Zoya Dree Swatch on St. Patrick Day

It's St. Patrick's Day today! We don't celebrate St. Patrick's Day in Malaysia and therefore I have no idea what this day is all about. As curious as a cat, I decided to look up in the Wikipedia to understand better. Quoted from Wikipedia, St. Patrick's Day commemorates Saint Patrick (c. AD 387–461), the most commonly recognised of the patron saints of Ireland, and the arrival of Christianity in Ireland.

Green color and shamrock, a 3 leaved clover, always associate with St. Patrick Day and therefore I decided to put on a green color polish today. I don't have many green polishes in my Stash and today I have chosen 1 of my favorite green - Zoya Dree from the Smoke and Mirrors collection 2011!

Zoya Dree is the first Zoya polish that I own. Prior becoming a Zoya craze, I have been consistently reading good reviews on Zoya polish. During my trip to US on last Jan, I decided to pick up a bottle of Zoya at Ulta. Due to the tight budget, I only managed to pick 1 up (though I have a long list in my wish list :D). I fell in love instantly when the first stroke landed on my nail bed. Though today this is not my first time wearing this color, I am still in love with this color.

Zoya Dree - Flash

 Dree is a yellow toned olive green which work excellently on a warm skin tone like mine. This color reminded me of the army uniform which I used to see at the streets on weekends when I studied in Singapore.

Zoya Dree - artificial light

The formula is excellent like all other Zoya polishes. It was so easy to work with even the most careless person wouldn't make mistake when applying Zoya. This is one of the main reasons why I love Zoya so much, their formula never fail me. 

By the way, I went out bared nail this morning before I put Dree on. If you are interested how my bare nails look like, head on down to my another blog here.

Til next time... Esther

Essie School of Hard Rock Swatch & Review

I know that I have been neglecting my blog for almost 1 week. I was super busy at work this week as I was going through some sort of qualification test at work. I am finally done and could steal some times to relax and update! 

Today I am going to show you Essie School of Hard Rock which is part of the Winter 2011 Cocktail Bling Collection that was released Q4 2011. It was love at first sight with this baby but it was overtaken by other color in my priority list, therefore I only purchased this in Feb 2012. Another reason that held me back from bringing it home earlier was I kept worrying that my warm skin tone would not able to carry this cool tone baby well.

But I have decided to give it a chance and today I am going to show you how this color looks on my warm skin tone.

 Essie School of Hard Rock is a greyish green with a hint of teal that made it leaning to the cool side. Well, you could tell that I was too paranoid about this color being too cool for me. It does look pretty on me isn't it.

I have no complain about the formula of this color, it went on smoothly like applying butter. The only thing I do not like about Essie polish is the tiny brush. I have a pretty big nail bed and I have applied a few more strokes to have my whole nail covered. 

The above swatches are with 2 coats with Essie First Base and Essie Good to Go. Now that I have used Essie Good to Go several times, I really recommend to those who are looking for a good fast drying topcoat. The only miss with Good to Go comparing to Seche Vite is Seche Vite has shinier finish.  

Hope this could help you to decide on this color if you have a warm skin tone like me.

Til next time... Esther

Zoya Yara Swatch & Review

I have been reading post regarding Zoya polishes but never have a chance  to get my hands on it for long long time. I guess Zoya is not as famous as other brands such as OPI in Malaysia and that makes harder to get one here, unless we order online.

As I read more about Zoya, my interests on this brand expands. I knew I wanted to start collecting Zoya when they released the Smoke and Mirror collection last Fall. The colors were captivating and interesting. 

However, I did not manage to get any until my last trip to US in Jan. Since I was super broke shopping too much, I only managed to get 1 from the collection  during that trip and that was Zoya Dree. After I returned to Malaysia, I regretted not getting Zoya Yara! Whenever Yara swatch photos popped out in Google, I drooled so hard that I decided to place an order with Sharon from Nail Polish Spree in late Jan. 

I finally got the polish last Monday and I knew at once that I would definitely love this color by looking at the bottle alone. Opps, I have been telling too much of the grandmother story.. So here is the swatch photos...

Love the stunning gold shimmer!

This color does look good on my warm skin tone.

One thing I love about Zoya polish, other than the lovely color, is the superb formula. The polish flows easily and level itself effortlessly. Zoya is marketed as the longest wearing nail lacquer. Well, I do not wear a color for more than 3 days so I couldn't confirm the durability. I guess base coat and top coat do play a big part on this. It is my 2nd day on wearing this color with Essie First Base as base coat and Essie Good to Go as top, let's see when I would see the first chip.

Til next time... Esther