OPI Holland Collection - Swatches and Review

I've been somewhat slack recently on posting for one reason and one reason only...the Olympics were in London! I've been glued to my TV firmly clutching my Team GB flag throughout and I’ve also been lucky enough to go to a few events, with appropriately themed nails which I will be doing a post on soon but I've been a bit of a slow coach catching up on my other posts.

Anyway making a tenuous segue to a post on archive polishes today featuring OPI's Holland collection for Spring/Summer 2012. The Holland collection is one of their traditional collections themed around destinations. If you were supporting the Netherlands in the Olympics you were royally spoilt for choice with this collection. They seemed to go with pretty classic (and possibly a smidge stereotypical?) Dutch imagery – it feels very wind and water inspired with nods to windmills, tulips, cheese, canals and errr...Amsterdam nightlife in shade and name selection.

 

OPI Holland - Edited highlights (taken with Instagram)

Overall I really liked the shade selection in this collection but I only picked up four shades ( I Have a Herring Problem, Dutch Ya' Just Love OPI, I Don't give a Rotterdam and Wooden Shoe like to know) which are swatched below the break. I've also added a little bit about what I look for when picking out which shades to get as I'm interested to see how you guys make your choices.

OPI James Bond Collection

OPI updated their Facebook page on Thursday with some details of their Holiday 2012 collection which is a James Bond inspired collection.


OPI James Bond Collection - Picture from OPI Facebook page

 Colours left to right are: The Spy Who Loved Me, Casino Royale, You Only Live Twice, Die Another Day, Skyfall, GoldenEye, The World Is Not Enough, Moonraker, On Her Majesty's Secret Service, The Living Daylights, Live And Let Die, Tomorrow Never Dies


Apparently the collection will be available from 1st October in both the US and the UK. I love the idea of a James Bond collection because it makes for great polish names, although why no Goldfinger?? Possibly OPI are avoiding confusion with that one because as James Bond himself says -

 "Auric Goldfinger. Sounds like a French nail varnish"*

*geeky face

This will be the third year OPI have done a movie collaboration as their holiday collection (after Burlesque - 2010 and Muppets - 2011) and it's worth noting they've also done summer collections like Pirates of the Caribbean that were tie ins. I guess it must generate interest from both nail polish and film lover perspectives (of which I am both) but I'm not sure I'd normally buy a polish just because of a film tie in. I am susceptible to having a lemming for a shade when I've actually seen it worn on screen (take a bow Why Don't you love me video, Beyonce and Chanel's Nouvelle Vague!).

Colour wise I'm a bit undecided on these, they are very James Bond friendly - lots of gunmetal grey, red and the unavoidable gold - which is also kind of holiday/Christmas appropriate. Nothing hugely inspiring here though at first glance but I'm always hopeful swatches will show up something more unique. Currently it just feels very much like a rejigged OPI Switzerland collection. I love the fact the Living Daylights is a glitter but if it's another Rainbow Collection dupe I won't be bothering. Tomorrow Never Dies is the standout for me but again doesn't look terribly unique. Funnily enough I think in this case it is the names that will get me buying. I can just see myself wailing along to "Nobody does it better"** whilst painting my nails with "The Spy who Loved Me". So what do you think? Will you be swept away by James Bond this Christmas?

**Second best Bond theme ever, after We have all the time in the World - FACT

UPDATE !

OPI have added an update to their Facebook page with an additional shade "The Man with the Golden Gun" an 18-karat gold leaf top coat that will also be included in the collection in celebration of James Bond’s Golden Anniversary. 

OPI The Man with the Golden Gun - Photo from OPI's Facebook page 

Apparently this is the first time OPI has released this kind of polish. I think it looks great and provided it's cheaper than the Rococo Gold Leaf polish which retails at the princely sum of £35 (Space NK stock it) I may well pick it up. If it's the same or more then I might be frankening my own version with art supplies! No details of the base colour are given but if they are keeping with the James Bond Collection I'm assuming, based on the top photo, that it's Casino Royale maybe at a push Skyfall. I think it'll look great over the non glitter shades in this collection and it's both Christmas and James Bond friendly so I think this is probably a smart move by OPI. Plus it's a special effect polish that is NOT A SHATTER!! Well played OPI, well played....

Chanel Black Velvet and Chanel Illusion D'Or Swatches and review

Chanel Black Velvet and Chanel Illusion D'Or were released in Spring 2010 as part of Chanel’s Noir Et Or Paris-Shanghai Collection. The collection was a follow up to the Chanel Metiers D’Art fashion show in Shanghai. Apparently the show was intended to be a study of dark and light which mixed together different textures and reflected Coco Chanel's impression of Shanghai in the 1930's and 40's.


When I was checking the dates for this post I actually learnt some things I didn't know about the Metiers d'Art collections. Since 2002 Karl Lagerfeld has shown yearly Metiers d'Art collections  to recognise the work of the artisans who create those beautiful details that set Chanel apart. The show takes place in a different city each year spots have included Moscow, London and New York and of course Shanghai. The Chanel Paris-Moscou Metiers d'Art show resulted in the now infamous trio of polishes - Nuit De Russie, Feu De Russie and Or De Russie which Peter Philips created for the 2008 show. This year's Metier d'Art was the Paris-Bombay collection that gave is Diwali as seen in my previous post

Chanel Black Velvet Le Vernis

Chanel Black Velvet was, I believe, advertised as a true matte polish but as you can see it's not. It is however a perfect, buttery, satin finish black polish. It has some of the best application I used, super smooth amazing finish in two coats. The crystal detail was me testing some new nail art supplies I had, so a bit of unrelated extra. On a slightly random note I love the frosted bottle for this one, don't think they've done it for another polish but it really works here.

Chanel Le Vernis Illusion D'Or

Chanel Illusion D'Or was the polish that I think everyone was most excited about when the collection was released and for good reason. It's a truly stunning shimmering gold polish with round opalescent flakies. It's definitely a layering polish not a buildable glitter. You could try multiple coats but you'd have to waste a lot of polish before it was even close to opaque, besides I think it looks best over another polish as it is here.

Chanel Le Vernis Illusion D'Or  Close Up

It has a very fine warm gold shimmer base with a scattering of large gold particles. The final element are the round opalescent flakes which shimmer a range of colours from blue, through green to lilac. They shift and change colour as you move your nails so in the top swatch you can't necessarily see all of the flakes on the nail. In the bottle picture above you can get an idea of how many there are in the base and the range of colours.


There was a third polish in this collection was a medium gold called Gold Lamé which I didn't pick up as it didn't feel hugely unique to me. These were limited edition so if you want them you'll have to scour eBay.

Chanel Delight and Holiday Le Vernis - Swatches and Review

Chanel Le Vernis in Delight and Holiday

 These two are from a trio of polishes that are part of the Summertime de Chanel collection that’s currently in stores. The third polish in this collection is a shimmery pink beige called Island which is pretty but a very sheer pearly neutral so it wasn’t really for me. There are apparently dupes for these out there but clearly I have no self control so couldn’t resist!The collection was inspired by the summer sun and the colour palette definitely fits with that image. Neutrals, bronze-golds and orange brights are perfect summer desert island shades. I thought I’d only go for Holiday when I saw the promo pics but Delight was lovely too so I ended up getting both.  

Chanel Delight Le Vernis

Delight is like Graphite’s lighter bronze-gold little sister, it has that same super sparkly but non-gritty formula. Application with these kind of Chanel shades is a dream, really smooth with a perfect finish. This was only two coats but it's completely opaque. The base is a shimmery warm champagne gold with a hefty whack of bronze microglitter. It makes me think of sandy beaches and sunshine, definitely a beautiful summer shade. It has a similar base to Chanel Diwali (as reviewed here - Chanel Diwali) but Diwali has silvery glitter in place of Delight's warmer bronze tone. They are part of the same family but they are distinct shades so no dupes there. 

Chanel Le Vernis in Holiday

Apologies for the difference in photos here, I took this photo before I had my new camera and the Delight photo after so you'll  have to bear with my super pale zombie skin tone! Holiday is a bright medium orange that has a slight jelly feel. Application on this one was good too, this was three coats and dried to a great glossy finish. It's more opaque than the OPI Texas sorbet finish shades but it has a very definite jelly squishiness to it. I personally think it's great that Chanel decided to go with such different finishes for this collection. Chanel Island, the third shade in the trio is different again with more of a pearly frost finish. Whilst I loved April, May and June having three cremes in a collection wasn't the most interesting range ever. Chanel Holiday is a perfect, bright, beach pedicure colour and it's jelly feel makes it more unique among Chanel's so I think it's worth picking up too.

Overall I love both of these so should you be lucky enough to be going somewhere other than the UK that's hot and sunny, pack these two for your perfect holiday nails duo. If you are coming the UK I'd recommend something more wet weather...possibly Illamasqua Raindrops...we're getting a lot of that at the moment....

OPI Alice in Wonderland Collection

These were released way back in Spring 2010 but I'm slogging through all of my swatches trying to get them loaded up here rather than dotted around different blog platforms. These are the first of a series of archive posts trying to clear my backlog.

OPI's Alice in Wonderland Collection was released in conjunction with Tim Burton's film of the same name. There were four polishes but the ones I'm going to show you here are the glitters from the collection. There were two others - "Thanks so muchness!" a red shimmer and "Off with her red!" a tomato red creme - but I already had very similar ones in my stash so I passed on those.



OPI Mad as a Hatter



First up is Mad as a Hatter which is a silver based multicolour glitter. This was the first glitter polish I had that gave full coverage without needing a base colour. It has a medium silver glitter base with extra silver micro glitter and pretty much every other colour of medium sized glitter you could want. The best count I've been able to do has found pink, purple, green, turquoise, gold and orange, the close up swatch below gives you a better idea of just how many colours are in there.



OPI Absolutely Alice Close Up



It's still one of the best glitters I have in my collection, these pictures really can't capture just how sparkly it is. There are still a few bottles floating round out there so if you do manage to find one grab it while you can.



OPI Absolutely Alice



Absolutely Alice is another full coverage glitter, this time turquoise medium sized glitter with a scattering of gold. I've always assumed they used the traditional Disney interpretation of Alice as the inspiration for this shade with the bright blue of her dress and the yellow gold to represent her hair? Either way it's great, very sparkly and good coverage.

Some notes about the formula on these, they are pretty thick so you need to be careful during application so they don't clump and drag. They also chip pretty quickly if you don't use a heavy duty top coat so make sure you double up. Removing them is also a bit of a nightmare, as is often the case with glitters so you can either go the cotton wool soaked with acetone and covered with tinfoil route or just be prepared to go through a LOT of standard remover and have impressively sparkly cuticles. They do also lift off in one complete piece if you happen to be someone who picks at nail varnish but obviously none of you do that...right?....

Disclosure: This polish was bought with my own money

Models Own Hedonist with Ibiza Mix and Disco Heaven



Models Own Hedonist with Ibiza Mix and Disco Heaven



Hedonist (the base colour) is a bright neon red with a hint of coral, it looks like it leans more towards the coral here but trust me it’s very definitely at the red end of the spectrum. It’s a true neon so it dries matte but obviously the glitter top coats meant that was lost, although I did add a coat of Essie Matte about You to try and show the colours of the glitter off better. Coverage is pretty good, this was two coats and I didn’t really have any issues with streaks but it has the typical neon application which can be a bit thick in places.

Ibiza Mix is the large multi coloured glitter you can see, it’s a blend of small turquoise, pink, copper and gold glitter and larger hexagonal glitter in the same colours with a bit of extra teal-green thrown in for good luck. Application on this was fine as a one coat top layer as shown here but you may need to move some of the glitter around to get the effect you want.
Disco Heaven is a fine gold glitter with a scattering of opalescent blue glitter. It’s actually really pretty and gives good scattered coverage on the nail with one coat.

Dupes? - I don’t have anything for these (which was why I felt ok splashing out!) but I’m pretty sure Hedonist has a match out there. There are some posts out there querying whether Ibiza Mix is a dupe for OPI Rainbow Connection. I have both and to my mind it’s really not. The effect in terms of sizes and shapes of glitter is very similar but the colour bases are different, I promise you. Rainbow Connection is the colourful, silver based sister with bright green, orange, yellow and cerise versus Ibiza Mix which is the pastel, gold based sister with the more subtle tones. I also think Ibiza Mix may have a very, very slight grey toned base but it makes zero difference on the nail. If I had to pick I think Ibiza Mix wins for me.

The only thing I have that’s even in the same ball park as Disco Heaven is the limited edition Chanel Illusion D’Or. The Chanel is much, much subtler (and prettier in my opinion) but DH is a possible substitute if you have a lemming that just won’t go away. I’ll do some side by side comparisons to show the differences when I get a chance.

All of these are part of the Models Own Hed Kandi collection that’s available now on their website and in stores now.

Disclosure: I bought this polish myself and have no involvement with the brand

Quick note on this post. My point and shoot camera had finally given up the ghost so had to take this with an Iphone hence the dodgy focus and slight lighting issues. I originally posted this review on my tumblr - http://www.theboxesunderthebed.tumblr.com/