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

A-England - The Legend Collection

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.



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



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......



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!