I've been spending all my money on planners, lately, and I have more polish than I know what to do with, anyway, so it's been a month - maybe more - since I've bought any polish. But I haven't posted the last stuff I did buy, so I'm trying to get up the swatches I have that never got posted. The first installment is from Olive Ave Polish.
This is turquoise with gold shimmer - super-pretty, but sheer. I liked it best when I layered it over other things - here's a swatch over Aster:
Aster is a paler green creme, but I was surprised at how much I liked this. There's a picture of it on my hands in this post, and it's also on my Instagram page!
For the record, here's my earlier post about Aster and the other colors from the spring (Flora) collection.
Then here's the other one I bought from Summer Reading, which is Fey - not quite as showy as Herbology but really pretty, still:
From YouTuber Kelli Marissa (see her video at the bottom of this post):
The Nail Polish Collection Tag!
(Since I don't do videos, you get text. I'm old-school.)
How many nail polishes do you own?I have a spreadsheet that's more or less up to date, and it says I have about 900 bottles, including minis. (About 100 of them are minis, I think - and in any case that's less than KM has! But still... that's a lot of nail polish.)
What was the first nail polish you remember buying? A Revlon bright pink, don't remember the name any more. This was in the 70s, when even fuchsia was still considered a little racy, and I was 12 or so, so I thought I was being very daring.
What is the most recent nail polish you added to your collection? At the time I first wrote this last week, it was two polishes from Olive Ave's new summer collection, Herbology and Fey. However, I've now gotten a couple of I Scream polishes in the mail, so for now, they're actually the newest. (There's a picture of Herbology below. I'll try to get some more posts up about all this stuff!)
What is your least favorite nail polish that you own? I've said it before and I'm sticking with it, OPI Decades of Shades. Total baby-poop brown. (Some people love it, so I'm thinking it's one of those warm vs. cool colors thing. I'm very much a cool-tone person, so you warms may have better luck with it!)
What is your rarest nail polish?I have Hard Candy Sky, which is the one that Alicia Silverstone made famous years and years ago. It's supposedly very HTF so I imagine that one would be the winner. I've thought of trying to sell it, but I like having it even if I don't ever wear it! Also I don't have the cheap plastic rings any more that came with the old Hard Candy colors, so I imagine that would hurt its resale value.
What is your most expensive nail polish? If we go by what I actually paid for it, probably a Lynnderella that I paid maybe $22 for some years ago. Most of the time I won't pay those kind of prices, though. I have a couple of designer polishes that I didn't pay full price (or anything) for - some Marc Jacobs that I bought on sale, a YSL that my sister gave me, etc. Some of those might have a higher value than the Lynnderella, I'm not sure!
What brand do you own the most of? Zoya, no question - I think I have about 100. (I do love Zoya, but also they have (used to have) really good sales, which is why I have so many.)
What color do you own the most of? Either pink or purple, I've never really bothered to figure it out. I am super-partial to those berry colors that are right on the border between pink and purple, anyway, so it's often hard to figure out which is which!
Which nail polish in your collection means the most to you?I get very attached to fall polishes, for some reason (maybe just because fall means the hot Texas summer is over!) - Xtreme Wear Pumpkin Spice - which is long discontinued - is one that I am pretty sentimental about, although there are some others, too. (see below for a picture)
What is your go-to nail polish right now? I have only been changing my polish once a week, lately, and I haven't been repeating myself much. I've been on a pink tear, though, so let's say anything pink, especially bright pink (but some pale ones, too). -- I've worn more pink this year than I have in years. Not sure why, exactly.
Re question 3: here's Herbology (not particularly well-cleaned-up, sorry!) over another Olive Ave green, Aster:
(I don't really think you're seeing the full awesomeness here. I really love it.)
And re question 9: here's several fall polishes that I'm very attached to (none of which are available any more, far as I know): Lippmann All Night Long, the aforementioned Pumpkin Spice, and Spoiled Cougar Attack. (Going from this, I think the thing that makes a great fall polish for me is brown + copper! But P-spice is still the best.)
Right after New Year's, Walker (from Olive Ave Nails on YouTube) had a Kickstarter for her new polish brand, and you could pre-order either the entire first collection of 6 polishes, or 3 polishes of your choice. I'm never the completist so I did three, and the Kickstarter was funded in, like, 2 days, so there wasn't much suspense about that part - always a good sign.
I knew my polishes were supposed to be in the mail - considerably earlier than the date promised, I believe - and they came yesterday. The first collection was pastels, but I'm not quite as anti-pastel as I used to be, and they are lovely. (See the bottom of the entry for Walker's swatch video with all six colors.) When I was trying to decide what to get, I passed over the yellow and the coral (because I usually think warm colors aren't flattering on me), and the blue (just because it was a cornflower-ish color that seemed similar to things I already had), and what I got was the purply-pink (Rhododendron), the minty green (Aster), and the pale-green shimmer (Calla Lily):
Added: I forgot to say that these polishes are now available online! here - Olive Ave Polish
My swatches are below, but first of all, it came in this nice (recycled and recyclable) envelope, with a hand-written note inside. (I believe if you ordered the full set of 6 you get a box.)
Here's Rhododendron:
These two cremes have really nice formulas. On both this and Aster, I did two coats. And I love this color. It's light enough to be spring-like but not super-pale - right up my alley.
Aster:
I was calling this a green, but really it's noticeably blue-green. And as I said, the formula seemed very similar to the one above. This is also two coats.
The third one, Calla Lily, is different, since it's a shimmer:
It's much more pale, but super-pretty. This is three coats. I haven't tried it on my nails yet, so I don't know yet whether I'll feel like that third coat is really necessary on the nail. But it has sort of a golden shimmer that's really unusual. (I should have swatched it over Aster, just to see what that looked like, but I didn't think about it last night when I was doing these!)
