Sea Spray was released by China Glaze as part of its Anchors Away collection for spring 2011. It's a beautifully crafted, creamy blend of pastel sky blue and pearly pale grey with the added ethereal touch of ultra fine silvery microshimmers that give it an delicate luminous bloom on the nail. I absolutely adore this color, it's my favorite pale blue and for that matter my favorite pastel period, although the grey in this polish pushes it to the outer boundaries of what you may typically think of as a pastel. It also makes it all the more versatile, flattering and stylish without relinquishing the gentle softness that is intrinsic in a pastel.
With smooth nail beds, application would be dreamy. The consistency of Sea Spray is fluid and light with a bit of chalkiness that is the nature of whitened lacquers. Even so, it has a very creamy texture and is easy to manipulate. Streakiness on the first coat is easily smoothed and evened out with the second. I recommend adding thinner to this polish if you find it at all thick or goopy. It will vastly increase the ease of application and will also help with ghosting around the edges, another propensity of whitened colors.
Now for me and my particularly furrowed nail beds, a third coat was necessary as the ridges were still visible jutting up through the polish after two. I was consoled by the fact that Sea Spray dries naturally very quickly, so I was able to go on to subsequent coats almost immediately, and also by my sheer delight in the color, which my eyes just can't get enough of. I experienced no bubbling, and cleanup was easy and straightforward.
Photos show three coats of Sea Spray over treatment and basecoat with a topcoat of Seche Vite.
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| China Glaze Sea Spray |
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| China Glaze Sea Spray |
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| China Glaze Sea Spray |
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| China Glaze Sea Spray |
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| China Glaze Sea Spray |
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| China Glaze Sea Spray |
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| China Glaze Sea Spray |
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| China Glaze Sea Spray |
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| China Glaze Sea Spray |
After enjoying this beauty solo for a day, I was ready to add some sparkle!
Today Was a Fairytale was released by Deborah Lippmann as part of her Holiday 2010 Shades duo with Boom Boom Pow. The claim to fame of both polishes, besides being Deborah Lippmann glitters, of course, is the inclusion of precious materials in their formulas. For Boom Bloom Pow, it's 24 karat gold. For Today Was a Fairytale, it's Virgin Diamond Powder.
What is Virgin Diamond Powder? I didn't have a clue so I googled it. Virgin Diamond Powder is made by crushing dark, imperfectly formed/crystallized diamonds of varying levels of opacity with steel mortars. As a polishing agent it has excellent thermal stability and is used industrially as an abrasive for grinding ceramics and glass and polishing gems. What's it doing in nail polish? Perhaps there are aesthetic properties such as amplified sparkle and visual impact and whatnot, but it's probably there mostly to provide a bit of cachet: wear this polish and you can tell folks that's you've got diamonds on your tips!
Today Was a Fairytale has a dark blue-tinted translucent suspension base swimming with Virgin Diamond Powder (as we know!) and silver hex glitters in two sizes. It can be built to opacity on its own or layered over another polish, which is where this baby is a real stand out. It's gorgeous as a layer of sparkly goodness over white, greys, blues, black and silver. A blue grey like Sea Spray is a shoo-in for this!
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| China Glaze Sea Spray and Deborah Lippmann Today Was a Fairytale, bottle shot |
I know a lot of polish enthusiasts apply Deborah Lippmann glitters by brushing them on like regular polish, but for whatever reason this doesn't work for me. I prefer to plosh and spread. That said, Today Was a Fairytale has a fluid consistency that is not goopy or sticky and is easy to work with. A brushful of polish provides a substantial amount of glitters that lay flat to the surface of the nail. You really don't need to be too fussy about how evenly this goes on (I wasn't, as you'll see) because once it's on there the light playing over the glitters is all you or anyone else will notice. Today Was a Fairytale dries naturally in good time to a smooth finish with only the slightest texture of glitters to the touch, and becomes glassy smooth with just one layer of topcoat.
Photos show one coat of Today Was A Fairytale over the Sea Spray manicure above with a topcoat of Seche Vite.
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| Deborah Lippmann Today Was a Fairytale over China Glaze Sea Spray |
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| Deborah Lippmann Today Was a Fairytale over China Glaze Sea Spray |
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| Deborah Lippmann Today Was a Fairytale over China Glaze Sea Spray |
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| Deborah Lippmann Today Was a Fairytale over China Glaze Sea Spray |
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| Deborah Lippmann Today Was a Fairytale over China Glaze Sea Spray |
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| Deborah Lippmann Today Was a Fairytale over China Glaze Sea Spray |
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| Deborah Lippmann Today Was a Fairytale over China Glaze Sea Spray |
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| Deborah Lippmann Today Was a Fairytale over China Glaze Sea Spray |
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| Deborah Lippmann Today Was a Fairytale over China Glaze Sea Spray |
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| Deborah Lippmann Today Was a Fairytale over China Glaze Sea Spray |
This is one of those polishes that you have to see in motion to appreciate how fabulous it is. The glitter sparkle is there of course but the effect is more like the way water shimmers and sparkles and reflects sunlight. If you've ever been in a boat house or under any ceiling by the water and admired the shimmering patterns of light reflecting off the water onto the ceiling, that's the effect this polish has in person. It's beauty is surprisingly organic and full of light.
I don't know if it's the Virgin Diamond Powder or what but the silver glitters in Today Was a Fairytale are incredibly reflective. I was wearing a black top when I took these photos and you can see how the black is reflected in the large hexes especially. There were shots (not included here) where they reflected my face and turned out looking pink on the nail. This reflectivity is especially cool because the glitters are going to reflect whatever color they are near, so no matter what color you're wearing, you're going to be able to see it on your nails.
Very, very cool polish!
love,
Liz
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