Nail Polish Stress Test: Profusion Sugar Lacquer Set

Profusion is an interesting company. Their shtick is making really cheap cosmetics, usually eye shadow or lip gloss. A lot of their packaging mimics other companies’ products.

When I came across this set at TJ Maxx, I was quite curious as the packaging and product design was very similar to the Physicians Formula set I reviewed not too long ago. They even used the same interlocking bottle concept. I figured, what the heck, give it a try!

I decided to go for a set with a metallic dark blue, silver, and a purple jelly with purple glitter.

First and foremost, I need to address the biggest problem I had with this set: The bottles themselves. Simply put, they suck. The brushes will not stay in the cap. I had this problem with all three polishes. Even worse, one of the brushes actually fell out while I was using it.

Normally I would do a shot with nail art, and then stress test the polishes on their own. I’m not going to do that this time as there’s too high a risk of this polish making a mess I don’t want to clean up.

The formula was pretty good on these, I could have gotten the job done at two coats, but I went with three for all the colors. I was a little disappointed that the glitter in the purple polish was hard to see. The jelly base is pretty dark.

It water marbles well too, even the purple glittery one. I usually don’t have good luck getting glitter to play nice in the water, so that was a nice surprise.

 

Does it stamp? Yes. The silver did the best by a long shot. The purple and blue didn’t stamp as well as I had expected. Oddly enough the color from the purple and blue bled into the silver after the fact.

 

The polish held up pretty well. It lasted a full day of work with some tip wear, but nothing major.

Verdict: Unacceptable

The polish itself is good. Having the caps come off the bottles without the brush is not. Brushes falling out while in use is a whole other thing. I’m giving them the lowest rating to date because no one should have to protect their work area and wear a smock just to do their nails. Do not buy this!

It’s a crying shame really. The best polish in the world is useless if the bottles they’re in self destruct. They could have been a contender!

Nail Polish Stress Test: Physicians Formula California Goddess Set

Physicians Formula is one of my favorite brands of makeup. I use their products on my face on a daily basis. I've never seen them do much with nail polish…that is except for this one line called Endless Color.

The idea is to mix and match the three colors in the set in different ways. The packaging suggests layering the polishes to make custom colors, or doing nail art like French manicures. The set I chose was California Goddess, which came with a pink, light orange and dark orange polish. I actually bought it last year from TJ Maxx for around $5. I found I didn’t like them and consigned them to my bag of loser polish until recently when I saw them at Ocean State Job Lot for $3. I figured I'd give them one more try.

 The other gimmick with this set is that the three bottles can be connected to each other. I suppose if you bought enough sets you could make a giant totem pole of polishes if you wanted.

I wasn’t overly happy with the formula. It’s seriously streaky, yo. I used three coats of the pink and dark orange. The light orange needed four. I used a combination of the pink and light orange on my thumb. They never really blended.

They will stamp okay, which was a nice surprise. You can see that on my ring finger here. While it’s possible to water marble with them, the color is so weak I’d say it’s not worth it.

As for durability? Yeahno. I had a huge chip on my middle finger by the end of the first day, and noticeable tip wear on all my other nails.

Verdict: Party polish

This is another case where if it didn’t have a use in nail stamping, I’d say it was loser polish. With that said, I don’t plan to use these ever again. I have polish in similar colors that will do a better job overall.

My Favorite Momicures

My mother is an awesome person. She’s always my biggest supporter and always encouraged me to be the best I can at whatever I take on. She’s also the one that got me into nail art, especially nail stamping.

Over the last few years, she’s had health problems that have led to her having to stay in a nursing home. Shortly after she started to get well enough to handle longer visits, we started the tradition of my doing her nails while I was there. I like to call these momicures. 

In honor of Mother's Day, I'd like to share some of my favorites.  

As a rule, she chooses the polishes and designs, and I execute them. At first, she was very conservative about what colors of polish she wanted to use. I still call those kinds of shades "mom polish". She hates that!  

However, she got bolder over time, and started making more forays into the realm of color. Plus that "mom polish" label was really starting to annoy her! (I love you Mom!) 

One of the things I love most about Mom is that she thinks outside the box. She'll ask me to try stamping with something that I suspect won't work, I try it anyway, and discover that it does! Not only is this fun for both of us, but I find I learn more as I go along too. 

More recently she's gotten into holographic and glittery polishes

Textured polishes too! 

Thanks for everything Mom. I love you.

Nail Polish Stress Test: Milani Sardina

Every time I stop in a drug store, I have to check the nail polish displays to see if there’s anything new and interesting I’d like to try. In this case, it was Sardina, part of Milani’s Fierce Foil collection.

Sardina is most definitely pretty – like I’m going to spend my hard earned cash on an ugly polish! (Oh wait...I did. Oops!)  I wouldn’t call this fierce or a foil for that matter. It’s pearly white flecks in a sheer shimmery base. I needed three coats to get full coverage.

I couldn’t resist doing a little nail art with this one. It’s a shame I wasn’t able to stamp or water marble with it.

So, how did it hold up?

It did well. I got a solid two days out of it before I felt the need to take it off. I probably could have pushed it to three since this kind of polish hides damage. Once I know it’s there, it bugs me though.

Verdict: Good

This is a good polish to have if you’re into more conservative colors or French Manicures.

Nail Polish Stress Test: Ulta XOXO

Ulta recently had a $2 sale on their nail polishes. Being as they’re normally $6 I had to jump on that. One of the polishes I got was XOXO.

XOXO is an interesting polish in that you really can’t tell what it’s like until you actually wear it.

When I saw it on the website, I thought it was pink and red glitter in a clear base. 

 When I got the bottle, it looked like a red jelly with pink microglitter. 

When I applied it, it turned out to be a red jelly with scattered holographic microglitter!

This polish is really really pretty. Every so often I had to stop and admire it. I was able to get full coverage with three coats. I added my usual coat of Seche Vite on top.

So how did it hold up?

Eh. It was pretty banged up after one day.

I didn’t have any luck watermarbling or stamping with it.

Verdict: Party Polish

I really wanted this to do better, but it is what it is. I still love it and will keep it, but as a weekend polish. I still want to try it in a French Manicure or layered over something else.

Top Coat Stress Test: Revlon Matte Pearl Glaze

Matte polishes aren’t my favorite things in the whole world, yet I keep trying them. Up to this point, every one I’ve tried has ended up being party polish. Then I learned about Revlon’s Matte Pearl Glaze.

Matte Pearl Glaze is a part of Revlon’s Transforming Effects collection. What attracted me to this one is that it’s a matte top coat and it has a beautiful pink shimmer. I’ve never seen anything quite like it, so when Rite Aid recently had Revlon polishes on sale 2/$4, I made a point to acquire it.

I decided to test it over Ulta Blue Holiday, a polish I rated as excellent. My hope was that testing Matte Pearl Glaze over a solid foundation would tell me whether this was going to be a good topper, or $2 I’ll never see again. I used one coat over two coats of Blue Holiday.

 

I really love how this looked. The matte finish would have been nice enough on its own, but the pink shimmer really is fantastic 

So, how did it hold up?

Pretty well! I suspected it wouldn’t last as long as it would have if I’d used my usual top coat and I was correct. With that said it definitely did better than straight up matte polishes have. Just a couple chips and some loss of texture.

I did try stamping with it. It can be done but I don’t think it’s really worth it. It came out looking like adhesive that was left behind, and only showed up on really dark polishes. Pity that. I found it dried out too quickly to be used in water marbling. I think its best chances in nail art would be to use it with nail vinyls.

Verdict: Good

If you’re like me and you want your matte manicures to survive more than six hours, definitely give this top coat a try. I am looking forward to playing around with it some more. If Revlon came out with the same thing in different colors, I would absolutely buy them.

Nail Polish Stress Test: Everglaze Don’t Grape About It

Is it me or does it seem like extended wear polishes are cropping up everywhere? I have not had good luck with the ones I’ve tried so far, but I keep hoping one of these will actually work for me the way they claim. This time I’m trying China Glaze’s Everglaze, bought during one of Sally’s buy one get one free sales, of course. I’m not paying full price for potential broken dreams!

Don’t Grape About It is a lame pun is a lavender crème. The formula was easier to work with than the Endless Wear polish I tried. I had full coverage in two coats, which dried very quickly. I used the Everglaze top coat afterwards. It had a really nice shine to it. Could this polish be the one that survives the warehouse?

Nope. While I didn’t have catastrophic polish failure this time, it was pretty much trashed in one day. 

I didn’t have any luck water marbling or stamping with this polish. It dried too darn fast to do anything with it. 

Verdict: Loser polish

Fellow warehouse workers and retail people, I’m sorry to report this is not the polish we’re looking for.  I do recognize that any manicure of mine will die an accelerated death, BUT I do expect it to last longer than traditional polishes. With that said, people with office jobs might be able to get this to work. Everyone else should steer clear.