Friday, June 28, 2013

on 4 comments

Ulta3 - AFL Fan Nails

Popular Aussie polish brand Ulta3 have recently released a set of 18 boxed polishes called Fan Nails.  There is a set for every AFL (Australian Football League) team that contains nail polishes in official teams colours.  They sent me some of the sets to review and to create some fan nail designs, so lets see how I went.

The four sets I received were Sydney Swan, Fremantle Dockers, Hawthorn Hawks and Collingwood Magpies.  As you can see, each set comes with three bottles of polish.  With all four that I received, there were two coloured polihses and a clear polish, basically because those teams colors only have two colours. But there are many sets that have three colours, such as the Suns, Eagles, Power, Lions, Giants, Cows, Bulldogs and Saints.  

Most of the sets appear to contain existing polishes, such as Lily White, Black Satin, but some of the sets definitely have new colours.  Unfortunately all the promo material I've got doesn't show the polish names on any of the bottles, so while some colours look new, I cant tell.  I'm going to have to check out the rest of the sets in real life to see.


Each set has also comes with a Ulta3 fan nails file - which is really coarse and probably only something I would use in an emergency.  They also come with three sheets of nail sticker guides to help you in creating your fan nails.  One just has straight edges, another has regular curved french guides and the third is a chevron design.



The first design I created was the Sydney Swans design, and I chose to follow the promo picture and create the same design that appears on the side of the box. This set comes with Lily White, Scarlet, and Clear polish. I started with a white base.


I then applied one of the chevron stickers to the tip of each nail and painted the tip in red.  Scarlet is a super pigmented and vivid red creme, so it's just perfect for this sort of thing.


After I painted each nail, I pulled the chevron sticker off.


The chevron design sticker is really easy to use and you get a nice clean and neat finish. You don't get a sharp tip at the apex of the chevron using the sticker, but if you wanted it to be a sharp point you could touch it up with a fine nail art brush. 





Next up is the Collingwood design, and again I chose to do the simple design that is pictured on the box for this team.  This set comes with Lily White, Black Satin and Clear polish.  I started with a white base and when that was dry I used the straight sticker guides to tape my nail in half.


I then painted one half black, peeled the stickers off and applied top coat.





The next design is for the Fremantle Dockers. This set comes with Lily white, Royal and Clear.  Royal is a new colour to me.  I do have a purple polish called Royal from the silver capped Speed Dry Ulta3's, but this is a different purple.  It's actually a very dark purple and this first photo in full sun actually makes it look a lot lighter than it really is.  The photos with the white chevrons are more colour accurate for this polish.


I chose to do a different team design for this mani compared to the one on the box, because the one on the box for this was the same chevron design as I already did for the Swans mani.  I love this purple colour, but I actually think it's a bit too dark to be the right Dockers purple colour.

For this mani I just created a double chevron design which matches the team jersey.  I used Lily White and a fine stripper nail art brush.


The last fan nail design I created was with the Hawks set.  This set comes with two new colours, general mustard and fudge brownie.  General mustard, apart from having an awesome name, is a great yellow.  It has a very slight silvery shimmer to it too. I don't have photos of fudge brownie on it's own, sorry.

Last year I created Hawks nails for the AFL grand final, so I thought it was funny that I actually got this set to review. Back then I had to franken a yellow polish to get the right shade, so general mustard definitely filled a gap in my collection.


I originally used the provided white straight sticker guides to mark off my nails, but I didn't like how thick the lines looked, so I took them off and just did thin brown lines freehand using a long bristled stripping brush. Of course I could have used scissors to cut the tape up into smaller lines, but the truth was I didn't have the patience to tape up my nails that much.  In the end I was really happy how these turned out for free hand stripes. 





The Ulta3 AFL Fan Nail boxed sets retail for $9.95 and are available from selected pharmacies, AFL stores and Club Merchandising stores.  They are also available at participating supermarkets.  The Ulta3 Facebook page has a stockist locator app which can help you locate shops that stock Ulta3 polishes.

Are you and AFL fan?  Who you you support?

Products provided for review.

4 comments:

  1. Love all of these! Im a big AFL fan, I support the Essendon Bombers :) Really love the mustard colour in the Hawks set!!

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  2. Love the idea of these kits, although since I go for North Melbourne I could probably use polishes I already have. I love 'general mustard', such an awesome name and looks like a really unique colour too.
    Hope you enjoy the rest of the weekend :)

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  3. love this idea but in the scheme of things $9.95 is a lot of cash for a couple of bottles of ultra 3 :( rugby nails would have been a good set too tho!

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  4. I'm really very annoyed that the pharmacies around here are ONLY stocking Crows and Port sets. Because nobody in Adelaide barracks for any other teams? (Actually, truth be told I can't abide Football, but I desperately want General Mustard. I'm not big on yellows, and this is the first one that's made me sit up and go "Want!")

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I live in Canberra, Australia with my husband, Mr Ten and Miss Eight. My blog is all about nail polish, and a few other bits in between. You can contact me at morenailpolish@iinet.net.au