Today, I have four polishes from China Glaze's 2013 Summer collection called "Sunsational." These are a few of the neon jelly finishes, which I was crazy excited for.
First, is China Glaze- You Drive Me Coconuts:
You Drive Me Coconuts is a blue-based, bright pink jelly with an almost-fuchsia quality. I love this type of cool hot pink.
Artificial light, three coats:
It dries very close to the actual bottle color, which is appreciated.
Outside, shade:
Window-filtered daylight:
Formula: This is the least sheer of the four that I tried. The first coat was patchy, and it'll cuticle drag if you paint over the same area too many times. If you don't load the brush up with enough polish, then you'll end up with patchy, cuticle-dragged areas.
And yet, when I used just enough polish to avoid that, I got bubbling. Multiple times. Conundrum...ugh- not cool China Glaze, not cool. (I had to scrap my first two applications, as it kept bubbling up on me; you absolutely need to paint really thin coats, or it's bubble hell. Ugh.)
In the end, I used three coats, and it's just shown with the bubbles, as is. Not satisfied.
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Next, is China Glaze- Heat Index:
Heat Index is You Drive Me Coconuts' warmer-toned sister. It's a hot, yellow/orange-based pink jelly.
Artificial light, four coats:
This one dries down slightly darker than the bottle color, but still seems more "neon" than You Drive Me Coconuts. Even though this shade is more warm-toned, I liked it against my skin better than YDMC.
Outside, partial shade/sun:
Window-filtered daylight:
Formula: One of the sheerer ones I tried, but easier to work with, and self-levels slightly.
I also experienced bubbling with this one, despite using thin coats, and as you can see, the bubbling was somewhat worse than I encountered with YDMC. I needed four coats, and used quick-dry topcoat in between layers to try and mitigate the bubbles (which didn't work). Bummer. It would've been an instant favorite if it weren't for the bubbling issues.
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Next, here is China Glaze- Are You Jelly?:
Are You Jelly? is medium purple, warm-toned, jelly. I love this shade of purple, especially for Summer! It's not really a neon though, just a vibrant purple.
Artificial light, three coats:
Outside, shade:
This one also dries exactly to bottle color, which is nice. You can probably also tell that it is super shiny, in true jelly form!
Window-filtered daylight:
Formula: This one is sheer and does tend to cuticle drag. You really shouldn't go over an area more than once during the same coat. The first two coats are very streaky, but the third mostly fixes the issues, and was opaque enough for me. It also bubbled, but much less so than the first two, I found.
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Last, is China Glaze- Shell-O:
Shell-O is a very bright, pink-toned coral jelly.
Artificial light, five coats:
It dries down similarly to bottle color, but slightly less pink, which you can see in the photo below.
Outside, shade:
Window-filtered daylight:
Formula: This is definitely the sheerest one I tried, but it does self-level a bit, and is more workable than Are You Jelly? or You Drive Me Coconuts. It glides on the nail smoothly, but the first few coats (read: 3) are very streaky. The fourth coat is no longer so streaky, but the VNL was still too strong, so I added a fifth coat. I would suggest using underwear with this one, or possibly white.
With this shade, I did not experience any bubbling, and it was a vast improvement over the others in that regard, and my favorite (even though it's the sheerest).
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Because Shell-O strongly reminded me of China Glaze- Flip Flop Fantasy, a rather famous CG polish, here is a quick-
-Comparison Time!
Outside, shade:
Sorry for the awkward hand, but Flip Flop Fantasy (4 coats) is on my thumb, and Shell-O is on the index nail (and all other nails).
Shell-O, in person, is less obviously, in-your-face neon than the older Flip Flop Fantasy. It's slightly more subdued, but doesn't look so in photos.
It also has more pink in it, while Flip Flop Fantasy is more orange-based. And, don't forget: they're different finishes (FFF is a creme that dries matte). The color difference was less pronounced for me in reality, than when looking at these photos, so I don't think you need to own both unless you really love neons!
So, no dupes here!
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Overall, these are fun, really pretty colors, but all have below average formulas. I wanted to love these so much (Neon jellies!!), but they were just such a pain to apply nicely. Although the colors are fabulous, I've used plenty of jellies, and none have formulas as bad and finicky as these.
I would say take your time between coats, and use the thinnest application you can while at the same time avoiding cuticle drag. Using another base color, (or white?), as underwear might help out.
All in all, I've got to say that I'm a pretty disappointed. These are such good colors- that's why it pains me that the formulas are much less than stellar. I would have loved to love these, but I'm honestly not sure they're worth all the effort. I am going to re-try them at some point in the future, and see if I can avoid the bubble calamity.
Man, that purple shade is really nice but not sure if it's worth picking up if the formula is so hard to work with. :(
ReplyOut of the four I tried, it was my second fave, formula-wise...didn't bubble as badly as the others. It is a nice purple too! Maybe you will have a different experience!
Great swatches, too bad about the bubbling, the colors look so good.
ReplyThanks! I am definitely going to try these again in the future and see if they don't bubble (maybe it was just me??).
These were among my favs for doing summery jelly sandwiches. On their own they are kind of a PITA to work with as you mentioned, but layered they seem to be a different animal. I picked up the entire set which included a blue and teal I didn't see here, but in this same series :)
ReplyI'm going to try layering them! That's one of my favorite reasons to have jelly finishes around!
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