Reswatch: Milani Dot Com

About a year and a half ago, Milani Dot Com was one of my all-time favorite colors. I'd still consider it part of my Top 20, but I haven't reached for it in a looooong time, so I figured I'd pull it out again. Dot Com was released in Spring 2010 with the Liquid Metal Collection, which was comprised of shimmers & foils with Internet-themed names. Aside from Dot Com, the collection consisted of a pearly white metallic, a light gold foil (along the lines of Orly Luxe, but lighter and cooler-toned), and a rose gold foil, but I don't really think that those colors are particularly interesting. Dot Com, however, is another story. 3 coats, with top coat.

It consists of superfine warm purple shimmer and larger copper flecks of shimmer in a dusty, cool-toned purple base. SO COOL. I'm not sure why a few of my nails look a bit bumpy, but rest assured the surface is completely smooth. No bubbles or clumps or anything.

I love how prominent the shimmer is! Ok, now that I'm done gushing about the color, let's talk formula, because this is.......not good. Dot Com takes 3 coats for opacity, which isn't bad, but it also takes a very long time to dry. In order to avoid bubbles, I decided to let each coat dry completely before adding the next. As you can imagine, that took quite a while. Oh, and guess what! It chipped five hours later, before it even finished drying! NOT HAPPY. I don't remember having this issue last time I wore it, so it might be because of the base and top coats that I used, which were Essie Fill the Gap & Revlon Quick Dry Top Coat. It's so unique though....and like I already said, it's so pretty :( I mean, look at this!

If it wasn't such an awesome color, I'd be a lot more irritated, but I do have a weakness for a nice purple shimmer. .

Have you ever experienced such a troublesome formula? How did you deal with it?

Oh, and HAPPY FRIDAY! I'm moving back into my dorm tomorrow, so I'll probably be AWOL for a few days while I get settled in. Thanks for looking & commenting, and have a great weekend!!

Milani Dress Maker + Comparison

Milani Dress Maker was released with the Haute Value collection from Fall 2010, and is known to be a dupe of Chanel Jade. I believe it's also similar to Dior Waterlily, minus the revolting rose scent of course.

Unfortunately, Dress Maker is really sheer. This is 5 coats, with top coat, in the shade.

I rather like Dress Maker. It's got enough yellow in it that it works with my skintone, but it's not so yellow that it borders on lime green, which I thoroughly despise. I'm also quite a fan of the green shimmer. It's subtle, but in this case, I think it works. Unfortunately, you can still see a bit of VNL at 5 coats...not good. In direct sunlight:

I also compared it to my 2 other mint greens, Sinful Colors Open Seas and Sinful Colors Mint Apple. I used 3 coats of each in the following photos.

Obviously, they have very different finishes. Open Seas is a creme, Dress Maker has small particles of subtle green shimmer, and Mint Apple has larger particles of silver and yellow/gold shimmer. Dress Maker is the most yellow-toned of the three, and I think Open Seas is the most blue-toned. It almost looks aqua next to Dress Maker. 

Thanks for looking and commenting!

Franken Friday #4

Happy Friday!!! It's been a while since I posted a franken...just haven't gotten around to wearing 'em lately, I guess.

The Milani holos were my first foray into holographic polishes over a year ago, and I wound up with HD (the silver one) and Cyberspace (the blue one). HD is still my favorite of any silver holo out there, but I've also acquired OPI DS Sapphire and China Glaze 2NITE since then, and honestly, those are a lot more interesting than Cyberspace, so I figured I'd franken with it.

As you can see, there's no longer any trace of the holo, but I'm okay with that. I started with a 70% full bottle of Cyberspace, and the other 30% is Ruby Kisses Regaled Out Blue and Verity Aqua Blue in a roughly 2:1 ratio. The Milani holos have a very interesting type of shimmer- rather than normal particles, these are more like shards of shimmer. You can see it more closely here:

Pardon my weirdo thumbnail shape...I nicked it on something and was too lazy to file out the unevenness before taking this photo, lol.

Thanks for looking and commenting, and have a great weekend!

Milani Silver Dazzle

Good morning! It's midterm season...boo. 2 down, 2 to go...le sigh. I have been on a huge glitter kick lately, which is funny because when I started wearing nail polish (about a year ago), I absolutely hated glitter. Hated it. I thought it was ridiculous and tacky, ESPECIALLY full-coverage glitters, but here I am, wearing a full-coverage glitter. I love it! I still hate glitters like OPI Mad as a Hatter and Deborah Lippmann Happy Birthday, but I am really enjoying these Milani One-Coat Glitters.

They do require 2 coats, not one, but the formula is really easy to apply. It's not at all thick or gloopy like many glitters can be. Silver Dazzle is a bit of a misnomer; the glitter is definitely grey or gunmetal-colored. Regardless, it is so awesome! I layered it over a grey creme franken that I'll be showing you later this week, but that turned out to be superfluous, because Silver Dazzle is so dense. This is 2 coats of Silver Dazzle over 1 coat of my franken:

It's sparkly enough on its own, but top coat makes it super glossy and even more sparkly! Here's a blurred picture so you can get some idea of how awesome this is:

So shiny! So amazing. Glitter is such a pain to clean up, but that goes for all glitters, not just this one. Of course, before I took this off, I had to try wearing it matte, and I absolutely love the result:

As you can see, I used Essie Matte About You, and the result looks almost like granite! It's got a really interesting texture, and it's completely smooth, but still sparkly, and has loads of depth. I'm the type to repaint my nails after only a day or two, and I wore this matte mani for 3 days. I had this nail polish on for a total of 6 days, and I got absolutely no chips, and a hardly-noticeable amount of tipwear. 

Milani Dot Com

Happy Friday, everyone! Today I have a random find to show you - Milani Dot Com. There's a similar color from Milani as well, called Totally Cool, but it looks like that one is more of a jelly than this. Neither Totally Cool nor Dot Com have actual spots in Milani core displays...I found Dot Com sitting next to a box of Orly minis in a CVS that time forgot.

Dot Com has a blueish purple jelly base, with a ton of awesome gold and copper shimmer. My skin color tends to draw more attention to the copper and gold than the purple, but I love this color all the same. My mom loves it too! As usual, you can click on the photo to enlarge if you'd like!

This is 3 coats, plus top coat. It dries kinda dull, so top coat is a must, but I think the end result is worth it. This one definitely has a place in my top 20!