Revenons aux bases avec Butter London

Bonjour tout le monde! Oui, je sais, vous attendez en trépignant d'impatience le résultat du casting pour le swap, je m'en occupe au plus vite, mais j'attends encore une réponse qui est en retard par ma faute, donc il va falloir patienter mais promis je vous dis ça avant ce soir avec la suite des opérations.

Pour le moment, je vous avais promis une deuxième partie suite à l'article SNB de dimanche pour vous montrer mes autres bases et top-coats vu que mon article était déjà très long. On commence par les bases, je suis assez "classique": outre la Nail Foundation de Butter London que je vous ai montré dimanche, j'ai une base Orly Bonder pour les vernis à risque de tache, et une Aqua Base de Nfu Oh pour les vernis holo et tous les vernis qui sèchent très vite (les mates et les chromes).

 Passons maintenant aux top-coats. La star, c'est le Hardwear de Butter London, qui est pour moi aussi efficace et "bénin" que le Poshé, donc je passe de l'un à l'autre selon les dispo et je vous les recommande: séchage rapide, super brillant, rien à dire. Alors oui, il peut arriver que certains vernis rétrécissent sous un vernis à séchage rapide, pour ça il faut essayer "d'enrober" la pointe des ongles avec le top-coat.

 

ça briiiiillle!!!

Ensuite on a les top-coats à effet avec le Nfu Oh 38, le Matte About You d'Essie, le Wireless et le Ghoulish Glow de China Glaze.

Alors évidemment, j'me suis trompée, j'ai inversé le 38 et le Wireless sur mes doigts

Wireless est un top coat holographique mais c'est vrai qu'autant il y a quelques années c'était une merveille, autant il a mal vieilli et on dispose maintenant de tellement de superbes vernis holo qu'il fait un peu pâle figure. Matte About You est très connu, c'est un t-c matifiant, et Nfu Oh 38 est un top-coat flakies arc-en-ciel. Quand à Ghoulish Glow, c'est un top-coat phosphorescent que  j'ai montré ici (aïe les vieilles photos minis et flous avec ongles trop longs :p).

Pour finir cet article, je vais parler du fantastique coffret Backstage Basics de Butter London. Dès que Camille a commencé sa collaboration avec Butter London, je l'ai harcelée, littéralement, pour qu'elle prenne ce coffret. Pourquoi? Parce que je connaissais déjà l'excellence du top-coat Hardwear, que  je voulais tester la base, et que ce coffret est un fantastique rapport qualité prix: un top-coat, une base, un vernis, une lime et un petit flacon de dissolvant pour à peine le prix du t-c et de la base!
Je me suis donc ruée dessus dès qu'il a montré son nez dans la Pshiiit Boutique.

Comme toujours, le design est vraiment très sympa, mélange de graphique par les lignes des flacons et d'adorablement suranné par les clichés so British des couronnes, des fleurs et autres touches kitsch. Je vous ai sciemment caché le vernis qui se trouvait dans mon coffret (parce que oui, cerise sur le gâteau, le vernis inclus est au choix!), parce que je l'ai offert à Thilwen pour son anniversaire et je lance donc une opération de harcèlement bloggesque pour qu'elle le montre sur son blog, allez-y, lâchez-vous!!!

Donc, outre la base et le top-coat dont je vous ai parlé, la lime est très sympa avec sa forme courbe et ses deux faces qui sont douces et efficaces pour une lime carton. Quant au dissolvant, comme dirait Camille "il sent la vieille poule", et je suis assez d'accord, l'odeur "poudrée" n'est pas top, mais je trouve le format super pratique: je nettoie mes manucures au pinceau et donc avoir un petit flacon pour tremper mon pinceau et pouvoir l'essorer sur le bord.
En conclusion, ce coffret, je l'ai voulu, je l'ai attendu et j'en suis 400% satisfaite. Vu que la Pshiiit Boutique est fermée, je ne sais pas s'il y est toujours dispo (je sais qu'il était soldé), mais je vous le recommande chaudement!

A tout à l'heure pour des nouvelles du swap!!

OPI New York City Ballet - Pirouette My Whistle & comparisons

We finally reach the last instalment for my presentation of OPI NYC Ballet collection. As you know if you've looked the collection up, there are two other shades, one beige pink and one sharper pink that I don't have. I wanted to try the formula with unusual colours but now I admit that I'll probably get Barre my Soule at some point, because as much as I like OPI Bubble Bath's colour, I hate the streakiness. But that's another story. Now to the last bottle of the mini-set, the glitter top-coat Pirouette My Whistle. You've seen it layered on other shades, so I'm going straight to what makes this t-c special. I thought it would be a dupe to my H&M Confetti Kisses, but as you can see below, it's not the case at all.

 

 

 

The theory is the same, but the hex glitter in Confetti Kiss are silver, pure and simple, like little foil leaves, while the glitter in Pirouette my Whistle is more of a matte/milky silver quality, which makes it very delicate and really suited to the collection it belongs too. I love them both, and I think that a full-size bottle of PmW is likely to end up in my Helmer sooner or later.

To finish this review, I added below a comparison of Don't Touch my Tutu with two other non-opaque whites that I have, Essie Waltz on the left and Urban Decay Love Train on the right, all in two coats.

Love Train is shimmery/frosty so it's quite different, but Waltz and DTMT are really close in colour and texture, the only difference being that Waltz is streaky and DTMT isn't... So if you love Essie Waltz but would love a better application, I really recommend the OPI!!

I had intended to post this earlier so if I want to stick to my schedule, I'll be publishing another message this afternoon (lucky girls) to tell you about my meeting with a star! From now on, I will also switch the languages in my post, putting the French first: my French readers now far outnumber my English-speaking ones, and it seems only fair to make things more comfortable for the majority, I hope you won't be too mad at me...

My Manicure Part 4 - cuticle removers, base coats and topcoats

Sooo, final part of my manicure products. Now we're leaving the realm of treatments to deal with products that are specific to manicures and have to be used when you want to polish your nails.

First thing is pushing back cuticles. Cuticles are a barrier between the outside and your nail matrix so they are necessary to avoid infections, but they are not very aesthetic and pushing them back will make polish application and clean-up easier. But this operation requires a lot of delicacy and good products.

First is Blue Cross Cuticle Remover, which I have in a big bottle and use in this smaller one. It's quite potent and while I've read that some people were using it with the scrapping end of a metallic cuticle pusher, my nails are too fragile and I just use a plastic one. This stuff literally melts the dead skin of your cuticles but as I'll tell you later, it might need to be used in combination with another product. Moreover, it's ridiculously cheap, less than 5$ for 32oz.





I also had the occasion to test LM Cosmetic cuticle remover and oddly enough, I would say that this and Blue Cross are complementary: LM is really good for pushing back cuticles, which will then be scrapped easily with Blue Cross. With Blue Cross alone, if your cuticles are a bit grown on the nail, you might hurt yourself when scrapping, while if you push them back first, the result will be clean and perfect.

Once your cuticles are pushed back, it's time for the basecoat. While my nails were still fragile, I tried to reduce buffing them to a minimum, and my ridges were quite visible, so I took to using a ridge-filler basecoat. I tried Zoya's and OPI's but was disappointed, while China Glaze's is perfect. It dries to a smooth satin finish and since it's slightly coloured, it's perfect for French manicure or to wear bare, it makes your nails natural but better! However, I found out after some months of use that it didn't protect the nail against stains and my nails had gotten yellow. So now I keep it only when I do a French manicure.

On a daily basis, I now use Orly Bonder, a rubberized top-coat that improve the adherence of polish and is known to prevent staining. I have indeed noticed quite a difference and whenever I decided to keep a manucure for some days (which, I admit, doesn't happen often), I saw an improvement too, my polish didn't chip.

Once base and polish are applied, a manucure is finished with a top-coat. It can serve several purposes, but the main one is a glossy finish and helping your manicure last longer.

Seche Vite is one of the most popular top-coats out there. Highly glossy, fast-drying, you can finish up a manicure and walk away five minutes later without any fear of smudges. However it has a couple of drawbacks: if there's a difference of consistency between the top-coat and the polish (one of the two being significantly thicker or thinner than the other), it'll make your polish shrink. It also has a tendency to thicken quite quickly too, you need to invest in a bottle of Seche Restore to keep it manageable. Finally, it's not known to help your manicure last longer.

If you want to have a long-lasting manicure, LM Cosmetic top-coat is one of the solutions, but since nothing can be perfect, it's not fast drying!!

Finally, Orly Polyshield will also give you a long-lasting manicure but the application is not perfect, it can leave bubbles.










So while I'm aware of its flaws, Seche Vite remains my favourite top-coat. It's quite hard to test quick drying top-coats in France since almost everything has to be ordered online, and while I've read some good reviews of Nubar Diamont for example, I'm not ready to fork that price. I use a lot of top-coat, so the big refill bottle of Seche Vite is comes quite cheap and is a very good compromise for its shrinkage and thickness!!