Category Archives: Finish: Holo

Weekly Loves #1

I decided to start a new series, Weekly Loves. I’ll be (hopefully!) posting it every week on Sunday so I can discuss my loves / favorites from the week. I’ll use the following four prompts to structure the post:

A newly purchased product I am loving;
A long-time or rediscovered favorite I am loving;
My most-wanted wishlist item; and
A blog post I especially enjoyed reading.

Let’s get started –

A newly purchased product I am loving

I really love thermal nail polish right now, and Polished by KPT makes my favorites ones. The newest addition to my thermal polish family Harvest Moon, which is especially great because it’s work appropriate – nude/beige when warm & orange when cold (and holo, too!).

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China Glaze Hologlam Polish – Swatch of the Day

Purchase

china glaze hologram when stars collide swatch

China Glaze When Stars Collide

China Glaze is releasing a collection of twelve linear holo polishes; the Hologlam Collection. They’re supposed to come out in April, but my local Sally Beauty had them out yesterday, so I purchased two shades. When Stars Collide is an eggplant-y purple, and OMG A UFO is an olive-y green.

OMG A UFO // When Stars Collide

From the swatches I’ve seen, these don’t look very holo – and it’s true that they’re not nearly as holo as Color Club Halo Hues or China Glaze’s old OMG collection – but they’re definitely noticeably holo, and somehow they’re holo in a way that’s difficult to capture on camera.

Note that both photos in this post were taken with my cell phone camera in full sun; by the time I got home to take photos with my real camera, the sun wasn’t as bright, and the holo doesn’t show up as well with flash. So, if you’re on the fence about these, I think it’s worth buying one shade to check out the holo effect in person – you might be pleasantly surprised, like I was!
*As noted in this review, I purchased both of the featured polishes. Please see my disclosure policy for more information.

Spotted: New LA Girl Holo Nail Polishes – Display Photos & Swatches

Affiliate LinksPurchase

Black Illusion // Sparkle Ruby // Purple Effect // Brilliant Blue // Teal Dimension

I spotted an exciting new display earlier today at Rite Aid – LA Girl Holographic / 3D Effects nail polish. It seems that holo polish has now truly hit the mainstream! The polishes were $4.80 at my Rite Aid; prices will vary by region, and you can purchase them online at Cherry Culture for $4 each.

Here’s the display – it was on the lowest shelf, so I couldn’t get a good angle to photograph the whole display in one photo:

Note that the display photo makes these look they might be linear holos – I was skeptical – these look to be scattered holos in the bottle. The collection has eight shades; I purchased five, and have nail wheel swatches for you of those shades. First, here are bottle shots of the other three – I think the color is still a little off in these (sorry!) – I couldn’t quite adjust it to be right.

3D Silver

Dazzling Pink

Electric Coral

And the swatches of the five shades I have in some different lighting conditions:

LA Girl Holo Polish Black Illusion // Teal Dimension // Brilliant Blue // Purple Effect // Sparkle Ruby Swatches

Natural indirect light: Black Illusion // Teal Dimension // Brilliant Blue // Purple Effect // Sparkle Ruby

LA Girl Holo Polish Swatches - 3D Effects-2

Flash: Black Illusion // Teal Dimension // Brilliant Blue // Purple Effect // Sparkle Ruby

LA Girl Holo black teal blue purple ruby swatches

Direct Sun: Black Illusion // Teal Dimension // Brilliant Blue // Purple Effect // Sparkle Ruby

Clearly, these are scattered holos – and not particularly holographic at that. Black Illusion and Purple Effect are the most holographic – you can really see the rainbow of color in both of them. Teal Dimension has a faint rainbow in some lights. I can maybe see a hint of rainbow in Brilliant Blue, and I see no holo / rainbow effect in Sparkle Ruby at all.

That said – these are all gorgeous polishes, even the ones that aren’t holo. I love the depth of the color; they’re basically holo jellies. The quality is fantastic too – they were almost-but-not-quite wearable at one coat, and one coat of polish was very even – not even a hint of unevenness or streaks – they just needed the second coat to be fully opaque. I’ve worn several of them now, and wear time is great – longer than average.

EDIT: I went back to buy the orange, Electric Coral – here’s a swatch, both in focus and blurred to show sparkle.

Electric Coral

I’ve also been layering the polishes; since they are jellies, they layer quite beautifully, bother over cremes and with each other. Here are the teal, purple, and red over a black creme:

LA Girl Holos – layered over black

And here is the purple holo over the blue one and the teal holo over NYC Apple Fizz:

Purple over Blue, Teal over NYC Apple Fizz

So, overall, even though these range from not holo at all to weakly holo, I would absolutely recommend them as beautiful, high quality polishes, and I’m very happy to have purchased the ~~five~~ six I did!

*I purchased the product(s) featured in this post. This post contains affiliate links. Please see my disclosure policy for more information.

Neutral Holo Comparison – Swatch of the Day

OPI DS Classic // Butter London All Hail The Queen // Color Club Cherubic //
Color Club Cosmic Fate // China Glaze FYI

I love, love nude / neutral holo polishes. I have five so far – two scattered and two linear. My favorites are Butter London All Hail The Queen and China Glaze FYI, which are the two with the smallest holo particles – but I really do love all five. Do you have a favorite?

NOTD: Milani Hi-Tech

Just a quick NOTD photo – this is two coats of Milani Hi-Tech (a scattered holo that almost looks linear sometimes) over two coats of American Apparel Army Jacket. I have been really into greens on my nails lately!

Nail Polish Comparisons & Swatches: Linear & Scattered Holos

Holo Nail polish swatch sticks

It’s time for part six of my nail polish series! Today I have my holos, both linear and scattered. I’ve also snuck in my indies at the end, just beacuse I don’t have very many of them. I didn’t include my Starlight and Sparkles color shifting polishes and topcoats, because I have all them swatched here. If you’d like to see the previous ones, I’m collecting all the links from the nail polish swatch series on my Project Swatch Roundup page (scroll to the bottom).

As before, I’ve included pictures that have the handle of the swatch stick, so you can more easily see the name of the polish. I also have a close-up of the polished tips only. In every set, the close-up of the tips is more color accurate. The number at the end of the stick is the number of coats, and no number means two coats. A couple of these have topcoat, and the swatch stick then says “+ TC.”

Again, I’ve left these pictures larger than usual – click to enlarge.

First, my linear holos. Magia Negra and FYI are my favorites here.

Jade Magia Negra, Layla Flash Black, Glitter Gal 707H, Starlight & Sparkles Starlight, China Glaze FYI

Some very strong scattered holos; I think my favorite here is OPI DS Classic. I really love neutral holos – they are classic with a twist!

OPI DS Classic, Milani 3D, Milani Hi-Res, Milani HD,
China Glaze Glistening Snow, China Glaze Angel Wings

I love all of my A-Englands, but Tristam might be my favorite. I also like using them together – using one color as an accent nail with a manicure as another, doing a gradient, or things like that. I’ve been wanting to water marble with them, but haven’t tried it yet. These are much prettier in person than in my swatches here – they’re full of rainbows in the sun!

A-England: Bridal Veil, Saint George, Tristam, Lady of the Lake, Ascalon

And finally, three miscellaneous holos that didn’t fit in my other groups – weaker scattered holos. Catrice Dirty Berry is a new favorite, and Butter London All Hail the Queen is an old favorite. It’s also my fiancee’s favorite polish for me to wear, so I might wear it at my wedding next year. It is a bit lighter and more holo in the sun than in my swatch.

Catrice Dirty Berry, Essence Can’t Cheat on Me,
Butter London All Hail the Queen

And, some indies! As you can see, --> --> -->Nail Pattern Boldness --> --> --> makes my favorite indie polishes (I’ll have a review on her Glitter Food topcoat coming up in the next few days). I also adore Hare Twilight Savings.

swatches - Nail Pattern Boldness "Silver" Flake Topcoat, Nail Pattern Boldness Oodiful, Nail Pattern Boldness Ignition (remix), Nail Pattern Boldness Seppuku (with a frisbee), Candeo Colors Jellybean, Hare Twilight Savings

Nail Pattern Boldness “Silver” Flake Topcoat, Nail Pattern Boldness Oodiful, Nail Pattern Boldness Ignition (remix), Nail Pattern Boldness Seppuku (with a frisbee), Candeo Colors Jellybean, Hare Twilight Savings

Anything in this post catch your eye?