Lacquer Slacker Liz: Femme Fatale Merida

Sunday, June 19, 2016

Femme Fatale Merida

Merida was released in April this year by Australian indie polish maker Femme Fatale Cosmetics as part of the limited edition Enchanted Fables collection, a series of 22 polishes inspired by and named for creator Sophie's favorite fairy tale heroines. Enchanted Fables had a one-time-only release as a pre-order on the Femme Fatale website, with stockists launching (one restock only) some time thereafter. This particular polish takes its name from the main character of the 2012 Disney Pixar film Brave, Princess Merida of DunBroch.

Described by Sophie as a "fiery, luminous orange with a violet sheen," Merida is perfectly delicious example of that fascinating feat of formulary engineering known as contrasting shimmer. The base color is a robust medium orange peel shade. It bears superabundant finely-milled purple particulate shimmers, that by all laws of color mixing should read as brown but instead magically appear as a vibrant ultra pink. The result is a gorgeous rosy bittersweet look, a warm flame color overlaid by translucent raspberry that shades to tomato red around the edges, highlighted by a silky sheen of cool purple-pink along the axis of light. This is a sunset polish par excellence, the mix of cool and warm is exquisite. Love!

Application was equally delicious. The consistency of Merida is fluid, light and silky smooth with a medium-viscosity and a near-effortless creamy slip over the nail. I'm not sure what I was expecting, but I was honestly astonished by the utter biddabilty of the formula, so buttery and lovely to work with. Self-leveling properties are excellent. Pigmentation is very good. The first coat is sheerish and muddy-looking, but be not dismayed as it builds quickly to a wearable opacity with the second coat. A third delivers a denser opacity and more saturated color, and that's what I recommend to see the full effects of this beauty. Cleanup is easy and straightforward. Merida dries naturally in very good time to a flat finish that wants a nice topcoat to look its best.

Photos show three coats of Merida over treatment and basecoat with a topcoat of Seche Vite.