I did find an ATM and was inordinately fascinated by the 20 dollar bills which came out of it—I hadn't seen, much less touched, these updated bills with the holographic queen and tower on a embedded plastic ribbon. Money you can see your nails through that's also got holo accents? Sign me up!



The craft show was at a community center which also houses an ice rink, so I got to watch part of a youth hockey game before the other ladies arrived—that felt very Canadian. When mrsrexy and nailXchange got there we did a quick tour of the show floor and found not only Girly Bits but also a Konad booth in amongst the knitting and quilting and jewelry and foodstuffs and decorative home accessories and other crafty items. We then left to go eat lunch; we could have eaten there at the rec center but the selection wasn't that great and besides, leaving the building meant we could go to the beauty supply in town, where they had some Pupa displays. I don't think I've ever seen a Pupa display in person before. The two I got photos of were called Jeans n' Roses and 50s Dream.





Then we went to lunch and after eating took the mandatory nail photo. You might recognize my green and black Maybelline Nail Falsies in the lower left. nailXchange was sporting the pink stamped look on the right, and mrsrexy had a glittery blue stamped with white (the glitter is not showing here but trust me it was very sparkly in person).



My main credit card had been declined at the beauty supply store (yeah, I bought some of those Pupa colors) but that didn't concern me since that bank often shuts me off when I leave home and I'd forgotten to call them to tell them I'd be in Canada. During lunch I called and yes, they had blocked my account but I navigated the automated system and verified things and got the message that it was unblocked. I went to pay for lunch; it was blocked again. I called the bank again and spoke to a person this time. A rude person who told me they could not unblock it and were canceling my card and sending me a new one and when I questioned this, told me I needed to stop interrupting him. I hung up and paid cash for lunch. I called the bank back and spoke to a different person who tapped away on her keyboard and told me I was good to go. Just in case I was not, I hit another ATM on our way back to the show—more plastic holo queen money for me. Back at the show, I happily spent that cash on Girly Bits. It was so fun to be able to pick up the bottles and swatch sticks and nail wheels and ponder all the pretty colors before deciding which ones needed to come home with me.



I didn't get anything at the Konad booth since I barely use the stamping stuff I already have but it was interesting to look at all the different products she had. I did get a couple things to take home to Mr. K and few non-polish things for me, too. All too soon the show was closing and we had to part ways, heading home in opposite directions. On my way out of town, I took a small detour to see Lake Erie—seemed silly to be a couple blocks away and not go look.



It was the same theory that led me to stop at Shoppers Drug Mart in Windsor—I was driving right by, might as well stop. One of the first things I came across when I went in was a Cover Girl Hunger Games display that wasn't like any of the variations I'd seen in the U.S. This one had five of the polish colors and slots for four designs of nail stickers (of which three were there, including two I'd not seen before).



There was a GOSH Christmas display which included a five piece set of Oh My GOSH polishes



There were sets of adorable mini bottles of Quo by Orly; the 18 piece one shown below and two different 6 piece ones (Sugar, with pastels, and Spice, with bolder colors).



And look here—Quo by Orly 3D Nail Art Stickers; I wanted many, but only bought one in case these are the type that doesn't last on me (my credit card I'd called and called about did not work at checkout, so I used my other card, which is from a bank that doesn't seem to care where I go):



At Rexall, I saw my first Kit brand display.



They also had a smaller display that oddly covered up most of the bottle where the color shows; I guess these are the shy shades.



It was a fun day, and I hope it won't be too long before we get to do something similar again.