Ulta3 Jade

The story.

I had removed my nail polish the night before but it got to late for me to paint them. The following morning I headed out to the shops with *gasp* naked nails. I finished at the shops and came home to drop off some shopping and decided I couldn't handle it any longer. I gave in and decided to paint my nails  >.<


I used Sally Hansen Triple Strong for my base coat follower by 2 coats of Jade. Although Jade is quite frosty, I found that as long as I kept my hand steady I easily got nice straight lines so the brush-strokes weren't terrible. Jade applied very smoothly, so this Ulta3 was a hit :) Since I was heading back to the shops soon I used OPI RapiDry Top Coat to finish my manicure. I did this mani in about 15 minutes which is quite an achievement for me!


Please excuse any mess as I took these photos before I headed out again :(

Ulta3 Jade in Artificial Light

Ulta3 Jade in Artificial Light

Ulta3 Jade in the Shade

This is such a gorgeous colour! I swear it's like it glows! All I have to say is that I love this!

Ulta3 Cocoa

I was changing my nail colour and wanted to match it to a gorgeous dress I was wearing. So that's how I came to choose Ulta3 Cocoa from the Metallic Crush collection. I've shown you swatches of this colour and I loved the gorgeous metallic brown then and I love it now!

I applied a base coat of Revlon Calcium Gel Nail Hardener. This base coat disagrees with several of my polishes and Cocoa was no exception >.< I applied two coats because the first coat did the same 'balding' that I've experienced with other polishes using this base coat. I find Cocoa easy to apply just keep the brush straight! I know that others don't like this collection because they find them too frosty, showing all the brush strokes, but I love them! I finished it off with a coat of Sally Hansen Mega Shine top coat.

So onto the pretty pictures!

Ulta3 Cocoa in Artificial Light

Ulta3 Cocoa in Artificial Light

 Then the following morning I took these.

Ulta3 Cocoa in Natural Light

Ulta3 Cocoa in the Shade

Cocoa is such a gorgeous reddish brown metallic! This colour matched my dress perfectly. The thing I loved most was how quickly it dried between layers since it was rather late at night when I finally got around to painting my nails!

Ulta3 Metallic Crush Swatches

So I picked up a few of the new Ulta3 Metallic Crush collection and figured I would swatch them :) First of all I wish they had kept the name Molten Metallics, it just sounds so much better than Metallic Crush! But I guess they wanted it to be different from Face of Australia Molten Metallics collection. I didn't pick up Pinot because when I picked up the bottle it looked almost identical to Shiraz and I also didn't buy Burnt Orange because it didn't appear to be a metallic like the others in this collection.

Each of these swatches is without base/top coat. All photos are taken in artificial light.

Jade

This is two coats. Application was good. Jade is a gorgeous jade green metallic. As expected you can see the nail brush strokes but they aren't very defined so it doesn't bother me at all. I love this shade!


Copper

This is two coats. Application was good. Copper is a vivid orange metallic. This one's a stunner! The moment I put it on it reminded me of China Glaze Riveting.

Shiraz

This is two coats. Application was good. Shiraz is a brilliant red metallic. I love this one too! It looks like my nails are on fire :)

Antique Gold

Two coats. The formula on this one was slightly thick and I think that might be why the brush strokes are a bit more obvious. Overall though the formula wasn't anywhere near horrible just a bit thicker than the others from this collection. Antique Gold is a dark gold metallic. I don't have any colours like this in my collection so I like it!


Cocoa

Two coats. Application was good. Cocoa is a brown/bronze metallic. This one was another stunner. I think I only have one other bronze nail polish so I'm happy to have this one it's so pretty!

Enchanted

 

Two coats. Application was good. Enchanted is a dark plum purple with a gorgeous green shimmer. I saved the best until last! Enchanted is absolutely gorgeous! When I picked up the bottle there was an obvious green shimmer to the polish that I desperately hoped came through when applied to the nail AND IT DOES!  Love This!

Stamping

Copper, Antique Gold, Enchanted

I saw people asking about how this collections is for stamping. They all come out very sheer, except for cocoa, so if it's an intense look you're looking for I wouldn't recommend any of these. I tried these with different images and found that ones with small detail didn't work at all so you needed large whole images. If you're using a stamping image without fine detail and after a subtle look these will work. However, I found Cocoa came out really clearly unlike the others.



Overall

I love this collection! I was surprised to fine that the application of these was so good! I have almost no metallics in my collection so I was more than happy to pick these colours up, especially considering how cheap they are (AUD$2.25ea). I was especially happy since the formula on these was so great, except for Antique Gold. My personal favourite of these has to be Enchanted! However, I love the intensity of all the colours, they're absolutely stunning.