Lacquer Slacker Liz

Sunday, July 26, 2015

Literary Lacquers Curious Yellow

Curious Yellow was released by indie polish maker Literary Lacquers as part of the Vurt-U-Want collection for summer 2015 in June this year. This collection of polishes was inspired by the 1993 sci-fi/cyber-hallucinogenic novel Vurt by British author Jeff Noon. Noon's first book, it won the Arther C. Clarke Award in 1994 and was included in The Best Novels of the Nineties by Linda Lesher in 2002.

Yellow is not a common shade for nail polish, but if done well it can be spectacular. And Curious Yellow is spectacular. Described by creator Amy as a "taxicab yellow neon matte polish with flakies and glass flecks," this is a very clean and bright maize color loaded with golden glass flecks and holographic flake shimmers that dries to a matte finish with a stunning radiant sueded look on the nail. The visual texture is very fine and smooth, like a beach glass. And like beach glass, it has a softly glowing luminous quality, a luxe look of stone-washed silkiness that in the brilliant shimmery maize hue of Curious Yellow takes on a soaring opulent splendor. It's a signature look!

Application was wonderful. The consistency of Curious Yellow is fluid, light and smooth with a silky even flow over the nail. Leave it to Amy to create a yellow that goes on without streaks, patchiness or any other application drama common to yellow polishes. And even though matte finishes are notoriously unkind to ridged, uneven nailbeds, Curious Yellow somehow managed to tame my furrows to a great extent with only the slightest faceting to the surface to show that my nails are less than perfectly smooth. Pigmentation is actually very, very good. By design there is a degree of translucence to this polish, so opacity must be built over multiple coats, but the color is rich and full even on the first coat. I was happiest with the coverage at three, but it could definitely be worn at one or two depending upon your tolerance for visible nail lines. Cleanup is fairly straightforward with some expected recalcitrance on the part of the glass flecks. Curious Yellow dries naturally in good time to a smooth matte finish.

Photos show three coats of Curious Yellow over treatment and basecoat without topcoat.


Literary Lacquers Curious Yellow

Literary Lacquers Curious Yellow

This reminds me of a more refined, more color-saturated version of Zoya Solange, without the texture particles. Amy could make this sort of polish in any number of colors and I would probably buy them all. My pasty pinkage is not the best showcase for Curious Yellow, but I love it anyway. Against a richer, darker complexion it would be breathtaking! It can also be worn with a glossy topcoat for a less glowy, more twinkly look. I couldn't bring myself to topcoat it, it's just too glamorous and luxurious in it's natural matte finish for me to even think about changing it up.

Here's a short synopsis of the novel Vurt that I jacked from Wikipedia:

Vurt tells the story of Scribble and his "gang," the Stash Riders, as they search for his missing sister/lover Desdemona. The novel is is set in an alternate version of Manchester, England, in which society has been shaped by Vurt, a hallucinogenic drug/shared alternate reality accessed by sucking on color-coded feathers. Through some mechanism, the dreams, mythology, and imaginings of humanity have achieved objective reality in the Vurt and become "real."

Before the novel begins, Scribble and his sister-lover take a shared trip into a vurt called English Voodoo, but upon awakening Scribble finds his sister has been replaced by an amorphous blob that Mandy, a fellow Stash Rider, nicknames "The Thing from Outer Space." From that point on, Scribble is on a mission to find another copy of the rare and contraband Curious Yellow feather so that he can exchange The Thing for Desdemona.

Shades of Tom Robbins and Thomas Pynchon, no? Knowing the significance of Curious Yellow in the novel only heightens my admiration for this polish. If you're looking for a special yellow to add to your polish collection, you've found it. This is one for the books. (So to speak... ha!)

love,
Liz

Saturday, July 25, 2015

Literary Lacquers Je Reviens

Like Rebecca Always Rebecca and Shadow Between Us, Je Reviens was released by indie polish maker Literary Lacquers as part of the Rebecca collection in October 2014. This polish completes the trio inspired by the 1938 novel Rebecca by Dame Daphne du Maurier, and is similar in construction to the other two, described by creator Amy as a "deep teal linear holo with holographic sparkle."

However simple that sounds, this polish is not "simply" teal. Courtesy of the nuancing effects of the finely-milled holographic pigment, Je Reviens is a complex murky mixture of shifting hues of blue and green. Medium-dark in tone, it's like the undersea of your imagination, with restless turbid marine blues shadowed and tinted by even deeper vegetable greens. The tiny silver holographic microglitter squares sprinkled throughout the polish glow with bright pinpoint sparks in colors of all sorts but especially aquatic blues and greens, creating an effervescent effect. Direct light provokes a luminous holographic display with a central blaze of cerulean trimmed in twinkling sparks of electric blue and grassy green before shading to a deep, tenebrous sea green at the edges of the nail.

Application was delightful. The consistency of Je Reviens is fluid and smooth, with a slightly less viscous formula than the other two Rebecca polishes. It has a silky, self-leveling flow over the nail and is easily manipulated with Literary Lacquers' round flexible brush. As with the other Rebecca polishes, the microglitters glide on without tumbling or stickups and disperse easily across the nail. The first coat is evenly sheer and builds easily to wearable opacity with the second. I would definitely recommend adding a third coat for fullest, richest color. It's a fast drying polish so the addition is not a hardship. Cleanup is easy and straightforward with very little pigment travel and no residual staining, surprising for a deep teal. Je Reviens dries naturally in very good time to a smooth, shiny finish.

Photos show three coats of Je Reviens over treatment and basecoat with a slightly bubbly topcoat of Seche Vite.

Literary Lacquers Je Reviens

I love the full-bodied oceanic coloring of this shade, and the way its moodiness is punctuated by the effervescent twinkle of the microglitters. On the nail it has a brooding, mysterious quality with an underlying sense of something powerful and potentially dangerous in spite of its alluring sparkle. In the novel Rebecca, Je Reviens is the name of the boat that Rebecca was sailing when she drowned. It's French for "I return." To me, this polish is a startlingly apt interpretation of the significance of that plot element. It's kind of spooky, actually!

One thing I've been noticing while working with Amy's formulas is the even, complete nature of their dry-down. A lot of three-, four- and five-free polishes have a certain amount bulk to them, especially if you paint in thicker coats as I have a tendency to do, where the volatile elements evaporate from the surface of the polish very quickly without even penetration to bottom layers. This can result in a certain puffiness to the look of the polish that will even dimple at the free edge if the polish is very thickly applied. Literary Lacquers polishes consistently dry down very evenly, thoroughly, and quickly to a thin, compact layer on the nail, even when multiple medium to thicker coats are used. As a result, the manicure cures and dries to a fresh, crisp look that I imagine would wear very well.

Something else I've noticed about Literary Lacquers polishes is that they are always capped very, very securely. I've learned that if I don't want to scrub up my treatment and basecoat layers trying to torque open a fresh bottle of Amy's polish, I better crack open that bottle at the outset and recap. I keep a rubber band in my manicure kit and wrap it around the cap of tightly closed and even stuck polishes to open them. I can't remember where I learned this, but it works really well.

I hope you enjoyed these beautiful, fascinating Rebecca polishes as much as I did. I think my favorite of the three is Rebecca, Always Rebecca, but they're all pretty fabulous!

love,
Liz

Friday, July 24, 2015

Literary Lacquers Shadow Between Us

Like yesterday's polish, Rebecca Always Rebecca, Shadow Between Us was released by indie polish maker Literary Lacquers as part of the Rebecca trio, a collection inspired by Daphne du Maurier's 1938 novel Rebecca, in October 2014. Described as a "smoky grey linear holo with holographic sparkle," this one is lighter than I expected. It's a light-to-medium battleship grey with a breath of warmth to it, filled with finely-milled holographic pigment and a modicum of tiny silver holographic microglitter squares, which I'm sure are among the most sparkly things for their size on the planet. I can't even IMAGINE the sort of orgasmic visual experience you'd have looking at them in bulk, just thinking about it makes the hair stand up on the back of my neck!

Anyway, the holographic effects in Shadow Between Us are responsive and athletic, with a brilliant display in direct sun. The flame-shaped flare is dominated by an inner ribbon of cyanic electric blue that shifts to cover the center at oblique angles. Patches of semi-metallic cinerous coppery grey flash sporadically beneath it, and thin sparkling bands of bright prismatic colors -- green, yellow, orange and red -- run round its edges. Beyond the flare, the base color deepens to a shadowy slate around the periphery of the nail. In indirect light there is subtle nuancing of the base color with a brighter grey blaze faintly tinted a milky blue in the center of the nail shading outward to a deeper taupey grey tinged with copper. Ever present during all of these effects are twinkling sparks in rainbow colors from the microglitters. That sparkle is especially delicious in low light, where it adds a delightful kick of formal glamor to this unusual neutral.

Application was great! The consistency of Shadow Between Us is similar to yesterday's Rebecca Always Rebecca: fluid, smooth and dense with some pull to it and an even, self-leveling flow over the nail. The first coat is somewhat sheer, building to a wearable opacity after the second coat but I liked the color and coverage even better with three coats, the colors are richer and more dimensional and the holographic effects more pronounced. Cleanup is easy and straightforward. Shadow Between Us dries naturally in very good time to a beautiful glossy finish.

Photos show three coats of Shadow Between Us over treatment and basecoat.

Literary Lacquers Shadow Between Us

The holographic effects in Shadow Between Us create surprising combinations of cool and warm nuanced colors in the base, with a scorched-like coppery taupe shading around the edges of the nail. It's unusually complex and dramatic for a lighter grey like this, and difficult to pin down. Even the microglitters contribute with bright sparks of orange and yellow that read as copper and gold in certain lights.

Beautiful and unexpected!

love,
Liz