Today I have swatches of the new Face of Australia Calypso Bay Collection. The collection is a set of eight metallic frosts. Yes, I said frosts! This collection is a granny's dream, as the polishes have that classic 1980's frosted appearance, and I know many nuggles (nuggle = non nail polish addicted person) that would just love the pale pink one in this collection.
Now frosty polishes don't get much love generally. If I were to do a survey right here and now I best most of my readers would say they that Frosts are their least favourite finish. The main characteristic of a frost polish is that is has a pearly look and will always show the brush strokes. Some may say that this is a collection of chrome polishes that are very brush strokey, but either way, I'm thinking not too many hard core polishes lovers are going to love the brush stoke finish.
I had pretty high hopes for these polishes. From looking at the bottles I was really hoping they would be like the
Layla Mirror Chromes, or the
Sally Hansen Color Foils that weren't released here in Australia. Unfortunately they are nothing like those two amazing polish collections.
That said, I was actually surprised how much I liked the original finish. In these swatches I've tried a few different ways to wear these polishes. I had read on another blog that if you applied Matte top coat to a brush strokey polish and then applied regular polish, that the brush strokes disappear. As you will see from these photos, that is not the case with these polishes, and in fact adding matte top coat and then regular top coat significantly changed the appearance of these polishes.
Now let's look at each shade in detail.
A Mermaids Tale - light blue metallic frosty chrome. This is two coats with no top coat.
This is two coats of A Mermaids Tale and one coat of Matte Top coat.
This is two coats of A Mermaids Tale, one coat of Matte Top coat and one coat of Seche Vite top coat. The brush strokes are still visible, but now the finish is like a shimmer rather than a chrome.
Blue Lagoon - a very pale silvery blue metallic frosty chrome. This is two coats with no top coat.
This is two coats of Blue Lagoon and one coat of Matte Top coat. I actually really love how all these shades look with a matte top coat applied.
This is two coats of Blue Lagoon, one coat of Matte Top coat and one coat of Seche Vite top coat. Again the brush strokes are still visible, but now the finish is like a shimmer rather than a chrome.
Itsy Bitsy Bikini - a pale lavendar metallic frosty chrome. This is two coats with no top coat.
This is two coats of Itsy Bitsy Bikini and one coat of Matte Top coat.
This is two coats of Itsy Bitsy Bikini, one coat of Matte Top coat and one coat of Seche Vite top coat.
Morning Mimosa - a pale pastel pink metallic frosty chrome. This is two coats with no top coat. Hello Granny! I have a friend that would absolutely love this polish. In fact a few years ago she showed me a polish she was wearing at the time and commented to me that she was nearly out of it and did I know of anything that was similar. I shuddered on the inside and advised her that they didn't really make polishes that had that finish any more.
Morning Mimosa with matte top coat...
... and with seche vite added on top of the matte top coat.
Pirates Booty - a olive gold metallic frosty chrome. What an unusual colour. I love that it's not the normal gold shade you would expect from a metallic collection. This is two coats with no top coat.
This is gorgeous with a matte top coat.
The brush strokes nearly do disappear on this one one the top coat is applied. But it looks like a completely different polish compared to the original shade from the bottle.
Rainforest Rendezvous - very pale minted green metallic frosty chrome. This is two coats with no top coat.
Summer Breeze - a neutral toned taupe metallic frosty chrome. Yay for another edgy colour in this range. I love all three versions of how this looks, so totally different. I also love this neutral tone for winter manis.
Tropical Heat - a warm nude metallic frosty chrome. In its out of the bottle application it's quite dramatic and shiny, but apply a matte top coat and it totally blends into your nails. This was a very good netural tone for my skin colour. This is two coats with no top coat.
Adding top coat again darken the shade up and brings out the shimmer rather than the chrome.
Given these were very chromey, I thought they might stamp well. I have to say the stamp OK, but not great. You can't really see the colour differences between the polishes once they are stamped and the stamping isn't totally opaque. If you have no other metallic stamping polishes then they will be fine, but I will use others that I already have in my collection.
Overall, this is a unique collection. You will rarely find a collection of frosty chromes these days. I really love the colours, but if you don't like brush strokes you are going to want to stay away from these.
Getting the polishes applied with the relatively straight strokes you see in these pictures was hard work, even for a seasoned pro like me. But the frosty metallic finish actually grew on me and I liked them more and more as I wore them.
Formula was good, with each polish only needing two coats for opacity and dry time was normal.
These polishes are in store now available from Priceline Pharmacy, Big W,
Fashion Addict and
Makeup Express. Polishes are 12ml with a RRP of $4.95.
Polishes provided for consideration.
