Review: Nail Pattern Boldness Glitter Food

We all have it: somewhere, in our vast hordes of cremes, shimmers and sparkles, that one glitter polish that hasn't stood the test of time. Whether it's gotten all gummed up or the glitter has sunk to the bottom of the base, for one reason or another, it's just not what it used to be. I was really bummed when I went to wear one of my favorite indie glitters a while back and found it had changed for the worse. The glitter had sunk to the bottom and the suspension base was super thick and gunky. Maybe I didn't seal this polish up well enough or maybe it just didn't hold up--either way, it was completely flat and virtually unusable.

I tried to salvage it with polish thinner (PSA: DO NOT use polish remover to thin a polish--all you'll do is damage your polish) and even after putting an insane amount of thinner, there was no visible difference. The base had gotten so thick that the metal mixing balls inside couldn't move and help disperse the thinner throughout the bottle.

I have a couple sunken down glitters (none near as bad as this one) I've been meaning to try and fix anyways, so I figured the time was right to try Nail Pattern Boldness Glitter Food. I'm a huge fan of their Glitter A-Peel peel-off basecoat for glitter manis and I've always wanted to try Glitter Food after hearing so many positive things about it.

Glitter Food is a two-in-one product. Its first purpose--and the one that interested me the most--is that it can help save glitters experiencing any of the issues I mentioned above. When you have a polish where the original suspension base used was not strong enough to hold up the glitter (this is more common with polishes that have larger glitter pieces), Glitter Food gives it an extra boost to help the polish look and apply the way it should.

I tried it on a couple of my sunken glitters and it worked exactly as described! If you have a bottle that is nearly full or a bottle where the clear base has completely separated from the glitter, you might need to suck out some of the old suspension base with an eyedropper and then replace it with Glitter Food. It takes a little shaking up and then a few minutes to let Glitter Food do its magic (I usually turn the bottle upside-down while it sits), then you've got a glitter polish that looks good as new! Your big glitter pieces float back up to the top of the bottle and everything is distributed nice and evenly!

So it worked with mild cases, but could it save my poor pink glitter? This bottle was so flat, that no eyedropper was needed; I just poured some Glitter Food straight in. After lots of shaking and giving Glitter Food a few minutes to settle in, I used an orange stick to stir the glitter around a bit and let the Glitter Food penetrate deeper into the bottle. After a few more minutes, here's how it looked:

 Ta-da! I have my polish back!! It looks and applies wonderfully and you'd never guess that just a few minutes before, it looked like this polish was done for. If Glitter Food can salvage this worst-case scenario, I'm confident in recommending it as a fix for virtually any glitter polish problem!

Those results alone were worth the price of Glitter Food for me. But as I said earlier, that's not all Glitter Food does! It can also be used for smoothing out "hungry" glitters that eat topcoat and leave a rough or gritty finish. You'll find it's thicker than most top coats, but that's what makes it so smoothing. I also want to note that on its own, Glitter Food has a semi-matte finish to it, so you'll need to use regular topcoat over Glitter Food if you want some shine.

 So there you have it: another genius, innovative product from Nail Pattern Boldness! I hear NPB makes a fantastic base and top coat system as well, so that's next on my list to try. But it's going to take a lot to dethrone my current fav, Deborah Lippmann Gel Lab!

You can purchase Glitter Food from Nail Pattern Boldness' website.

Twinsie Tuesday: Endometriosis Awareness Nails

Endometriosis is a hormonal and immune system disease in which cell grows outside the uterine cavity, causing extreme pain and infertility. This female reproductive disease affects approximately 1 in 10 women worldwide. Today, the Twinsie Tuesday girls are wearing yellow to bring awareness to this debilitating disease.

I chose a pastel yellow creme, Deborah Lippmann Build Me Up Buttercup. When you're as pale and as blonde as I am, you have to be careful with yellows, but I can usually do okay with pastel ones like this.

The formula is pretty decent--certainly world better than the other DL yellow I own, Yellow Brick Road. It goes on a little streaky (still, show me a pastel yellow that doesn't) but it's not chalky in the slightest. I used three coats here.

Alaina at The Little Canvas

Amanda at Amandalandish

Amanda at Fashion Footing

Amber at Nails Like Lace

Bridget at A Painted Nail

Chelsea at Nailed

ChiChi at I'm Just Me...ChiChi

Erin at Paint Those Piggies

Jessica at Blue Velvet Lacquer

Lakeisha at Refined and Polished
​Lisa at The Polish Playground

Marisa at Polish Obsession

Savannah at Addicted to Polish

Róisín at Cuti-CLUE-les

Tiffany at Polished To Precision

Nicole by OPI Coca-Cola Preview

Nope, you didn't read wrong--OPI is doing another collab with Coca-Cola. This time, it's a part of their "little sister" brand, Nicole. I love me some Coca-Cola, but I'm not 100% convinced there was a need for another Coke-branded collection. Either way, I can't really complain, because the colors look very nice! Take a look!

Always A Classic Coca-Cola

 

DC Lover

Zero Is My Hero

 

Seriously Citrus

The Look Is Orange

 

In Grape Demand

 I'm definitely loving on Seriously Citrus, plus DC Lover and Always A Classic Coca-Cola look promising to me as well. I was wild about Coca-Cola Red from the original OPI collection but I was originally a bit surprised they made it a creme rather than a metallic, which would match the finish on the iconic Coke cans. So I'm happy to see they put in a metallic this time around. 

Look for these this March!

Essie Coat Couture

Essie Coat Couture is a purple-leaning grey satin with soft iridescent blue shimmer. I love how effortlessly chic this shade is! I can see myself wearing this a lot come fall. The finish and the color together bring to mind a luxurious leather hand bag--you know, a classic one that goes with everything? I absolutely adore grey polish and I am really living for this one!

Coat Couture looks stunning all on its own, but I couldn't resist popping on some topcoat to see that gorgeous shimmer come to life. Look how pretty and twinkly it is!

The formula is one of the best I've seen from a matte/satin. It's very creamy--no streaking or dragging. I used two coats here.

I thought I'd be hard pressed to find a shade from the Cashmere Matte Collection that I liked more than Just Stitched, but Coat Couture is giving it a run for its money! Both are wonderful, classic shades that benefit even more from the understatedly chic look of the satin finish.

PSA: Fake OPI Update

Seeing as it continues to be one of the most popular posts on my blog, I wanted to let you guys know I've updated my How To Spot Fake OPI post with new information for 2015. I try to keep that post as up-to-date as possible and OPI has made some pretty significant changes to their bottle labeling this year--probably their biggest re-design in the past five years. So if you like to buy your OPI online, you might want to take a minute to look over the changes so you know what to look for with new, authentic OPI. Happy hunting! :)

China Glaze Electric Nights Preview

Nowadays everyone does a summer neon collection, but in my mind, China Glaze did it first. They've released neon collections for years! So leave it to CG to shake things up this year with neons that glow even brighter under a black light. I hate clubs (give me a good book and a mug of tea instead any day) but it's still a cool idea. The collection, Electric Nights, features nine cremes and three matte glitter topcoats, to create a splatter effect. I don't know 100% which shades are which, but you can get a good idea by reading the official descriptions, which I've included below:

• Violet-Vibes: An ultra-violet purple crème.
• Plur-Ple: Vibrant blue-purple crème
• Glow with the Flow: Ultra bright baby pink crème
• Red-y to Rave: Unstoppable neon red crème
• Home Sweet House Music: Neon orange crème
• Daisy Know My Name?: Hi-light yellow crème
• DJ Blue My Mind: Vivid blue crème
• UV Meant to Be: Tranquil baby blue crème
• Treble Maker: Glowing  green crème
• Point Me to the Party: Neon green, orange, pink and blue matte multi-size glitter
• Let the Beat Drop: Hot orange and pink matte multi-size glitter
• Can I Get An Untz Untz: Cool neon blue and green matte multi-size glitter

These puppies are slated to drop in April. I feel like I already have a lot of neons (plus Essie's look really promising this year) and as I mentioned, I won't get any use out of the black light function, but I might pick up a shade or two if there's a standout when I see these in person.

Do you like the wave of neon polishes each summer or are you over it? I am all about brights, but now that there are soooo many neon collections, I gotta admit I could do with a little more variety sometimes.

Sneak Peek: Essie Summer 2015

 Essie is cranking out the brights this summer with a huge batch of new polish! There is no official info on this collection (Or collections? Essie has been doing both a summer AND a neons release lately), but I did find some promo shots floating around, so I thought I'd share what I've come across:

 

 

Source 

It may just be an early preview, but so far I am loving the collection(s)! The color variety looks wonderful, so if Essie can get the formulas right for these (I know that's been a concern in years past with their neons in particular), then they should be a big hit! And you know I'm personally loving that there are so many blues and greens here. ;)

2014 was kind of a lackluster year for Essie in my books, so I'm happy to be falling back in love with the brand this year. What are your thoughts on these?