SpaRitual Regal and Konad Plate M56

Good morning, Dear Reader!

Guess what? I couldn't handle having one grey and one white hand, both with four fingers Konaded all to heck yesterday. I changed it. I've wanted to use SpaRitual Regal again, so I did. It's the third time I've worn this one since I got it in August. I love it very much.

Again, so you don't have to go hunt down what it looks like alone, I took new pictures of it. It was kind of cloudy out, but the pictures turned out well. This is three coats, right before I went to Konad it.

SpaRitual Regal Nail Polish, Three Coats

For the Konad, my original idea was from swatching. I wanted to pair this with the Light Gray Konad Princess Polish, using a pattern I have never used from one of my favorite plates. I've seen a few manicures using the leaf French Tip pattern from plate M56 in browns lately, and I was thinking a less literal interpretation with respect to colors might be interesting.

I sat down to Konad, and it turned out the fine lines of the leaf pattern were too fine to hold my year-old, kind of thick Princess polish before it dried once scraped. Okay, Plan B: use the regular Orly polish that was close to the right color nearby... I stamped one hand, looked at it, and was reminded of why I use Konad polishes. The lines were simply not as crisp. So I swiped my nails with acetone to remove the polish. Here, I ran into another problem. I'm getting low on Diamont, but still have some SpaRitual Tout de Suite from when I switched brands. I used Tout de Suite today. I discovered that it does not stand up to being swiped with acetone, for the record!

So, I strayed from two of my usual methods of my routine, and was reminded of why they're in my routine! I put on another coat of Regal over my left hand, then stamped my leaf pattern over it in Gold Konad Special Polish. Success! What a hassle for one manicure... At least it turned out like I wanted it to, and likely a little better than my original color choice. I was going for Fall with a little color twist on the leaf theme, but still subtle, and I think that's what I got. Here's my result.

SpaRitual Regal Nail Polish, Three Coats, and Konad M56

That's the tale of my overcomplicated manicure, Dear Reader! I did want to pass on to you what I found out about that swiping with acetone trick, though, since Tout de Suite is my #2 choice for top coat. It's watery thin going on, and I think it just doesn't leave a thick enough layer of the product to stand up to acetone. I need to order more Diamont for Konad bases though, having made that discovery. Nubar's got a 15% off code right now - I found out about it a couple days ago via Twitter and forgot to tell you. It's on their Promotions page on their site - I was poking around there, so you can find it there. The minimum is $30.

That's it for now. Until next time, love and nail polish to you!

Konad Princess Nail Polish Swatches, Part I

Good afternoon, Dear Reader!

A couple of days ago, reader Cinthia put forth a request that was both a great idea and quite a challenge. She asked if I would swatch Konad polishes for you. Well, I've taken up the gauntlet and figured out a way to make it a manageable task for me to do as for you to refer back to.

What I'm doing for this is eight colors per post, keeping Special and Princess in separate posts, and I will add a tab at the top as soon as I'm done writing this which will be in outline format. It will have Special and Princess with color families, such as Brown, in alphabetical order, and links top the posts there.

As for keeping it manageable for me, I'm using both hands and two stamps per nail. Here, you shall see why I don't show my right hand. I am the polar opposite of ambidextrous. I apologize in advance for the right hand picture, and am ashamed to admit it's the best of seven...

The stamp I chose for the samples is the Coraline profile from plate CO1. Although I have a great love of my Coraline plates, that's not why I chose it... I picked it because it's small enough to stamp on my nails twice, and it has a good sized section that's solid as well as fine detail lines, so it seemed a good choice to show how well a given polish performs.

The polishes I chose are simply the first eight Princess polishes I dug up. I ordered them on my nails so as not to have similar colors together (such as a blue and a purple), lest the color balance of the pictures get thrown off. For the base, at Cinthia's request I used white on one hand, which clearly displays the color itself, and on the other, I used grey to show how the color was affected by a pigmented polish. The colors used were OPI Alpine Snow Matte and Diamond Matte Smoke, both with Diamont on top before and after stamping, since that would be normal conditions. I chose the two base polishes for color and dry time. Here are the pictures, I'll tell you about the polishes after.

Konad Princess Polishes over Grey

Konad Princess Polishes over White

Please note that all of the stamps on my left hand, the grey, are good. Some on my right hand are iffy. Again, that's because my left hand is really uncoordinated, it's not the polish. I think going forward, I'll put the white base on my left hand.

From left to right and top to bottom, they are:

1. Princess Chocolate: this is the ones that seems thin, probably best suited to small patterns that are fine lines. The streaks are visible on my pinky with the white base. It's a chocolate crown creme.

2. Princess Light Gray: perfect, I've had this one the longest and never had a problem. It's a light grey with a touch of lilac and a bit of shimmer.

3. Princess Violet Pearl: this is a shimmery deep violet that stands up against the grey polish. I have no troubles with this one.

4. Princess Coral Blue: excellent cool blue creme which I've used a lot, and never had a problem with. On the grey, I smudge it, I see. That was user error.

5. Princess Pop Green: despite being a light green creme, this one is so heavily pigmented that it is unaffected by the grey polish. I have never had any trouble with this one.

6. Princess Cool Red: a strong red creme that produces very clean lines.

7. Princess Olive Green: just what it says, olive green creme. Also trouble-free for me.

8. Princess Deep Jungle: this one is testy, but worth it. I found that the polish doesn't want to come off of the stamper if it's used in the normal manner. What I do is pick is up as usual, wait 10 seconds, then apply to the nail. Then it works. It's a blue green shimmer.

Those are the first eight Konad polishes on what will be an I-don't-know-how-many part series. I'll likely try to alternate between Special and Princess for this. It's certainly not an attractive manicure I'm left with!

That's all I have for you today, Dear Reader. I'm off to add a tab to organize things... Until tomorrow, love and nail polish to you!

SpaRitual Inner Sanctum & Konad S6

Good morning, Dear Reader!

Today I have one from the vault for you, a manicure I did after some swatches in the past week. I like Chanel Dragon too much to change in. For the record, I'm finding it's wearing really well over Nu Nails, too - not a bit of tip wear or a single chip.

The manicure you have not seen yet started with a base in SpaRitual's Inner Sanctum, from the Forbidden Collection, which is a light brown creme. It required three coats to be even and opaque, but was no big deal because SpaRituals tend to have a good dry time and the cremes have a great shiny finish, so it's worth it. Here is three coats with a top coat.

SpaRitual Inner Sanctum Nail Polish, Three Coats

To it, on my quest for a subtle Konadicure, I added the woven pattern from plate S6 using Chocolate Konad Princess Nail Polish. I found that the Chocolate was a bit thin by Konad polish standards, although well pigmented, and left streaks on the plate. I saw right away they'd show up in pictures, but not walking around. I liked the color, so I used it anyhow. Here is the finished manicure.

SpaRitual Inner Sanctum Nail Polish and Konad S6 in Chocolate Konad Princess Nail Polish

By the time I finished my right hand, I got a handle on the Konad polish, and I really like it, so I'll use it again.

I may have more in store for you later, Dear Reader. I just don't have the heart to take off Dragon right now! Until then, love and nail polish to you!