I’m back! Things are going to be a bit slow at first because, frankly, my life (and nails) are still a huge mess. But rest assured, I will respond to all the emails and comments very soon. Posting frequency should pick up shortly thereafter.

In any case, I know you’ve all seen it but here’s Color Club Catwalk Queen Collection. Like Femme Fatale,  this collection is composed of sheers and solids that can be mixed, matched, and layered. I like this collection but it’s a little depressing looking at these pictures. The photos are from a few months ago, my nails were so long back then. Man, the bar exam takes away everything.

Catwalk Queen, the collection namesake, is a vampy tyrian purple with complex amethyst and subtle blue shimmer. This swatch was 3 coats but this polish is pigmented enough that coverage would be fine with just 2 coats. (This image is a little blurry because I was trying to capture the shimmer – I failed. The shimmer is way more obvious in person.)

Fashion Addict is my favorite from this collection. Lilac holographic? Sign me up. The holo is medium grain like the holos in the Femme Fatale collection. Like Worth the Risque and Revvvolution, the holo has a greenish cast. The polish gets darker with each layer so it’s slightly lighter with 2 coats, this picture is 3 coats.

Here’s a shot of the holo flash. I hope Color Club does a few more holos in the future because these were just superb. Personally, I would love to see a dark green holo.

Front Row Diva is an extremely pale gray that leans towards lavender, it has a pearl finish. It’s chic and work appropriate – which is pretty much all I’m wearing now so I’m stocking up on colors like this and you’ll see plenty of them featured here in the months to come.

Runway Muse is one of those sadly deceptive duochromes. In the bottle, it’s a predominately green duochrome that flashes pink. On the nail, it’s a frosty sheer with pink shimmer that only flashes a subtle green rarely. I so wish that the bottle appearance was comparable to the on nail result, nonetheless, it’s pretty amazing over black. Scrangie has all the sheers from both the Femme Fatale collection and the Catwalk Queen collection over black on her site.

Vintage Couture. Scrangie called this a mod lilac pink baby creme and that’s definitely the best description for this color so I’m going to steal it from her. It’s pinker on the nail than I expected but it’s still pretty stark. The application was finicky. I forgot to write down exactly how many coats I used but if I remember correctly, I believe it took 4 to even everything out.

Ready to Wear is my current NOTD and as you can see my nails are little yellow nubbins right now. *More sobs*  Ready to Wear is a frosty opalescent sheer with warm pink shimmer. Usually sheers like this require 4 layers but I actually got good coverage with 2 coats, but since my nails are so yellow, I went ahead and added another layer. Edit: I’ve been wearing this color for a full day now and I want to revise my review. It’s definitely a duochrome, it’s not really noticeable until you see it in sunlight. It flashes a warm light coppery gold tone, almost some what metallic. The mixture of the gold and the pink reminds me of a sunset. I love it when colors present surprises in the sunlight.

The forces of the universe have been conspiring to prevent me from posting this collection. First, a while back, I decided to take a new approach to swatching. Instead of just painting my nails for a quick photo and just writing about my brief opinions, I decided to actually wear all the colors in collections I review. The result was a copious amount of notes on each color, similar to what I usually write for posts on manicures. But then, to my chagrin, the evil google virus did away with all my efforts. As far as nail polish goes, the notes lost, are the equivalent of the Library of Alexandria burning down. Sadly, here are my briefer impressions based on what I remember from wearing this colors.

Color Club had an interesting concept for this spring collection, these colors were intended to be mixed and matched to create various funky frenches. I can totally see where they were going with that idea, these colors (a mixture of shimmery sheers and opaques) do compliment each other well in the french format. However, this collection also lends itself to amazing layering combinations. I would have loved to have shown you guys the sheers from both Catwalk Queen and Femme Fatale over black and white but I’ve been so busy I just haven’t had the time. But, fear not, Scrangie has some great swatches of these shades over black.

Color Club Femme Fatale consists of ultra sparkly pink and yellow toned micro-glitter suspended in a gel like whitish polish that applies clear. This is 4 coats, it’s simply gorgeous over black. (Please excuse the perpetual yellowness of my nails.)

Color Club Oooooo La La is a stunning, wearable white with a pearl finish. I usually don’t like pearl finishes but I absolutely loved this color. This is 3 coats. The application was a bit off – the coats applied unevenly so you have to be careful to be apply as evenly as possible. While I would consider this color a PITA, it’s not impossible to work with and I think the pay off is worth the extra effort. This color is perfect as a base on which to layer the sheer colors in this collection.

Color Club Oui! Oui! Oui! consists of a very fine green shimmer in a sheer whitish base. My picture isn’t very accurate as far the shimmer, the green is way more obvious in real life. This one is also stunning over black. I believe this swatch is 4 coats.

Color Club Revvvolution is just, wow. WOW. I guess I might be biased because I love all holos – but this one is particularly brilliant. It’s a dark charcoal, pretty much black for all purposes, medium grain holo. The holo has a predominately greenish cast to it. Revvvoltion is very well pigmented. For me, it was essentially perfect in one coat but I applied two for good measure. I haven’t done a side by side swatch, but from memory, I can tell you that this is darker and more opaque than OPI My Private Jet. MPJ is one of my favorite polishes of all time, but I actually think that Revvvolution might take it’s place.

I’ve gotten a lot of complaints about the quality of my images of holographics so I’ve been trying to find alternative forms of lighting that are better suited to showing the holographic effect of these polishes. This picture isn’t as vivid as Revvvolution is in real life but I think you get the idea.

Color Club Where’s the Soiree? is a black creme that doesn’t dry glossy. It’s not exactly matte, but closer to a satin finish. It applies well in 2 to 3 coats. I would want to maintain the unique finish so I would probably either use no top coat or a matte top coat. Where’s the Soiree? is also perfect as a base for layering the other colors in this collection.

Color Club Worth the Risque is a medium grain holographic silver with a bluish cast. Like Revvvolution, the holo has a greenish cast to it. It’s a 2 to 3 coater. LOVE it.

Here it is in different lighting… *drool/dies*.

I’ve gotten a few questions concerning the format of my Top 20 so here is some information concerning my choices and how I went about choosing them.  First, some of the colors here are not necessarily here because they are my absolute favorites, some are here because I felt that they represented something significant about the world of nail polish. However, most are here because they are my favorites or they have some special meaning to me.

I plan to do a list every year. My list will likely differ greatly from year to year as I acquire and wear more colors. For example, Nars Zulu will probably be on this list next year but it is not this year because I did not own it when I finalized the list back in December. I am only choosing colors I own and have worn because I can provide more information and insight concerning those colors. The list would probably look very different if I were choosing from the entire universe of nail polish. I would probably lose my mind writing that list.

You can see the entire count down as posted so far by visiting this link.

And I deeply apologize for the length of time it’s taking to get this list finished. I’m trying to wear all these colors again before I post about them, that’s why it’s taking so long. It’s going to speed up a little bit now.

Whew. Okay. Now for #9: Color Club Sexsea.

Sexsea is one of the colors that is on this list not only because I LOVE the color but because it also means something  to me privately. I wore this color for the first time last year after my second mock trial. We won but it was a horrible experience for various reasons. I’ll spare you guys the gritty details; suffice it to say that by the time I got home, I was still livid heart-beating-out-of-chest-in-anger  pissed. No one else was home, so I popped in a Netflix DVD (Snoop Dogg’s Hood of Horror, haha) and went about the task of taking off my work appropriate manicure (Zoya Stephanie) and putting on the loudest color in sight. I chose Color Club Sexsea. I immediately felt better wearing it. This color fills me with an inexplicable sense of nostalgia, probably because the second trial was the equivalent of a final exam so I associate this color with feelings of accomplishment.

I had an immediate love affair with Sexsea. It intrigued me. I pondered and pondered, what color is it? It’s so hard to pin point. Is it coral? red? orange? hot pink? Sexsea is so tricky. Sometimes it seems like all 4. Sometimes I am convinced that it is just one of those colors, but never for very long.  It shifts between those shades, the true color is somewhere in the middle. I consider it to be truly unique, despite the fact that it is a creme and belongs to a class of colors that I usually ignore. I suppose the true test for uniqueness is the reception a color receives from the Peanut Gallery (i.e. the boys in my life). Even the usually nail color oblivious boyfriend commented on the uniqueness of this color. I rest my case.

Sexsea applies semi-chalky but well. The application looks good with 2 coats but I prefer 3. This color was released with the Color Club Yacht Club Collection (an excellent collection, by the way.)

(Click here for the mega sized picture)

Color Club may have just saved spring for me. Looks like they are releasing three collections this season. This one, the second collection I’ve seen, is called ‘Femme Fatale’. It contains 2 holographic polishes and one black glitter polish. Not to mention that I am a HUGE fan of white polishes. I am so excited for this collection I can hardly contain myself. I don’t have names or a release date yet but I’ll let you guys know more as soon as I find anything out.

I’m back-tracking a bit to show you guys the collections of yesteryear. Color Club released the Haute Browns collection a few seasons ago. In my eternal search for wearable browns, acquiring this collection was a no-brainer. The collection is composed of what I would consider three professional work appropriate colors and three colors with a little more pizzazz.

Color Club Urban Edge is a pinkish tan. It’s not hard to apply but it has a chalky consistency and it’s definitely a thee to four coater. Three of the six colors in this collection are pink toned tans that get incrementally darker and less pink. When I saw the three colors (the other two are pictured below) I immediately thought of OPI Dulce De Leche. The difference between these tans and Dulce de Leche is the pink tone, which Dulce de Leche does not have.

Color Club Diva in Brown is slightly darker and deeper than Urban Edge. The application was better than Urban Edge but it took four coats to reach opacity.

Color Club Out and About is slightly darker and deeper than Diva in Brown. This one had excellent application, it’s a two to three coater.

Color Club Golden Girl is probably my favorite from this collection. It’s a gorgeous tannish gold with a slight pink undertone and very complex shimmer that flashes mostly gold and green but you can see bronze as well. I think this color would work really well for people who feel that they can’t wear true golds. It’s very flattering. This is three coats.

Color Club Black-ish is a deep plummy reddish brown with the same complex shimmer found in Golden Girl. This is three coats but it applies very well, I think most people could get away with two coats.

Finally, Color Club Haute Couture is a vampy plummish brown. Gorgeous. This is a 2 to 3 coater, this swatch is 3 coats.

Nail art is a silly way to support a Presidential candidate, I know, but seeing as how some ***shat turd-wad stole my Obama sign ¹ I figured I might as well sport my endorsement on my nails, since presumably some McCain supporter can’t abscond with them. I’m not the only one, check out Eve’s custom Obama print. Only in my wildest dreams could I do anything that elaborate so I decided to copy Luckypenny (a fellow nber) and do a Obama hope symbol manicure.

I used China Glaze Bermuda Breakaway as a basic democratic blue. For the hope symbol I used OPI Vodka & Caviar and China Glaze Caribbean Blue. The stripes were done with Art Club by Color Club White.

I used notebook paper reinforcements to get the shapes right – sort of a pain, but definitely worth it. If you are planning to do an Obama or Democratic Party inspired manicure for election day, please send me your images. I would love to show our support for the Party by posting all that democratic creativity on Election day. And, I hope this goes without saying, GET OUT AND VOTE!

CND Black Platinum and Zoya Freja are pretty close but not the same. Black Platinum is slightly more frosty and metallic. Freja has a slightly more bluish tinge. CND Hyde in the Dark has the best coverage of the bunch, it two coats where all the others (except for Dying Love) looked best with three. It’s my favorite from this bunch. Color Club After Hours gave me some cuticle drag issues. That didn’t happen to me before when I swatched this color so I’m going to blame my haste in painting. Finally, Misa Dying Love is the darkest from this set, close too black. It also had great coverage at two coats.

I *love* Color Club Fast Woman. Normally, I’d classify this color as a straight up vampy but it’s actually a really deep brilliant red. I suppose the distinction is irrelevant because this color is obviously well within the vampy realm. Colors like this can only be described as disgustingly gorgeous, period. For this mani, I used one coat of Color Club Stuck on You, 3 coats of Fast Woman, 1 coat of Seche Vite. It applied well, no complaints. Fast Woman is from the Color Club In the Fast Lane Collection which also includes another great vampy, Color Club Killer Curves. I plan to swatch the entire collection soon, so stay tuned.

October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month. It’s not just about finding a cure. It’s about informing women about the disease, the facts, and early detection. And, of course, it’s about buying a bunch of pink stuff. The trick is finding companies that donate either all or a large portion of the proceeds of the sale of the pink stuff to breast cancer research or breast cancer related charities. Nail Polish companies are actually pretty generous, so fear not. If you want to see some of the nail related promotional products released for Breast Awareness Cancer Month check out this article on the Nails Magazine site. (I *love* that blinged-out crystal nail file.) I’ll be covering as many BCA promotional polishes as I can get my hands on so stayed tuned. First up is Color Club Colors for the Cure mini set.

Color Club is donating 100% of the proceeds of the sale of the Colors for the Cure mini set. These colors aren’t new so they’re also all available in full size as well but I say, get the minis and do a small good deed for mankind.

Color Club Bashful is a very light baby pink with extremely subtle shimmer. The shimmer is so subtle that it is effectively a creme. It’s a really delicate color but it’s a PITA to apply. I had to whip out the big guns, Barielle Camo. That helped but I still needed 4 coats.

Color Club Translucent is a translucent (duh) pink that would be excellent for french manis or for people who are looking for polishes that are ‘your nails but better’. It’s similar to Essie Pink Glove Service. The application here was excellent. This swatch is 4 coats because I wanted to see if I could get the pink to build. It does build a little bit. With all that said, I am absolutely ashamed to show you guys this swatch. My naked nails were not meant to see the light of day. They are *so* yellow. : ( Boo.

Color Club Angels N Pink is a creme barbie pink, very cute. This swatch is 3 coats.

Color Club In Bloom is a darker barbie pink. It’s a true pink, no bluish undertones. This shade, like Bashful, has ultra subtle shimmer that really isn’t noticeable (undetectable shimmer?… love it). In Bloom is my current NOTD. I used 1 coat of Color Club Stuck on You, 3 coats of In Bloom, and 1 coat of Seche Vite.

Thanks to the wonderful people over at Color Club the Polish Addict is hosting its very first giveaway, ever!

Fill out the entry form for a chance to win the entire Color Club Musique Collection including the 3 liquid lipstick shades. The winner will be chosen on September 23rd (which just happens to be my birthday : P). You can check out my swatches of the Musique Collection here.

This contest is actually the first part of a sort of two-part ordeal. My initial idea was to host a contest for the best franken made from Color Club polish but I realized that a lot people don’t have access to Color Club or have never tried the brand, so I decided to start off with a straight-up giveaway first. On the 23rd, I’ll launch the Color Club Frankenpolish Contest. The best Dr. Frankenpolish will win the Glitter Vixen Collection!

Anyone excited? I am! : )

I know that everyone has been dying to see the new Fall Color Clubs, here they finally are for your viewing pleasure. All and all, Musique is a solid collection. I was expecting some of these to be metallic but they’re actually just really shimmery. Even though these look highly pigmented in the bottle, they actually apply thinly. If you typically do thin coats like I do, these colors are going to be three coaters. However, I don’t think it would be difficult to get opacity in 2 coats if you typically like working with thicker coats.

Color Club Feel the Beat is a burnt orange shimmer. I’d almost say that it’s borderline metallic. ‘Feel the Beat’ is an appropriate name, I’m not really sure why but this color really reminds me of Miami (my home, sweet, home) and Gloria Stefan.

Color Club Slow Jam is a reddish brown with golden shimmer. It’s a redder version of OPI Espresso Your Style. Slow Jam is one of those rare brown shades that actually flatter my skin tone… now, if only I could find a creme brown that did the same. *sigh*

Color Club Groove Thang is dark purple shimmer – oh man, I. love. it. It is definitely the stand out from this collection. I expected to love it even more than I do because Groove Thang is actually a beetle duochrome in the bottle, unfortunately, I couldn’t get the beetle effect to show up on the nail. I’m not giving up though. I merely swatched Groove Thang. It’s possible that as a full mani, completely dry, in non-direct sunlight, I’ll get the beetle effect that I love so much and promptly die from happiness soon thereafter. Since I know this is going to come up, in my opinion, Groove Thang is not dupish to China Glaze Midnight Ride, which has violet shimmer as opposed to dark purple shimmer. I’ll do comparisons soon.

Here’s Groove Thang again, you can almost see the color change, almost.

As usual, my camera is perpetually deficient when photographing purples. Color Club Electronica is more purple than it looks in this swatch. Electronica, with fuchsia flecks and blurple shimmer, seems like a tamer version of OPI Ink. The main difference seems to be amount of glittery shimmer, Ink apparently has chunkier more abundant bling. I sound like a broken record but I’ll do comparisons soon.

Color Club After Hours is a medium charcoal gray with multi-toned silver, red, and green shimmer. The shimmer is very similar to the shimmer in CND Hyde in the Dark but After Hours is darker and has less silver throughout. After Hour is less dark and more shimmery than Misa Dying Love. Comparisons of all these will be up soon. After Hours is a great addition to my nail-breakage-in-mourning collection.

Last but not least, Color Club Velvet Rope, a magenta red with gold shimmer. I, surprisingly, liked this color on myself, which is rare for me as I am not a fan of shimmery reds. I can’t really give you guys much guidance in the way of dupes and comparisons because I really don’t own many shimmery reds. Sooorrrryyy.

Special thanks to Color Club.

The Fall Blitzkrieg continues, this time with Color Club’s Glitter Vixen Collection. I was already pretty excited for this collection when I saw the promo pictures, but in person, they’re even more impressive. All 7 of these are made up of multi-sized glitter suspended in clear polish. Some of the Glitter Vixens appear to be slightly tinted but I think that’s a result of the glitter shedding pigmentation, it’s not intentional pigmentation in the color design. Most glitter polishes apply sparsely – these are the complete opposite of sparse. The multi-sized chunky glitter creates a base on which to build opacity. Believe it or not, all these swatches are 2, albeit somewhat thick, coats. Basically, Glitter Vixen gives you full coverage ultra bling. The formula is a bit thick, but they are fairly easy to apply. These swatches are taken in indoor lighting (my new home-made light box oooh hoo hoo) with no top coat. Like all glitter polishes, these were a pain in the butt to remove – I used Remove+ and felt.

Color Club Object of Envy is emerald green. I want to see this next to China Glaze’s upcoming Emerald. I hope they aren’t dupes – I love green and I love glitter so this is the culmination of all my favorite polish attributes.

I know what everyone is thinking, Art of Seduction is China Glaze Ruby Pumps or Milani Garnet Gems. I say no, only because both the Milani and China Glaze are fine-ish glitter suspended in red tinted polish. The Glitter Vixens are chunkier glitter in clear polish. Most people don’t have the need to own both, for nail board addicts, I think these are sufficiently different to justify owning both.

Color Club Sultry reminds me of a denser version of the hard-to-find OPI Glim-merry Gold which I recently admired at a dusty but did not purchase, now I’m glad I didn’t. Sultry is also similar to Misa Disco Queen, which has slightly darker more yellow-gold finer glitter and applies a bit more sparsely.

Color Club Sex Symbol is foil-y multi-sized silver glitter. I’m curious to see how this one stacks up next to the mysterious China Glaze Tinsel that we all have yet to see. All my favorite brands seem to have jumped onto the bling wagon, I’m loving every minute of it.

Color Club Magic Attraction is my favorite from this collection. Chunky holographic glitter? Um…. please, sir, can I have some more? I don’t have anything else quite like it. I suppose the closest thing would be China Glaze Let’s Do it in 3-D but the difference in glitter size creates a completely different holographic effect. Let’s Do it in 3-D is a traditional holographic with the full spectrum of color collectively flashing on the nail, while Magic Attraction has the full spectrum twinkling individually through the flecks of glitter.

My camera refused to photograph Color Club Tru Passion (below) and Sexy Siren (above) accurately. The image of Sexy Siren looks suspiciously like China Glaze Blue Sparrow but they are not similar at all. Sexy Siren is more of a turquoise blue with a touch of green.

Color Club Tru Passion is my second favorite. It’s not a mid-range purple as shown above, it’s more of amethyst or violet. Sorry for the inaccuracy, I’m still working out my photography kinks.

Special thanks to Color Club.

I am SO excited for these!!!! I’ll have swatches up as soon as humanly possible once I receive them.

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These beauties belong to the official Fall collection. I’m not 100% sure of the name of the collection but I think it might be the ‘Dance’. Cremes seem to always be standard for the Fall so I applaud Color Club for doing shimmers – or are they metallics, duo-chromes!? Gaaaah, I have to know! Either way they look amazing. Blue! Black! Gun Metal Gray! Cannot. Wait.

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I’m not even going to bother raving about this because you guys should know how I feel about glitter by now. Really though, an entire collection of glitter polish…. *explodes*. It’s like a dream come true. I think this collection can possibly help quench some of the thirst for the re-release of the China Glaze Wizard of Ooh Ahz Collection, at least temporarily.

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Color Club decided to jump on the go-green nail polish wagon and release this new eco-friendly line. I don’t know the deets yet but I’m assuming these are going to be big 3 free. I’ll let you guys in the scoop as soon as I get the press release.

Special thanks to Color Club for allowing me to share these promotional images.

The next stop on my eternal search for the perfect off-white is Color Club Coastal Creme. It leans towards pink, but isn’t pink by any stretch. ‘Creme’ is actually the perfect word to describe this color. I couldn’t be any happier with the color, very flattering, but I did have a little trouble with the application the first time I wore it. The formula was a bit thick so I added 2 drops of Seche Vite Restore to the bottle, it made the application perfect. I’m finally, but slowly, getting over my fear of using nail polish thinner. Coastal Creme is a part of the Yacht Club Collection, which includes one of my favorite polishes of all time Color Club Sexsea (swatches of the whole collection coming soon).

As a side note: This is the last image of my long nails. *sobs quietly*

This is my attempt at a patriotic mani for the 4th of July. I used the following: OPI The Thrill of Brazil (and believe me, the irony is not lost on me), Rescue Beauty Lounge Dead Calm, Art Club by Color Club White and Silver Glitter, both of which are available individually or in the Art Club Bridal Kit.

I was torn over whether to use Silver Glitter or the tiny little silver crystals that come in the Bridal Kit. I ultimately decided to just wing it with the glitter. I’m a major newb at nail art so I have to say – for a first attempt, I’m really pleased with the results.

First let me say, I am so sorry about the sub-par application and lighting, again. I’ll be back to my usual application and lighting soon, I promise I’ll get it together. Second, OPI The Thrill of Brazil is one of my favorite reds, EVER. It applies like butter. Opaque in one coat, perfect in two – this red shines like there is no tomorrow. Simply, gorgeous. For the blue, I used Rescue Beauty Lounge Dead Calm. It was great for this mani because it, too, is opaque in one coat. I was able to use just one brush stroke for the blue behind the stars. Click here for a swatch of Rescue Beauty Lounge Dead Calm.

Finally, Art Club by Color Club – amazing. I’ve had the Bridal Kit and the Carnaval Kit for a while now but I’ve been stuck in professional-mani purgatory since the beginning of the summer so I haven’t been able to try them out until today. And WOW, I love these nail art polishes. The super long ultra fine brush is incredibly easy to use. The kits in general are pretty great. They come with 4 or so nail art polishes in assorted colors or glitters, decals, beads, stones, and other cute little accents.

To celebrate my nail freedom in exactly one month, I’m planning on breaking out all my accumulated nail art products. Seriously, I’ve been stock piling nail art supplies for a few months now in anticipation of a ridiculously elaborate nail art week on The Polish Addict, so if you’re secretly into the kitsch, like me, stay tuned.