Essie Blossom Dandy

Blossom Dandy was released by Essie as part of the Flowerista collection for spring 2015. This collection marks the debut of creative collaboration between Essie and accessories designer Rebecca Minkoff. While I'm not a consumer of her stuff I used to spend a lot of time haunting the Rebecca Minkoff threads at The Purse Forum, have always admired her color sense and feel like it's easy to see the benefit of her input with this collection.

Am I the only one who found Essie's official description of this polish a tad fulsome? Yes, this could be just another example of the pot calling the kettle black, but really: "electrifying mint crème hydrangea"? I will say that as confusing as it was at the outset, the far flung references in this do make sense to me now. Blossom Dandy is a whitened or baby aqua, a fresh mint-leaning cyanic pastel that manages to be both tender and lively at the same time. It's like a bleached Tiffany blue or robin's egg color, a spring harbinger with a sleek poolside vibe that'll keep it in polish enthusiast's rotations well into summer.

Application was a little tetchy, but not a sweaty, panic-ridden tetchy. More of a cautious, careful, breath-holding tetchy. The consistency of Blossom Dandy is pretty wonderful, fluid and on the thin side but very creamy. Pigmentation is good too. But like many whitened polishes, there's a certain amount of patchiness in the way this polish takes to the nail that is easily exacerbated by lack of finesse with the brush. A light, even touch will make for a happier application experience, and as you know I have my share of failings in this area. Nevertheless, I worked as carefully as I could and while it did take three coats to get a look that I was satisfied with (I'm sure there are plenty out there who can handle it in two), ultimately I'm really pleased with how things turned out. Blossom Dandy self-leveled much better than I anticipated it would, although I did end up with a few leveling issues on the shoulders of my C curve (doesn't bother me in person but you can see it in the photos). Cleanup was easy and straightforward. This polish dries naturally in fairly good time to a shade that's slightly more vibrant than the bottle color would lead you to expect and a smooth, glossy finish.

Photos show three coats of Blossom Dandy over Seche Rebuild treatment and Pretty Serious All Your Base basecoat with a topcoat of Seche Vite. Please try to overlook the lobster fingers.

Essie Blossom Dandy

Essie Blossom Dandy

Essie Blossom Dandy

Essie Blossom Dandy

Essie Blossom Dandy

Essie Blossom Dandy

Essie Blossom Dandy

Essie Blossom Dandy

Essie Blossom Dandy

Essie Blossom Dandy

Essie Blossom Dandy

Essie Blossom Dandy

Blossom Dandy has been compared quite a bit to Essie's well-known minty pastel, Mint Candy Apple, darling of mint polish enthusiasts everywhere. Despite how similar they appear in my photos of them, the truth can be seen in Michelle's swatch stick comparison of the two in her Flowerista collection post on All Lacquered Up, here. Blossom Dandy is more blue, Mint Candy Apple more green. Karen Falcon has another great swatch stick comparison to other minty shades in her excellent Beauty Geek comparison post of all the Flowerista polishes, here.

I'm honestly kinda loving the look of this baby aqua. There's a deft, sleek, summertime chic quality to it on the nail that's quite yummy, although I suspect that my affection has to do in part with the absurdly self-conscious pride that I'm taking in my relatively triumphant application of this whitened shade. No matter! One's as good as the other if it gives you that "yes!" rush when you look at your nails, right?

love,
Liz