Today's NOTD: OPI Princesses Rule!, Claire's Night Sky, and OPI Save Me!

This was one glitter bomb of a mani.



I put three coats of OPI Princesses Rule! on as a base, then sponged on a layer of Claire's Night Sky, a fantastic navy and holo glitter, and finally sponged on Save Me from the OPI Nicki Minaj collection.

When I got out into the sun today, I thought I was going to go blind from the disco ball on my nails.

Today's NOTD - shimmery white with a holographic glitter gradient

I was lying awake last night in bed just DYING to do this manicure! So of course the first thing I did when I woke up was break out the polish supplies. This manicure made my nails look like something out of a winter fantasy world.



The white base is four coats of Nicole by OPI It's All About the Glam, a semi-sheer glittery white, and one of my favourite base polishes. It's a soft white, easy to apply, and the subtle shimmer keeps it from being too stark. The main issue is that it's quite sheer, and even with four coats I could see my nail line.

To fix that, I added a glitter gradient using Claire's Night Sky, a fine holographic and navy blue glitter that I absolutely love. If you're near a Claire's or Icing shop (it's sold as Epic Winning there I think?), grab this! It's cheap and beautiful.

Topcoat Challenge: Redux

Looking over my topcoat challenge pics, I realised I was not happy with the method I used to test. So I'm going to do it all over again, in a slightly different manner.

Instead of applying a different topcoat over each finger, I'm just going to apply a different topcoat each time I do my nails, and take pictures of how they wear over the course of the next few days. This should better show which topcoat works best on my nails. I'll re-score the polishes based on application, smell, finish, and lasting power.

In the meantime, here's a random picture of a Claire's polish I picked up this weekend: This is Night Sky, a holographic and navy blue glitter in a clear base. It's absolutely beautiful, and cheap! It's also sold as Icing Epic Winning. I used it for a glitter gradient on top of OPI Princesses Rule! I have Deborah Lippmann's Candy Shop on my middle finger, and China Glaze Wicked Style + Konad special white polish dots on my pinky, in case anyone's curious :)

Deborah Lippmann Candy Shop dupe?

I was going to do another topcoat experiment for my next post, but I came across the rumoured Deborah Lippmann Candy Shop dupe at my local Claire's yesterday, so instead we have a comparison post!

As always, you can click through to see larger versions of the images.

The polishes:



Claire's Candy Shop, and Deborah Lippmann's Candy Shop.

A close up:



I immediately noticed that the Claire's base colour is a brighter hot pink, whereas the Lippmann is more of a milky candy pink.

The brushes:



The Lippmann brush is a little shorter and wider. Again, you can see the difference in the base colour. You can also see that the Lippmann version seems to have more of the smaller glitter than the Claire's version, which is heavier on the bigger glitter.



Side by side, the difference is obvious - Claire's brighter base shows through. Application wise, the Lippmann polish is smoother and lays flatter than the Claire's version, possibly due to the difference in the amount of small vs large glitter.

Are they true dupes of each other? Definitely not! But they're close enough that you don't really need both, and if you've been dying for Deborah Lippmann's Candy Shop but didn't want to put down the $20 for a bottle, the Claire's version might satisfy your craving!

A sneak peak...

I can't WAIT to work on these! I went into my local Claire's on the way home from the office and found the rumoured Deborah Lippmann Candy Shop dupe! I immediately grabbed it, then in a flurry of impulse buying, headed right to Holt Renfrew and picked up both Deborah Lippmann Candy Shop, and Glitter in the Air.

Look for a comparison post or two in the upcoming days!