Chanel Paradoxal vs Ulta3 Twilight Fever

Hey everyone! Hope you are having a great week! I have been ridiculously busy at work the past three days trying to tie up lose ends before I start my new job and before I go to Hong Kong on the weekend. Only two more days and I'm out of here!!

The other day after work I quickly popped into the chemist near my office to rummage through the Ulta3 bin to see if I could find any cheap gems. I instantly spotted a dark taupe colour with purple shimmer and thought it looked really familiar! Had I just found an almost exact dupe of Chanel's Paradoxal!?! To me, the base colour of Twilight Fever looked more brown/less purple than Paradoxal's base colour, so I wasn't convinced it was an actual dupe....

But here are the pics of the two together on my nails and if you can see the difference, you have better eyes than me! I honestly could not tell the difference and in fact, I got confused after a while about which brand was on each nail! I have taken photos in multiple lighting conditions to show that it isn't just the lighting that makes them seem identical!

Left to Right: Twilight Fever, Paradoxal, Twilight Fever, Paradoxal

So what do you guys think? Even if there is a slight difference, for $2.25AUD (compared to $39AUD!) it's a bargain dupe! I would suggest all my Aussie readers get their butts down to their local chemist and grab three or four bottles!

Rescue Beauty Lounge - Stormy

Before I get stuck into today's post I just want to say thank you so much to everyone who sent me well wishes in my last post. I actually inspected my finger again today and the majority of the damage is on the underside of the finger. So I'm hoping I'll be able to get back to swatching sooner than I thought!

In the mean time, today I have photos of Rescue Beauty Lounge's Stormy which I took about a week or so back. A couple of my followers suggested I do an RBL month since I have a few (*cough cough*) RBL polishes and I had started compiling the shots of my collection. So until I get back on track, I think I will show you all the photos of what I have so far!

Stormy is exactly as the name suggests - a stormy grey creme. I absolutely love the colour, but found application was a little streaky - you can see the patches on my ring finger. It has been ridiculously hot here in Sydney the past couple of weeks (think 100°F to 104°F!) so I have a feeling this polish was doing all sorts of crazy things because of the weather!

Apart from that tiny little issue, Stormy dried really quickly and looked fabulous!

Natural Light

Natural Light

Indoor Lighting

Essie Winter 2010 Part 1

Hey Everyone!

I hope you all had a fantastic Christmas! Mine was a little hectic as we had to visit three lots of family, but all in all I had a lovely Christmas. I was also a very lucky girl and was given a new camera! Say hello to my new Canon DSLR! 

This means no more crappy swatch photos! However, it also means I am going to have to look after my cuticles better (as you will see from the photos below!). Apologies in advance for the horrible cuticles! :s Please also excuse the nubbins. I had a killer break on my middle finger a couple of days ago so I had to file them all down *cries*.

Today I have swatches of three of the new colours from Essie's Winter 2010 collection. The collection consists of 6 chic and elegant wintery colours. Even though it is summer here in Oz, the colours are so gorgeous, I will definitely be wearing them!

Check out the pics after the jump!

China Glaze Channelesque

Due to my absence from the blogging community the past month, I'm really out of the loop when it comes to new nail polish collections. So I thought until I get my groove back (which will hopefully be this week!) I'd show you some of my fave colours from my collection over the next few posts.

And to kick it off, I have China Glaze's Channelesque for you.

Channelesque is a stunning dusty grayish purple creme. Sadly, it is a long discontinued colour but it is hands down one of my favourite nail polishes. 

I honestly have no complaints about this polish! It applied smoothly in two coats, didn't bubble or streak and lasted for days without a chipping!

The obvious downside is that it isn't 3free. But I have to be honest, I'm not too worried about wearing this colour every now and then, even though it has some not so great chemicals in it, because it is such a stunning colour!

The fantastic news is that supposedly Below Deck from the upcoming China Glaze Anchors Away collection is a dead on dupe for Channelesque! Mary from Body & Soul did a pretty convincing comparison between the two!

x

Deborah Lippmann - Waking Up In Vegas and My First Award!

Hey everyone! Today I have photos of one of Deborah Lippmann's Spring 2010 polishes, Waking Up In Vegas.

I had umm'd and ahhh'd about this colour for ages, but when I saw it on Lady Gaga on the cover of Vanity Fair, I went crazy for this polish..... (I have a slightly unhealthy obsession with Lady Gaga and Kim Kardashian as well :P But that story is for another day!) 

Lippmann isn't sold in Australia, but luckily I found it at KissandMakeupNY.com so I snapped it up straight away!

WUIV is freakin awesomeness! It applied beautifully, only needed two coats and dried quickly.  The colour is creamy beige-grey goodness! My nails were really long in these photos, but WUIV made them look even longer! I won't lie, Lippmann is pricey, but if you have the opportunity to get some of her colours, try this one out. You wont be disappointed.

Click to check out my first blogger award after the jump! :D

Eyeko - Rain Polish (And a swap with Konad-licious!)

Last week I organised to do a swap with the lovely Carli from Konad-licious for three of the new Eyeko polishes that I had been lemming for ages! I was so stoked simply about the fact that she was sending them to me! So, you can imagine how excited I was when I opened the box and found not only the three Eyekos, but all these other amazing goodies as well!!!!

There are so many gorgeous polishes I wanted to try (Milani holo! *drool*) but I was instantly drawn to Eyeko's Rain Polish, so that is what I'm wearing now.

Rain Polish is a light blue grey creme with a subtle shimmer. The shimmer almost disappears on the nail but it provides just enough dimension to the polish that you don't feel like it is just another flat creme. 

Application was a dream. Two thins coats was plenty and it dried in a flash! Not a bad word to be said about this polish!

You may have also noticed that I shortened my nails and changed the shape. I wasn't feeling the super square look anymore, so I went with the trusty squoval shape. What do you think?

Hope you are all having a fab day! Be sure to check out Konad-licious!  x

Essie Fall 2010

 Today I have swatches of three of the colours from Essie's Fall 2010 collection, which is officially being released tomorrow.

I have to say from the outset, all three colours applied so well! The formula is fantastic! I love all of them, but I especially adore Velvet Voyeur and Sew Psyched!