Nicole by OPI Step 2 The Beat Of My Heart

Hello!

This is a short post because I had swatched on the same day with my Sparitual Wilde collection and had intended to include them in the same post as a "by-the-way-swatch" but it slipped off my mind completely.

Step 2 The Best Of My Heart is one of the polish in Nicole by OPI's Justin Bieber One Less Lonely Girl collection. I won it from Secret Allure's first giveaway :) It's a clear polish that comprises of heart flakies in pink & purple shades and colorful glitters that appear prismatic but too scattered to be holographic.

I'm not Justin's fan but to win a giveaway is like striking lottery once in my lifetime! I'm happy to own this polish but I might not use it often. It's a fun polish, cute, sweet and light. My character has none of these traits. Ha!

One thing about the bottle. It's weird. The bottom protrudes out with a wider base. I suppose it's good for stability but I don't like the shape. It seems to me the glassblower made a painful mistake in the process but was appreciated by the company! And the cap, hmmm, it belongs to nail polish in the 80s which mothers still keep as souvenirs these days. Ha! Ok ok maybe I'm just fussy.

Well, I believe everything on earth is balanced. You can't have the good unless there's a presence of the bad. Despite the odd looking bottle and old fashioned cap, Nicole by OPI improvises a wide flat brush... No, they called it 'Perfect Stroke Brush'. Upon taking out the brush I realized they have the same brush type as Sally Hansen's Insta-Dri's with the only difference in length; SH Insta-Dri's brush stand is longer. View SH's brush here. It's good to have flat-head brush for Step 2 The Beat Of My Heart because you should be able to scoop out the heart flakies and place them on the nails much easier than a round-headed one.

So anyway, here's the swatch - I was testing Sparitual Wilde collection and didn't have enough time to put S2TBOMH on my nails. I have this practice finger with me and trust me, color is 100% accurate.

I used OPI Ridge Filler as base before putting S2TBOMH. I know other reviewers described it as clear polish with subtle/faint hint of purple/pink but on the practice finger it's clear as water. Yeah, please don't trust the fake finger, the nail color is definitely different from our nail bed's.

Application is, of course, easy, like any other clear polish. But placing the tiny glitter is a task; they are scattered in the bottle and it's not gonna be dense on the nails. As with other similar types of polish, usually you have to slap thick glob of polish on the nails to put the flakies and glitter effectively on the nails. You can see the obvious layer on top of Ridge Filler. You can also see my successful attempt in placing TWO heart flakies but failed in getting more glitters as it should have been. Hmm, as I said, everything on earth is balanced...

Do you like Step 2 The Beat Of My Heart? Or you like it because of Justin Bieber?


1 coat of OPI Ridge Filler
1 coat of Nicole by OPI Step 2 The Beat Of My Heart

Weekend Haul!

Last weekend I went to Sunway Pyramid with the intention to visit Inglot, the new flagship store all the way from Poland. Read the online reviews, they have nice makeup and nail polish so I was eager to witness their wands of magic.

But I was distracted by other nail polish in Watsons, Daiso and Elianto... I went into an overdrive by buying them till I forgot about Inglot!

Below is my drugstore haul:

Haul from Watsons, Daiso and Elianto
Finger rest at RM3.50, bought from a pushcart store

Essence Metallics collection - 8ml, RM9.90 each
L-R: Steel Me, Metal Battle, Nothing Else Metals, Copper Rulez!

Essence nail polish - 5ml, RM6.90 each
L-R: Where Is The Party x 2, Choose Me, Wake Up!

Bloop nail polish - RM8.90 each
L-R: H124, H563, H565, H137

Elianto nail polish - RM9 and RM5 (sale price)
L-R: Lilac, Shine Opal, Twilight Zone, White

Daiso Color Makeup and Heart nail enamel - RM5 each
L-R: Color Makeup 04, Heart 2 (bought as backup)

If you notice, I bought 2 bottles of Essence Where Is The Party. There was only 2 left on the shelf and I grabbed all of them... because they are DUOCHROME! Omg, duochrome polish in Watsons which costs RM6.90... my heart was pounding and fluttering!

It's in dark dusty purple tone with flashes of green and blue. Reminds me of Zoya Ki, almost a dupe but Zoya Ki has a brighter shade of purple.

Next up is Elianto Lilac which costs RM9 at sale price. My bestie and I bought the same polish :)

It's duochrome in the bottle but appears as hologram on the nails. A lilac tone with flashes of gold.

Now on to my quick swatch of my haul!

Bloop H563 is a surprise, the olive glitter is awesome. Great color for Fall. Bloop H124 in neon pink is fresh and fun, it certainly didn't show in the bottle but wow-zers on the nails!

L-R: Bloop H563 (olive glitter), Bloop H565 (grey glitter),
Essence Wake Up! (neon orange), Essence Choose Me (blue glitter), Bloop H124 (neon pink)
All these are applied in 2 coats

As you can see below, my quick swatch wasn't able to capture Essence's duochrome. I took the photos under artificial light but I will do it again in my next post. For Elianto Lilac, it's sheer but buildable. Nice purplish shade that flashes gold in angles. 

The disappointment is Color Makeup 04 and Elianto Shine Opal. They didn't turn out as expected; the former didn't show the pink duochrome on the nails and Shine Opal's blue glitter is too sparse and small to be visible. Lamers!

L-R: Elianto Shine Opal (clear base with blue tiny glitter - a weak one),
Color Makeup 04 (beige with pink duochrome - another weak one),
Essence Where Is The Party, Elianto Lilac, Bloop H137
All applied in 2 coats

Bloop H137 (a very sheer jelly neon coral-pink)

If you're wondering why I didn't swatch Essence Metallics, it's because I'll put it in the next post. They deserve their own space for their awesome-ness :)

Splashy Hearty Duochrome

Couple of weeks ago I bought nail polish from SaSa and Daiso. They don't belong to any well-known brands and they are cheap. However like the rest of the cheap polish, they carry strong awful smell and tend to chip fast.

After my failure in nail marbling, I needed something new, easy to accomplish but not too ordinary. I swatched a few from my collection to test the colors and decided on these two:

L-R: Splash S031 from SaSa, Heart No.2 from Daiso

Cute bottle from Heart nail enamel!

Heart nail enamel No.2 is milky white packed with pink and subtle green shimmer. It's a duochrome!

For Splash S031, it's an awesome blue jelly, bright and fresh in shade. It's sheer and may most likely reach opacity in 4-5 coats but I was blown by the jelly finish and the pretty blue. Application for both Splash and Heart was, sadly, terrible. The brushes were stiff, hard to control and all over the place, like they had a mind of their own. It's advisable to put light strokes on each nail and fill up any bald patches with each coat.

Index finger: 1 coat. The rest: 2 coats

3 coats of Splash S031

When dried, I applied Heart No.2. With 1 coat it became bluish-green. With 2 coats it was green with blue duochrome. Outstanding! My curiosity got better of me and I painted the 3rd coat. The duochrome faded a notch down and emerged as turquoise chrome with hints of blue seen at an angle.

Taken indoors, artificial light

Duochrome in green and blue

The next day, I took some shots at the front porch;

The manicure was too thick and resulted in bubbles forming on the nails. Nonetheless I was happy with it. The turquoise chrome was striking and gorgeous! It flashed blue and teal whenever I moved my hands, even my boyfriend liked it.. Ha!

Before heading out to meet my best friend, I received the parcel from Secret Allure!

L-R: China Glaze Crackle in Cracked Concrete, Color Club Fractured in Smash Hit and Nubar 2010

I decided to slap some goodness on my nails... Nubar 2010!

Well hello holo flakies!

Duochrome with holo flakies. How's that?

The magic of Nubar 2010

One complaint: I had the infamous Seche Vite shrinkage; the blue base was evident at the tips. I also realized my previous marbled nails suffered the same fate. I love Seche Vite but the shrinkage is annoying!

3 coats of Splash S031
3 coats of Heart No.2
2 coats of Nubar 2010
Seche Clear base coat
Seche Vite dry fast top coat

Here's a quick swatch of Color Club Smash Hit on my thumb nail.