Octopus Party Nail Lacquer Chimera

Chimera was released by Connecticut-based indie polish maker Octopus Party Nail Lacquer last month as creator Dave's birthday color. Dave describes Chimera as "a shaded olive linear holographic, brimming with multi-chromatic flakies." It's a deep murky darkened olive with walnut undertones abounding in multichromatic flake shimmers that shift in the gold/green/orange spectrum as well as copious amounts of finely-milled holographic pigment. In indirect light, the color-shifting flakies are quite visible and effect a marvelous opal-like play of color against the shrouded olive depths of the polish. In direct light, the holographic flair is powerfully and fully linear, manifesting the full rainbow of colors that float over a beautiful warm olivine flash. Rarely have I seen such a strong prismatic display in a polish that doesn't have a semi-metallic or silvery aspect to its base. 

Application was dreamy. The consistency of Chimera is fluid, dense and buttery, with a velvety glide over the nail and outstanding self-leveling properties. Pigmentation is also outstanding: completely even opaque coverage can be achieved with one medium coat. I used two for this manicure but the second was unnecessary in terms of coverage. The user-friendly formula generously allows for patching and edging, with the additionally applied polish melding easily into the host without ghosting or trace of patching left behind. Cleanup is easy and straightforward with no running of pigment or residual staining. And as if all that wasn't enough, Chimera dries naturally in good time to a glossy finish. Huzzah!

Photos show two coats of Chimera over treatment and basecoat with a topcoat of Seche Vite. 

Octopus Party Nail Lacquer Chimera

Octopus Party Nail Lacquer Chimera

Octopus Party Nail Lacquer Chimera

Octopus Party Nail Lacquer Chimera

Octopus Party Nail Lacquer Chimera

Octopus Party Nail Lacquer Chimera

Octopus Party Nail Lacquer Chimera

Octopus Party Nail Lacquer Chimera

Octopus Party Nail Lacquer Chimera

Octopus Party Nail Lacquer Chimera

Octopus Party Nail Lacquer Chimera

Octopus Party Nail Lacquer Chimera

Octopus Party Nail Lacquer Chimera

There are times when I fall in love with a polish simply because the formula is fantastic and the application so impressive and profoundly satisfying. This is one of those times. On the other hand, I am equally smitten with the unique color and ingenious composition of this lacquer. Win all around! If you're a lover of unusual greens, especially murky ones, you would love this earthy, organic shade.

My thesaurus has an interesting note on the meaning of the word chimera:

In Greek mythology, a Chimera is a fire-breathing female monster, usually part lion, goat, and serpent. Because of this derivation, chimera and its adjective, chimerical, came to mean something illusory, fantastical, hoped-for but impossible. Then scientists learned to make the illusory real, which changed the nature of the word. Gardeners have been grafting twigs from one kind of plant onto stems of another since classical antiquity. Eighteenth-century biologists created chimerical invertebrates using hydras and worms. Medical chimerism now refers primarily to organ transplantation, which establishes two genetically different cellular lineages within the transplant recipient. If, after a bone marrow transplant, the new blood-forming system is genetically the donor's, the recipient is a chimera. But so are mermaids and unicorns.

Chimera is not currently available from the Octopus Party etsy shop. I'm unfamiliar with Dave's restocking habits, but from what I've seen they appear to be somewhat idiosyncratic. His offerings seem to have a tendency to appear without warning and then just as suddenly disappear, never to be seen again. Let's hope for a future restock of Chimera. What about it, Dave?

love,
Liz