Monday, October 19, 2015

ILNP Mountain View

Mountain View was released by boutique polish maker I Love Nail Polish (ILNP) as part of the Fall 2015 collection earlier this month. Creator Barbra describes this as a forest green with blue undertones, but in some lights but my eye sees it as a spruce blue with aspects of pine green. Chameleon! Like the other jelly holos in this collection, it's a very deep, saturated shade with a jelly base bearing abundant medium to large sized holographic flecks that produce a bright prismatic scattered display in direct sun. It also carries a liberal sprinkling of bronzey/coppery metallic flake shimmers, which complement the deep blue-green beautifully and give the polish some delicious visual texture. Mountain View does indeed posses a certain dark sylvan quality, evoking dense coniferous forests like those in Siberia or one of JRR Tolkien's middle earth forests.

 Application was fantastic. The consistency of Mountain View is fluid, light and smooth with a silky glide over the nail, excellent self-leveling properties and a beautifully balanced viscosity for painting. Pigmentation is also excellent for a jelly-based polish, with wearable coverage achievable in two medium coats. You'll want to apply this polish as evenly as possible, as any unevenness will show as light or dark patches due to the built-in translucence of the formula, especially in the sun. Adding a third coat will ensure a more uniform opacity but it also deepens the color. Tip-wrapping is best done with each coat to avoid noticeable sheerness there. Cleanup is amazingly easy for such a dark, saturated blue-green, with hardly any pigment travel at all and no residual staining. Hurray! Mountain View dries naturally in good time to a smooth, shiny finish. Topcoat does not diminish the holographic properties of this polish in any way.

 Photos show three coats of Mountain View over treatment and basecoat with a topcoat of Seche Vite. Please excuse my excessively ruddy fingers!
ILNP Mountain View
ILNP Mountain View, macro shot in the bottle
ILNP Mountain View
ILNP Mountain View
ILNP Mountain View
ILNP Mountain View
ILNP Mountain View
ILNP Mountain View
ILNP Mountain View
ILNP Mountain View
ILNP Mountain View
ILNP Mountain View
ILNP Mountain View
ILNP Mountain View
ILNP Mountain View
ILNP Mountain View

 I was surprised at how comfortable Mountain View is to wear. I think I was expecting it to feel murky or muddied, but it has a limpid, soothing quality and a generosity of spirit that is unusual for a dark green. The holographic bits give it a soft twinkle in reflected and indirect light, and their silvery speckling combined with the bronze flakes create a sense of something treasured and precious. 

Really lovely!

xoxo,
Liz
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Location: Chapel Hill, NC, USA

4 comments:

  1. AnonymousOctober 19, 2015 at 10:55 AM

    I already bought more from the ILNP Fall collection than I had intended to ... - and last night I went back to the site and currently have 13 in my cart... - and now I have one more to add. I am going to wait a day or so to try to come to my senses. Maybe Barbra will send a coupon! But even with that, some serious winnowing needs to take place in my cart!

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    1. UnknownOctober 20, 2015 at 9:50 AM

      I've done that so many times, loaded up my cart and then abandoned it. I love it when sellers offer a wishlist feature on their site, it makes it easier to keep track of the ones that catch your eye and easier also to winnow out what you don't really need for whatever reason. I definitely overdid it with my ILNP pre-order. Not that I haven't admired every single polish -- they're all wonderful. But I'm more of a medium-toned polish person and the jelly holos are all very, very dark.

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  2. MelissaOctober 20, 2015 at 12:29 PM

    Yessssshhhh!! Sorta black + sorta green + sorta blue = win!! Hmmmm, a soothing quality, huh? Does it help with hormones gone awry?? :P

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    Replies
    1. UnknownOctober 20, 2015 at 6:42 PM

      YMMV, but it helped me! I had a good day when I wore this polish!

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