Lacquer Slacker Liz: Rescue Beauty Lounge

Showing posts with label Rescue Beauty Lounge. Show all posts

Monday, April 13, 2015

Rescue Beauty Lounge Oliveto

Oliveto was released by indie polish maker Rescue Beauty Lounge as part of the Italian Summer collection in August 2014. This is a creamy medium olive green with subtle hints of grey to it bearing ultrafine particulate shimmers in blue and purple. The olive has a very soft, slightly muted quality that reminds me of French green clay, the kind that's used in skin care. The shimmers are really lovely, and give the polish an ethereal lavender sheen that adds to its softness. I was surprised by how very delicate Oliveto is on the nail. I usually think of olive as a robust, organic color, but this one is almost dainty, especially in indirect light. Direct light brightens the color considerably.

Application was very agreeable. The consistency of Oliveto is fluid, light and creamy with a smooth, self-leveling flow over the nail. I found it to be very user friendly, amenable to ultra thin coats and all of the various finagling I end up doing during application. Pigmentation is good, slightly sheer on the first coat but evening up to wearable coverage on the second. I wasn't quite satisfied with the opacity on my nails at two coats so I added a third, but it didn't alter the color at all. Cleanup was easy and straightforward. Oliveto dries naturally in good time to a smooth, shiny finish. Topcoat seems to enhance the effects of the shimmers, which is a good thing.

Photos show three coats of Oliveto over treatment and basecoat with a topcoat of Seche Vite. Please excuse the ding!

Rescue Beauty Lounge Oliveto

Oliveto was inspired by the olive trees that Ji experienced during a trip to Italy. I've never been to Italy but I have been to Spain and well remember the rows of olive trees marching over the dusty hills.

olive tree orchard (source)

Olive tree leaves have an almost silvery quality, replicated and enhanced by the shimmers in this polish. Quite magical!

love,
Liz

Monday, April 6, 2015

Rescue Beauty Lounge All About Yves

All About Yves was released by bijoux polish maker Rescue Beauty Lounge as part of the R29 + Rescue Beauty Lounge collection in November 2014. This collection was a collaboration between Ji Baek, owner and creative force behind RBL, and Refinery29, an independent lifestyle website covering shopping, beauty, wellness and celebrities. All About Yves is a medium-dark bold ultramarine blue, a take on International Klein Blue that has a slightly softer, brighter royal blue vibe. I purchased this at about the same time that I got Elevation Polish's Pic de Sotllo. Am I the only one that simultaneously buys polishes from different brands that are roughly the same color? I seem to do this a LOT.

Despite the similarities (they are both ultramarine blues), there are pronounced differences between the two, namely their formulas. Pic de Sotllo is a jelly while All About Yves is a creme/jelly hybrid, which gives the color a certain creamy quality that lightens and subdues it ever so slightly in comparison. I found, though, that All About Yves appears differently depending upon the lighting under which it's viewed. Under incandescent light, for example, it reads as a saturated cobalt with a hint of purple in the undertones. It brightens and lightens significantly in direct light, while in indirect light it's a creamy deep royal blue -- at least, to my eye.

Application was great! The consistency of All About Yves has the eminently paintable thinner fluidity of many RBL formulas, with a silky glide over the nail and excellent self-leveling properties. It is easy to manipulate with RBL's slender, round, flexible brush. Pigmentation is buildable, with sheerness on the first coat, a growing opacity after the second, and completely even opaque coverage after the third. Cleanup is easy and straightforward with very little pigment travel and no residual staining. All About Yves dries naturally in very good time to a fabulous glossy finish.

Photos show three coats of All About Yves over Seche Rebuild treatment and Pretty Serious All Your Base basecoat with a messy, bubbly topcoat of Seche Vite. My topcoating efforts always seem to leave something to be desired, and that's never more visible than over a bold hue like this one. My apologies!

Rescue Beauty Lounge All About Yves

All About Yves is certainly bold and bright, don't get me wrong, but there is a softer side to its presentation that others such as Pic de Sottlo, Nails Inc Baker Street and Indigo Bananas Klein Trink Wasser, that hover in or around the International Klein Blue cloud, lack. Which is its edge, in my opinion. While still possessing the electricity of color, it feels bit more grown-up and evolved than the others, more traditionally stylish.

It's really a gorgeous, tremendously flattering polish all around, with a superb formula. If you love cobalt/royal/International Klein blues, this is a great one to add to your collection.

love,
Liz

Wednesday, March 25, 2015

Rescue Beauty Lounge Will They Won't They

Will They Won't They was released by indie polish maker Rescue Beauty Lounge as part of the Anatomy of a #KDrama collection in June 2014. It's a medium-light subdued lavender creme/jelly hybrid bearing abundant pale aquamarine glass fleck shimmers. This is a subtle, discreet polish that pulls a quite grey and a little muddy against my skin, robbing it of some of the delicate femininity I've seen it reveal on others, but it's beautifully composed and the icy blue glass fleck speckling offer an exquisitely lovely, ethereal hint of twinkle against the creamy muted lavender base when the light hits it just right.

Application was wonderful. The consistency of Will They Won't They is fluid and thin but silky smooth with a creamy glide over the nail and excellent self-leveling properties. Being a creme/jelly hybrid, the base has a degree of translucence that requires multiple layers for opacity. I've seen it wearably opaque in two coats, but my nails required three for completely even opaque coverage. The first coat is very sheer, just a wash of translucent lavender really, and I got a little angsty. But with the second coat builds the coverage well, much to my relief. Three coats did the trick. Cleanup is easy, I just needed to watch out for those sticky glass flecks. Unfortunately I still have a few glitters hanging around from yesterday's Night Fire manicure, so if you see a few peripheral sparkles hanging around my nail environs looking a little out of place in the photos that's the deal with those. Seems like it always takes a few doses with remover to get all the glitters off when I wear a glitter-filled polish, I wish I was more meticulous about it but I just get so impatient! Anyway, Will They Won't They dries naturally in good time to a beautiful glossy finish. Top coat amplifies the appearance of the glass flecks.

Photos show three coats of Will They Won't They over treatment and basecoat with a topcoat of Seche Vite.

Rescue Beauty Lounge Will They Won't They

Will They Won't They strikes me as a nice soft lavender for winter, but I'm not really loving how it looks on me. You can see the difference in color when you compare the two middle nail macros (one in indirect light, one in weak sun) to the other pics that show more of my fingers and hands. If you'd like to see how lovely the color can be, take a look at Victoria's photos in The Manicurator's post on this collection, here, or Pam's Polish Police photos, here.

I think I would have done better for myself by getting Oh Slap! (light pink) from Anatomy of a #KDrama instead of Will They Won't They, but I was seduced by the glass flecks... no surprise there! Just wish it looked a little better with my skin tone.

love,
Liz

Friday, March 20, 2015

Rescue Beauty Lounge Better Than Boyfriend Jeans

Better Than Boyfriend Jeans was released by bijoux polish maker Rescue Beauty Lounge as part of the R29 + Rescue Beauty Lounge collection in November 2014. This collection was a collaboration between Ji Baek, owner and creative force behind RBL, and Refinery29, an independent lifestyle website covering shopping, beauty, wellness and celebrities. Better Than Boyfriend Jeans "ideally replicates that faded, powder-y shade of your favorite pair of worn-in jeans," according to the R29 description. It's a whitened sky blue creme/jelly hybrid, a soft pastel shade with a cool creamy elegance on the nail.

Because I find pastels typically difficult to apply, I avoid them in general but after looking at swatches of this pale blue beauty I couldn't resist tempting fate. And I did find it difficult to apply. The consistency is fluid and thin and smooth, similar to other RBLs I've tried. It's also quite sheer, but not patchy. The first and second coats were very streaky and the polish wasn't as self-leveling as I would have liked. The third coat evened things out mostly but it took topcoat to produce an evenly opaque look. That said, I think this one was worth the angst and extra effort it took to apply because it really is lovely. Cleanup was easy, and I found this polish to be surprisingly amenable to repairs and extra dabs here and there. Better Than Boyfriend Jeans dries in average time to a glossy finish.

Photos show three coats of Better Than Boyfriend Jeans over treatment and basecoat with a generous topcoat of Seche Vite.

Rescue Beauty Lounge Better Than Boyfriend Jeans

In spite of my slightly sloppy topcoat efforts, I really love this manicure. Something about the milky blue translucence of Better Than Boyfriend Jeans gives it a precious, nostalgic quality, like a long-cherished item from childhood kept in a special box with other similar treasures. When you look at them, you are transported to a state where the past is both recollected and reassimilated, a place at once dreamy and poignant, humbling and empowering, where fundamental memories are refolded into the psyche.

love,
Liz

Friday, March 13, 2015

Rescue Beauty Lounge Jane

Jane was released by indie polish maker Rescue Beauty Lounge as part of the Real Housewives of the Tudor Dynasty collection for fall 2010. Creator Ji describes it as a "pale gray pearl," but I've seen it described elsewhere as everything from an oyster griege to a putty grey to a bone to a pale taupe to a mushroom to a nude. It has a delicate wash of super fine shimmers in gold, pink and pale green, which you can see in the bottle. On the nail they are very discreet indeed, with only a hint of the gold shimmers coming through on close inspection, although they do add a subtle diaphanous pearly cast to the desaturated milkiness of the shade.

I am not pleased with the way my photos of Jane turned out. It pulled a pale khaki, near camel shade in them that I do not find pleasant with my complexion. In person, the grey is much more evident and the polish is overall more neutral, less tan. It's another Capezio character shoe color, creamy and sleek. I read a review on Makeup Alley where Jane was described as light colored chocolate milk color with grey as the base instead of brown, sort of a pale grey-toned cafe au lait. This is is how it appears to me in person.

Application was disappointing. Although the consistency is similar to other RBL cremes, fluid, thin and creamy, Jane did not have the same wonderful self-leveling properties for me and it was quite difficult to render even coats. Pigmentation is very good. I believe that someone with more finesse and a more even touch with the brush could achieve wearable opacity in two coats, but I used three and even then ended up with an uneven, streaky, lumpy appearance. Topcoat helped a great deal to even out most of my nails (as well as popping the golden shimmers), but for a couple I had to resort to trickery, applying an addition thin coat of Jane over the topcoat and then one more layer of topcoat. The polish seems to even up more as it dries, so possibly I could have rested at three coats for all of the nails and eventually been happy with how it turned out, but I didn't. So some nails have four coats. There is a lot of white in this polish and that may have contributed its uneven application, I don't know. All I can tell you is that it didn't apply well for me. But so it goes with some polishes! Cleanup was easy and straightforward. Jane dried naturally in good time to a finish that was smooth, if uneven, with a low shine that wants a good topcoat to look its best.

Photos show three to four coats of Jane over treatment and basecoat with a topcoat of Seche Vite.

Rescue Beauty Lounge Jane

Fuzzy was uncommonly harsh in her commentary on this polish. I guess pale, ambiguous nude-type colors are fine for walls but when it comes to nails, "why bother?"And then she said it looked like "elephant breath," whatever that means. Get a grip, Fuzz! Not every manicure is here to entertain you! Some are here to softly and demurely accessorize one's appearance.

Actually, Jane reminds me very much of Dr. Scholl's sandals in their "bone" shade. I had a pair of those, and they didn't do much for me either. But I saw some great looking Jane manicures while researching this polish. Here are my favorites: Rachel's from Stuff I Swatched, here; Christine's from Temptalia, here; Michelle's from All Lacquered Up, here.

love,
Liz