Nail polish review: Butter London "Yummy Mummy"

I got this polish as part of a sample box from Latest In Beauty.

I'll say this up front: I would never have chosen this colour, because I loathe it. Brown and pinky brown and me do not go together. It's not a bad colour, it's just ... not me. At all.

That said ... the polish itself isn't bad. Butter London do 3-free polish (no formaldehyde, touluene, dpb). So that's good. It goes on easily enough, and I got opacity in two coats. The only reason it's a bit dodgy in the photos is because I used my hands before waiting for it to set. So my bad, really. No streaking, not too viscous, not too runny, although I prefer a stubbier brush than the one it has.

If it was only a green or purple or something, I'd love it, I think. As is, however, I'm glad I didn't pay full price.

Nail Art: Marble swirl and Half-moon

I admit it - I got ambitious. I tried to do no-water marble swirling on my nails. The first attempt was a disaster. The second attempt was ... okay, I suppose. I used Illamasqua Hemlock for the base colour, and tried to use Illamasqua Geist and Max Factor Dazzling Blue for the swirls.



What went wrong? I think I may have used too much polish, and also the wrong swirling tool - I kept gouging a hole in the base layer. I maybe try this again, when I have time, patience, and steady hands available.

I still wasn't happy with it, though, so I took it off and tried to do a half-moon mani. It sort of worked. But there's room for improvement here too, that's for sure. The highlight colour is OPI Significant Other; a lovely warm light lilac with a green shimmer that I unfortunately couldn't capture well in the photo. The darker colour is Illamasqua Poke.




The technique needs work, but I love the colours on this. I'm such a sucker for purples.

Nails: Revlon Moon Candy in 210 Galactic

I was in Boots again today, taking advantage of their 3-for-2 on skin stuff and 10 points per pound offers, and I accidentally went past the nail varnish.

Well, sort of accidentally.

Anyway, I've been hoping this range would be in stock for a while so I picked up a couple of shades, and it being a Do My Nails day, decided to try one out.

The instructions say to apply two coats of the dark base colour, a single coat of the glittery bit, and a top coat. The base colour was surprisingly dark - a blue that's almost black. It was also a bit challenging to work with. It didn't really want to go on smoothly, unless I used quite a lot of it. It is really opaque with two coats. I decided to do my cleanup at this point, and discovered that it's a pain in the posterior to tidy up. That's why my nails are still a bit of a mess - I ran out of patience and care factor a bit. Then came the glitter layer. I kind of dolloped it on instead of how I would normally apply nail varnish - otherwise I ended up with the glitter bits just at the tips of my nails. I have no idea if that's How You Are Supposed To Do It. I finished with a coat of Illamasqua's Geist (UV reactive top coat), and a coat of Save The Nail 45 second top coat, and it's still uneven, which is annoying me. Grr.

Colourwise, it is a bit darker than I was expecting. The glittery bits are quite bright, though. I'm not sure if I like it or not yet - I'm used to having lighter colours on my nails. On the upside, I strongly suspect I'm not going to be able to tell if I dent or smudge it, unless it's really bad. On the downside, chips are probably going to be obvious. I'll definitely be giving this another go at a later date.

Nails: Revlon Colourstay 230 Bonsai

This is the first of my nail polish reviews. I intend to do these fairly regularly, although there will be a hiatus while I'm travelling, I imagine. Without more ado, here goes.

I picked up this polish recently because I was in Boots, and they had 3-for-2 on Revlon nail polishes, and it was pretty.

Okay, first off, the formula. It's a nice balance between goopy and thin. I've been a fan of Revlon polishes for years, and I'm glad to see that it hasn't changed much. It goes on nicely, without streaking or pooling. It covers my ridges easily, and doesn't show up the other imperfections in my nails. I got good opacity out of a single coat, although I used two out of habit. The brush does pick up a little too much product, but it splays out nicely, making it relatively easy to cover the nail in a couple of strokes. I'm unsure about the long term wear, having only had it on for a day so far. It is very rare for a polish to last more than 3 or 4 days anyway, between the way I treat my hands and my application skills.

I love the colour so much! It's a very vivid, slightly olive green, with tiny gold shimmer particles in it. The photos below shows it against my Colour Me A Season (CMAS) Spring fan, strip 30. It matches the B and A shades reasonably well in real life. Whether the colours go with my colouring - well, that I don't know.

Will I be using it again? Yes. This is definitely a keeper. I'm a sucker for bright nail colours, especially metallic or shimmery or opalescent ones.

In other observations, my fingers are really wrinkly. Guess I'd better get my paws on some hand cream and start using it.