In a short interview with Emily of SweetVintageFashion, Amy said that one of the things that distinguishes her creations is that she considers light to be one of the ingredients. I love this aspect of her work and you can definitely see it in a polish like Mysterious Irrevocable Sacred, which combines pigments and shimmers with a certain degree of translucence that allows the light to get in there and set everything off to greatest effect. Thus you are presented with a violet-blue chameleon of delicious variability: sleek denimy blue with a discrete cadbury purple aura in some circumstances, dusky violet with flashing sapphire flecks in others. Direct sun produces an exquisite prismatic display, with a central blaze of bright blue that floats over a semi-metallic silvery violet flash scintillating with sparkling glass flecks and is trimmed by a band of twinkling rainbow sparks before shading to a mysterious cloudy violet at the edges of the nail.
Application was fabulous. The consistency of Mysterious Irrevocable Sacred is fluid, smooth and dense, with a velvety flow over the nail and excellent self-leveling properties. This polish has some pull to it, and I found it applied most easily with a generously loaded brush. Pigmentation is buildable. Amy's base to pigment ratios are a signature characteristic of her work, and as I mentioned above there is almost always a degree of built-in translucence to her polishes. So it is with this one, which is evenly sheer on the first coat but builds easily to wearable coverage in two generous coats. Three coats will produce the most evenly opaque coverage and fullest, richest color, and that's what I recommend. Cleanup is fairly straightforward, with a little stickiness of the part of the glass flecks but very little pigment travel and no residual staining. Mysterious Irrevocable Sacred dries naturally in good time to a smooth, shiny finish. Topcoat does not diminish the holographic effects in any way.
Photos show three coats of Mysterious Irrevocable Sacred over treatment and basecoat with a topcoat of Seche Vite.
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| Literary Lacquers Mysterious Irrevocable Sacred |
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| Literary Lacquers Mysterious Irrevocable Sacred |
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| Literary Lacquers Mysterious Irrevocable Sacred |
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| Literary Lacquers Mysterious Irrevocable Sacred |
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| Literary Lacquers Mysterious Irrevocable Sacred |
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| Literary Lacquers Mysterious Irrevocable Sacred |
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| Literary Lacquers Mysterious Irrevocable Sacred |
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| Literary Lacquers Mysterious Irrevocable Sacred |
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| Literary Lacquers Mysterious Irrevocable Sacred |
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| Literary Lacquers Mysterious Irrevocable Sacred |
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| Literary Lacquers Mysterious Irrevocable Sacred |
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| Literary Lacquers Mysterious Irrevocable Sacred |
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| Literary Lacquers Mysterious Irrevocable Sacred |
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| Literary Lacquers Mysterious Irrevocable Sacred |
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| Literary Lacquers Mysterious Irrevocable Sacred |
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| Literary Lacquers Mysterious Irrevocable Sacred |
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| Literary Lacquers Mysterious Irrevocable Sacred |
The Ultimate Outlaw collection is a series of eight polishes inspired by literary outlaws and rebels. The name of this polish is taken from a line in the 2012 book Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail by Cheryl Strayed.
I don't remember what I was up to in March 2014 when this collection came out, but obviously I wasn't paying the right kind of attention to indie polish releases because this is the first polish from the Ultimate Outlaw collection that I've purchased. Of Literary Lacquers' best-selling polishes, Amy says this one is her personal favorite. I love it. It's simply gorgeous and even better, it has a blissfully peaceful, soothing presence on the nail (like many darker blues) that makes wearing it a constant source of pleasure. There's nothing quite like looking at your nails and thinking, wow that's wonderful....
love,
Liz
I was going to say that this polish is perfectly named, but even more impressive, it's just perfectly inspired! I also love that light is considered an ingredient, and your swatches really illustrate that intent. So lovely! Far from satisfying my Literary Lacquer lemmings, I think winning that giveaway might have just opened a floodgate... and your posts aren't helping!! ;)
ReplyDeleteI've become a Literary Lacquers spree queen. Amy puts out polishes and I love them from afar for months and months and then suddenly I just can't stand it anymore and go and purchase a whole slew of them at once. So I know what you're going through, my dear -- far be it from me to give you tips on how to wrangle that lemming!
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