OPI Spring 2012 'Holland' Collection - Sneak Preview!

Top Row L-R:  Gouda Gouda Two Shoes, Wooden Shoes Like to Know It, I Don't Give a Rotterdam, A Roll In The Hague, Petal Faster Suzi, Dutch Ya Just Love OPI

Bottom Row L-R: Thanks a WindMillion, Red Lights Ahead...Where?, Kiss Me On My Tulips, Vampsterdam, I Have a Herring Problem, & Did You Hear About Van Gogh?

Yep, it's that time already... spring and summer polish collections are starting to be revealed - where does the time go?! I'm loving that OPI haven't gone for all pastel shades, it looks like a more diverse collection and I salute them for that... and also their fantastic naming choices (they're SO good with this)! Got to say, I am LOVING the look of at least 8 of them in that photograph. Will find out more very soon for you all!

Do we likey? x

Nicki Minaj Exclusive Polish Collection For OPI!

L-R: Super Bass Shatter, Metallic 4 Life, Save Me, Fly, Did It On 'Em, Pink Friday

OPI have teamed up with Nicki Minaj for a new collection due for release in January (much the same as it was with their very popular Katy Perry collaboration at the beginning of this year). I'm very excited about this collection, especially the glittery/metallic shades; although I have noticed that the stock image of Pink Friday (see below, I've edited them together, into the same colour order) looks a LOT different both in terms of the texture of the polish and also the colour too. The image above was from OPI's Facebook page so I expect that this image is the more accurate of the two, which is a shame as I kinda liked the other one better!

What do you think, are you liking the look of this collection? Got anything in your 'must have' list already?

OPI Holiday 2011 - The Muppets Collection!

Last year's Christmas saw the incredible Burlesque range from OPI - a collection that I ended up buying every polish from (along with the Switzerland collection from slightly earlier too but shhh we won't mention that)! This year, we have... The Muppets, a collection that again looks like it’s going to cost me lots of money (again). I know sparkle and glitter are not to everybody’s taste, but to me they are my weakness, like shiny things to a magpie – especially at Christmas, which would be my absolute favourite time of year if it wasn’t for the dark nights and crap weather that comes with it!

What do you think of the collection? Do you love or hate the look of it?

I’ll be back with some swatches as soon as I can!

OPI Serena Glam Slam - Rally Pretty Pink & Red Shatter (Pic Heavy)!

If you were a fan of ORLY’s Cosmic FX range then the new OPI/Serena Williams ‘Rally Pretty Pink’ polish will be right up your street! It has the same duo-chromatic qualities and the same kind of finish too!

I have to say, I love these finishes and I can sit looking at them for ages... even days after application. This is especially the case with these types as when the sun or any light catches them they sparkle and glisten beautifully.

The shade shows mostly as a definite pink on the promotional photographs but actually in reality I find it’s very a gold-y shade for the most part – of course this can also depend on your surroundings and lighting too as these can have a huge effect on the colours it reflects. You do get flashes of pink and even purple in there, but to my eye there are definitely a lot of gold tones in there.

This shows the pinky purple colour flashes best!

This post is picture heavy for this reason, as the light caught it in so many different ways, I couldn’t not show you them all!

The swatches show 4 coats but I could have managed with 3 and the wear time has been great, I'm on day 4.5 with minimal tip wear and a slight chip where I scraped it against the metal part of my desk by accident that was easily hidden because of the nature of the polish and its finish!

I wouldn’t say the shade instantly makes me think ‘SUMMER’ but it does look beautiful in the sunlight as mentioned, and doesn’t look out of place when wearing it in the summer either. Plus, with it being so spangley, I think would also be a perfect polish for the Christmas party season too – especially with the red shatter over the top!

The red shatter is lovely, and it isn’t quite as matte as the black shatter either, which is a good thing for me... and also good when using it with the Rally Pretty Pink polish too as I wouldn’t normally use a topcoat with this kind of polish finish!

It shatters well, leaving plenty of the polish underneath still showing, but to me appears a bit darker than I expected it to be – it’s not a bad thing though, it still looks great and possibly would appear lighter on top of a different polish (I shall experiment and post up as a NOTD feature)!

Available as a set from Lena White for £20.50!

Swatches: OPI Touring America (I Eat Mainly Lobster, Honk If You Love OPI & Uh-Oh Roll Down The Window), Plus Silver Shatter!

I received a lovely package containing 3 of the OPI Touring America (autumn 2011) shades, and also Silver Shatter from the upcoming Pirates collection (spring/summer 2011). I absolutely adore the shades I have been sent, I’m just not sure if I can wait until autumn to get my hands on about 6 more shades from the collection haha! I decided to swatch them all together as to be quite honest, I just couldn’t wait to get them on my nails!

My absolute favourite from the 3 shades I received has to be ‘I Eat Mainly Lobster’ and I am so pleased I have it as I have no doubt that it’s going to be one of my favourite summer shades this year! The polish is a little bit more on the pink side than my camera has shown it to be, a perfect bright coral shade with tiny speckles of gold shimmer running through it – absolutely gorgeous! It did take 4 coats to get it perfect but it is SO worth it!

 

 Close up:

 ‘Uh-Oh Roll Down The Window’

 

This is a murky olive green, a perfect shade for autumn, I feel. This was good to go in about 3 fairly thin coats but could get away with 2 slightly thicker coats! I love this colour but I think it would be even more amazing if they had the same gold shimmer running through – that would be the icing on the cake for me, although I’m more than happy to wear it as it is, anyway!

‘Honk If You Love OPI’

This is a beautiful deep grapey purple – I do love my dark polishes when we get to autumn and winter and this is no exception. It needed a good 3 coats, possibly even 4 depending on how thick you do each coat but again it’s well worth it. I have numerous dark purple shades but this one is different yet again, well worth having even if you do have a collection of deep purples already (in my opinion anyway, although I am a bit of an addict)!

 

All 3 shades (sorry there's so many, the light catches them differently in each one):

 

 

Silver Shatter is from the Pirates Of The Caribbean collection for spring/summer 2011 and will be out in May but I thought I’d include it with these since a) it came with them in the package and b) it looked especially good over I Eat Mainly Lobster once applied! I love this shatter; it’s kind of foil-y and metallic which I think would work well over all kinds of polish colours.

I hope they bring out a gold to match as I think this kind of finish works so, so well with a shatter polish – it certainly makes a change from the matte finish crackle effect polishes!

I found it ever so slightly harder to work with, but got used to it fairly quickly - I worked from my little finger towards my thumb and I think you can see it has crackled better from my middle finger to my thumb in the pictures below?!

 

 

What do you think of them, do you likey? x

Disclosure: PR Sample

OPI Pirates Of The Caribbean Swatches, Part 2: Mermaid's Tears & Stranger Tides!

A little later than I had hoped, and also less photos than I wanted to do (none with the bottle done outside as it was so, so cold that my hands could take no more – you may be able to tell from the pictures) but I think these show the colours fairly well anyway. Excuse the manicure; it’s not the greatest as I hadn’t tidied up after painting them.

The polish scent reminded me a bit of pear drops – weird! Anyway I found that I needed 3 coats with each of these shades, but gave 4 to be on the safe side. Out of the 2 I think Mermaid's Tears was probably the more opaque one, even though they had the same amount of coats in the end – I just think you could possibly get away with 2 thicker coats if you were in a rush with this.

Drying time was very reasonable and they do seem to last well on the nail – even without topcoat! Also I’d say that whilst the photos show quite true to colour, they’re possibly just a little murkier in real life... nothing too drastic though, in my opinion.

L-R Mermaid's Tears, Stranger Tides (With flash):

 

 No flash:

 L-R Mermaid's Tears, Stranger Tides, Planks A Lot, Sparrow Me The Drama (With flash):

Disclosure: PR Sample

OPI Pirates Of The Caribbean Swatches, Part 1: Planks A Lot & Sparrow Me The Drama!

Happy birthday to me! I’m 30 today – not particularly loving the fact that I have now officially left my twenties, but I’m still planning on having a bloody good day to make something about this birthday happy.

Anyway moving onto the real reason for this post... which is that I’ve now got my hands on 4 of the OPI Pirates of the Caribbean collection (which I have been very excited about) so can now swatch them for you; although I’ve decided to do the swatches of the shades I have from this collection in 2 separate posts.

This is firstly because I didn’t want to overload one post with lots of pictures of all 4 shades, and also because I had difficulty getting the colours to show accurately on the pictures, so I’m going to have to redo the greens (Stranger Tides & Mermaid’s Tears) later on, or tomorrow, but up first we have ‘Planks A Lot’ (purple-y) and ‘Sparrow Me The Drama’ (pink). Please excuse my cuticles, they’re not in the greatest condition, nor is my manicure the best I've ever done - but we're not looking at that anyway as it's the colours that are of interest here, non? :-)

No Flash:

 Flash:

Actually, even though I have redone these photos I still think that ‘Planks A Lot’ especially isn’t showing true to colour in some of the pictures; it is actually a little bit darker, and with slightly less of a blue tinge to it than the photos show it to have. If pushed I guess I’d describe it as a grape-y grurple. I found that this needed 3 coats (not too thick) but I gave it 4 to be on the safe side.

No Flash:
 

Flash:

Also, ‘Sparrow Me The Drama’ is again slightly darker than the photos show and a little duskier too. This was pretty opaque at 2 coats, but I gave it 3 just to be sure. It looks a bit patchy in the pictures but I think that’s just the way the light/flash is reflecting off it as it doesn’t look like that now, and it didn’t when I was taking the pictures either.

I love both these shades; they’re girly but still have an edginess to them that stops them from being overly pink and fluffy. I can’t wait to try the Silver Shatter over the top of them.

Available from May, priced £10.50 each at http://www.lenawhite.co.uk/

Disclosure: PR Sample