Nothing to Disclose -- kind of (read on)
Hello lovelies!
Today's post comes as a result of a slight hiccough in order packing. You see, I had ordered a bunch of Mentality polishes, and awaited for them to arrive with bated breath. And then they did! And they weren't my order! It turns out that my box was mixed up with another customer's. Hillary, in an example of exemplary customer service, has shipped me my correct order, and told me to keep these lovely polishes as well (gosh, so nice!!). I figured the least I could do would be to swatch them.
So that I don't repeat myself endlessly, I'll put this all here: all of these are three coats, no topcoat. The formula on all of them was very easy to control and apply (none of these photos involved clean up!! A MIRACLE), but you'll not want to go over your strokes too much or you'll create bald spots. Because these are expressly jelly holos, they are a touch on the sheerer side; Mentality makes stamping holos as well, so if you're in for extreme opacity, you might want to look into those. All of these holos have cosmetic grade holo powder in them, not Spectraflair, so you won't be seeing rainbows in my light box. (Somehow, Mentality themselves have captured the rainbows in their swatches-- they're obviously better at corralling rainbows than I am!) Now, let's dive in!
Bon Bon is a jammy pink with slight berry undertones. I'm not a pink girl but this one is deep enough that I like it.
Marmalade is an interesting one. In the above photo, it looks decidedly orange, but in real life I found it looked orange with a wee bit of pink to it. It made it much more approachable and wearable than straight orange (I love orange polish, but I know not everybody does).
Taffy is an acid yellow-green. I found this one almost a bit frosty, and it isn't as saturated as it looks in the above photo-- more washed out. I absolutely adore colours like these but they don't play nice with my skin tone.
Sourball is a grass green with the slightest bit of blue to it, which pulls it away from the 'kelly green' territory and more into 'evergreen'. The weird lumps you see are my fault, I think, for applying the polish too soon after shaking it. Blame the messenger for that one.
Pastille is my faaaaavourite. It's got a wonderful tonal shimmer to it, which I hope you can see above. I love this shade of aqua, it's playful and deep without being straight teal.
Gumdrop is a Wonder Woman blue. This one looks a bit sheerer here than it was in real life.
And finally, Hard Candy is a straight purple. It's much less blue than it appears above; not that it's a violet, but it's much less of a grape. It treads that fine line in the land of purple that my camera absolutely hates. It's also not as dark and saturated as it appears-- it reminds me, if this helps, a bit of a cousin or half-sister to A England's Lady of the Lake.
Polishes used:
no base or top coat
And so there you have it! Don't worry, I haven't forgotten about the nail art I owe you-- I hope to have that up tonight or tomorrow at the latest. Hopefully it'll have been worth the wait! This little exercise gave my newfound appreciation for what swatchers do. It's a laborious process, swatching polish, and it dries the living heck out of your hands. Bow down to the master swatchers, for they live in the land of parched skin and impeccable nail polish application!
xo,
J.
.jpg "Hallowe'en Mani: Jolly Rogers")
