A-England is a relatively small British brand that is the brainchild of Adina Bodana. All of her polishes are based on English myths and legends. Her first collection - The Mythicals - was named for the legends of King Arthur and his court. The Legend is based on the story of George and the Dragon with all of the polishes named after different elements of the legend. The collection has seven polishes - St George, Dragon, Ascalon, Princess Sabra (Tristam Eyes), Bridal Veil, Princess Tears and Order of the Garter. I've swatched the first three here, all of them are scattered holos with great formulas that are slightly on the thicker side. These were all two coats but you can definitely get away with one.
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| A-England Ascalon |
Ascalon is apparently the name of St. George's sword/lance although apparently that was a later addition that wasn't in the original text alongside the Princess first being identified as Sabra. Either way it's a great name for this polish which has a steely lavender base with scattered holo with a LOT of duochrome. You see how it looks more green towards my cuticle then shifts to pinkish by the nail tip? That's not the holo effect, it's the duochrome and it's amazing. Whenever I wear this I spend a significant amount of time doing the duo finger dance* it's really stunning.
* Duo finger dance - point your nails away, now point them back, now wiggle your fingers, now repeat
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| A-England Dragon |
Dragon for um, the Dragon. Dusty leafy green base with a strong bronze flash and more of that gorgeous scattered holo. I assume this is meant to be a play on the idea of the dragon's scales, that's certainly what it reminds me of. The bronze flash adds a kind of armoured element to the idea, you can see it best up the right side of the bottle, that's not just sunlight it's actually the bronze shining through. Definitely puts me in mind of a reptile basking in the sun but maybe that's just me......
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| A-England St. George |
St. George for, well, you know. This is also stunning (are you sensing a theme here?) it's a deep teal based forest green with scattered holo. I always slightly wondered why Adina went for another green on this one. Don't get me wrong it's totally gorgeous but I've always associated dark green with the Dragon, although Dragon the polish works very well in evoking the lizardy-scaley feel as I said above. I wonder if I've missed an association somewhere? I guess I was expecting maybe a red or something like the St. George's cross? There is already a red metallic in the Mythicals collection (Perceval) but a deep dark red holo here would have worked well.
Overall these are fantastic and I'd recommend them to anyone with a lemming for holos or just a love for good formula. I love a polish (and a brand!) that tries to capture the feel of the shade with the name (or vice versa). These feel genuinely mystical and Legen..wait for it...dary*
* ©B.Stinson
The rest of the collection are beautiful scattered holos like the three swatched here apart from Order of the Garter which is apparently a bright blue glass fleck. I also have Princess Sabra which is an olive toned gold holo but the UK weather is conspiring to thwart any chance I have of getting a sunlight picture of that one. If I ever get a chance I'll swatch that too and update the post.
These were released a while ago but my slow shift to blogger following various Tumblr misadventures means I'm only swatching them now. You can purchase them via the A-england website - http://www.a-england.co.uk/
Disclosure: I bought these with my own pennies, yay me!
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