Friday, February 20, 2015

Elevation Polish Weddell Sea

Inspired by our rare recent bouts with frozen precipitation here in central NC, I decided to try Weddell Sea today. This polish was released by indie polish maker Elevation Polish as part of The Sea collection in June 2014. Lulu describes Weddell Sea as an "off white (grey leaning) with silver shimmer, white shimmer and sparse holographic pigment." White polish can be difficult to apply for the same reasons that whitened pastels are: streaking, clumping, refusal to self-level. I generally avoid such polishes, knowing well the limits of my application skills, but I figured if anyone could create a white polish that I might be able to apply and wear, it would be Lulu. 

Even if Lulu calls this an off-white, it looked very white to me. The silver shimmers give it a gentle, barely detectable grey-speckled appearance, and the white shimmers and holographic pigment add a beautiful subtle sparkle like sun on snow. 

Application was an adventure. The consistency of Weddell Sea is thicker than what I've previously experienced from Elevation Polish, but still fluid, creamy and dense. Scaredy cat that I am, I added some polish thinner to it at the outset but still ended up doing thicker coats than normal. The first coat was very streaky. This isn't a sticky polish, but it was clumpy for me. I still had visible streaks and a lack of self-leveling after two coats, but by that time I was invested and wanted to see if I could pull this off. I added a third coat. With that third coat, things somehow started to come together a little bit. The surfaces leveled out a little better and the streaks disappeared, but I still had some major ghosting around the edges where my coats didn't align perfectly. Enter my beloved manicure-salvaging wonder of a topcoat, Seche Vite. Mostly level surfaces at last and it even took care of the ghosted edges.

Needless to say, I wouldn't be able to apply this polish well enough to wear without topcoat. I bow down before polish bloggers such as Jacki of Adventures in Acetone, Ida of Ida Nails It, Tamira of Lacquer Lockdown, Jen of The Polishaholic, Sheila of Pointless Cafe, Ashley of Ashley is PolishAddicted and every other polish enthusiast who achieves a smooth, level application of a polish like Weddell Sea in two thin coats. People, you rock!

Photos show three coats of Weddell Sea over treatment and basecoat with, of course, a topcoat of Seche Vite.


Elevation Polish Weddell Sea


Elevation Polish Weddell Sea


Elevation Polish Weddell Sea


Elevation Polish Weddell Sea


Elevation Polish Weddell Sea


Elevation Polish Weddell Sea


Elevation Polish Weddell Sea


Elevation Polish Weddell Sea


Elevation Polish Weddell Sea


Elevation Polish Weddell Sea


Elevation Polish Weddell Sea


Elevation Polish Weddell Sea

The Weddell Sea is part of the Southern Ocean just off of the northwest coast of Antarctica. It's land boundaries are defined by the bay formed from the coasts of the Antarctic Peninsula to the west and the coast of the Coats Land region of Antarctica on the east. The sea is contained within the two overlapping territorial claims of Argentina and Britain, and also resides partially within the territorial claim of Chile. At its widest the sea is around 2,000km across; in area it is around 2.8 millionkm².

By Landsat Image Mosaic of Antarctica team [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

Interestingly, the Weddell Sea has been deemed by scientists to have the clearest water of any sea. Dutch researchers ascertained that the clarity at 262ft/79.86m corresponded to that of distilled water.

Larsen Ice Shelf/Weddell Sea, Antarctica: Tabular Ice. Photo by Fiona Stewart (source)
After wearing my Weddell Sea manicure for a day I can say that it is indeed an off-white, shaded with light grey and pale glacial blue, with an all over silky, silvery flash. It's become more interesting to my eye over time, and more elegant -- I never expected that wearing this polish would be as engaging as it has turned out to be....

love,
Liz

4 comments:

  1. "Application was an adventure"- haha! Oh my, 262ft... that sounds awesome and terrifying. But then, the sea itself is both awesome and terrifying to me; I love to be near it, but the open ocean is just overwhelming. I have a slight fear of fish though, and that doesn't help :) Seals are my positive dream symbol when I have nightmares about this, and I'm seeing that the Antarctic seas are home to the very cute Weddell seal (with the southernmost distribution of any mammal)!! I love these little lessons in geography, geology, and such from Elevation Polish :) For gosh sakes, I need to get out my Elevation "Malaspina Glacier"!!

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    1. I developed a fear of the ocean after seeing the movie Jaws when it came out in 1975. I think I was about 14 or so? Anyway, it scared the bejeezus out of me then and there will always be some residual fear of being attacked by something whenever I swim in a natural body of water. The last time I did was about 15 years ago when I was participating in a trans-magnetic cranial stimulation study in Florida. We stayed with a family friend who lived near Lake Joanna in central Florida, one of the cleanest, clearest lakes in that area. Even though it was March, I went for a swim, dove in and swam out about 50 or 60 yards. I could look down and actually see the bottom, it was so clear. And even though it was obvious that there were no gators or snapping turtles anywhere around, I was suddenly filled with that same fear from Jaws, that there was something in the water and it was gonna get me. I lit out for the shore as fast as I could, got there panting and still scared and haven't been back in a lake or the ocean since.

      Before I saw Jaws, I had no fear of being in the ocean -- until I saw a barracuda while skin diving in the Bahamas. Those are some mean looking fish! I was out of the water and back in the boat almost before I knew it. I would love to see a whale, though. I've never seen one in real life.

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  2. I love this on you!! I am constantly drawn to colors (non-colors?) like this and get the same disappointing result on my own nails. How it hurts.

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    1. Thank you, Melissa! Although I've learned not to expect a walk in the park when applying whitened colors (self-fulfilling prophesy much? Hmm...), it's always turns out worse than I thought it would. Like here lately I'm craving a pale blue, which I think would be lovely on you too, but the thought of applying one is enough to put me off a purchase. I'm very attracted to some of the new Zoya Naturel Satins, Sage, Rowan and Tove in particular, but am hesitant to buy because of possible application difficulties. Even though it's just nail polish, life is too short for such disappointments....

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