Or alternatively we could title this post OMFG NAILS INC WHY ARE YOU SO AMAZING?

Finally the Pretty Serious store has launched and orders are making their way to happy customers so I can stop spending every moment thinking (stressing) about the house that Kaz built. I’m finally free to talk about other things. And what do I want to talk about? I want to tell you all about how much I freakin LOVE Nails Inc.

I REALLY love Nails Inc (yes yes I know they don’t use capitals in their name but that irks me. And this is my blog). This is no secret, I know – I’ve said it a thousand times before. I own a LOT of Nails Inc polishes which you’ve all seen from time to time. But thinking about it, in terms of quality, design and formula I think it’s time to finally admit that Nails Inc is my favourite current brand. Well apart from Pretty Serious that is, but that’s because I’m horrifically biased.

Nails Inc really is a brand that’s gone from strength to strength and it’s gotten to the point where I want pretty much want everything that they release. Let’s take a look at some of the newest releases.

Exhibit A – Nails Inc Sprinkles Collection
Seriously? Are you shitting me? These are freaking GORGEOUS. I love a brand that takes note of current trends and gives the people what they want. Bloggers have been doing the “jelly sandwich” mani for a long time by layering glitters between regular polish. Deborah Lippmann highlighted the trend when she came out with Candy Shop, which was basically Happy Birthday in a pink base. I like my Lippmann polishes, but I think these four are much more inspired. I’ve always said that you don’t have to be first you just gotta be the best and Nails Inc have nailed it if you’ll pardon the pun! Pudding Lane is a definite favourite from the collection for me. Very unique!

Exhibit B – Nail Jewellery Collection
Okay really, it’s time to crack out the tinfoil hat because Nails Inc are CLEARLY stealing my brain waves while I’m sleeping. I mentioned earlier that Nails Inc seem to be taking notice of what’s popular right now and chunky oddly shaped glitters are where its at. They’ve followed up their Special Effects 3D Glitters nicely with this line – The silver and green are especially interesting. The green is iridescent flakes and glitter while the silver has mirror like shards of silver glitter. Just amazing. And OMG MATCHING CAPS. GET IN MY HELMER YOU GUYS.

Exhibit C – Fishnet Magnetic Nail Polish
Just when we thought that we were completely over the magnetic trend, Nails Inc come out with something unique and amazing. I love everything about Spitalfields – the colour is fabulous and the pattern that the new magnet creates is unlike anything I’ve ever seen before. So many brands have all been bringing out their additions to the magnetic craze, but it’s Nails Inc that have come along and created something new. Truly innovative.

Exhibit D – Jubilee Crystal Cap Nail Polish
I’m totally enamored with the entire Crystal Cap line to begin with, but when I set my peepers on this beauty it was love at first sight. Of all the polishes I have listed today, this is the one I have bought. There was no way I was missing out on this one! Crystal Cap polishes are LE to begin with, but this one is a glitter as well! Nails Inc also have a section on their site where you can design your own Crystal Cap polish which I have yet to do. I’m worried if I start I’ll end up blowing a LOT of money!

So with that evidence submitted, you can see how I’ve come to the verdict that Nails Inc is UH-MAY-ZING. My only problem? Availability. I end up buying most of mine on eBay or relying on the generosity of friends to mule for me from either Sephora in the US or Nails Inc themselves in the UK. As far as I am aware, there is no Australian distributor.

Although funnily enough, Nails Inc is on sale at Ozsale at the moment for $14.00 with some awesome shades available.

Charing Cross, Eden Grove

Chesham Street, Symons Street

Edinburgh Gate, Buckingham Palace

Franklins Row, Regents Palace

To finish up this post, I thought I’d share some of my favourite Nails Inc polishes. If you haven’t tried this brand, you are definitely missing out. Better than Chanel. Better than NARS. Better than Illamasqua. Serious quality right here.

OH YES, that was a pun. I’m sorry. I’ve been so dedicated and straight faced these last two weeks while working on my business that I just couldn’t resist a tiny opportunity to be a little bit stupid. It’s probably a good thing that I at least pretend to know what I’m doing when dealing with business related tasks, otherwise I’d never get anywhere.

Me at the bank: So I’d like to open a bank account for my business.
Bank manager: Excellent. What is the business name?
Me: Pretty Serious Cosmetics.
Bank manager: That’s an interesting name.
Me: I know, right? It’s a pretty serious undertaking, starting your own business.
Bank manager: Clever.
Me: There’s pretty serious risk involved.
Bank manager: Yes…
Me: And seriously, what girl doesn’t want to look pretty?
Bank manager: Stop it.
Me: I’m sorry… seriously.

No, that didn’t happen. But I kinda wish it had.

So as some of you probably know, my shop opens on Monday and my polishes, lip glosses and loose shadows FINALLY go on sale. Yay! I’ve had a lot of questions about a lot of things so I thought I’d throw together a little Q&A post here to answer some of your queries. If you have any questions that I don’t answer, please feel free to comment and I will reply!

1. Are your products vegan?
Yes! All Pretty Serious products including the nail polishes are vegan. They are also Big 3 free, and formaldehyde resin free. Go team!

2. Do you test on animals?
Absolutely not. Pretty Serious Cosmetics is totally against animal testing. The only guinea pigs that these products are tested on are consenting human guinea pigs!

3. Will you ship internationally?
Absolutely! Although there will be a 2-3 week delay on the shipping of international orders while our stock reaches the US and UK. We will be housing stock with a fulfillment partner on both of those continents to allow for cheaper freight options to both US and UK destinations. As most of you are aware, there are restrictions on what can be shipped via air with Australia Post and nail polish is one of those restricted items. This solution allows us to send our goods around the world without getting into any trouble.

If there is demand, we also have the option of Canadian, German and Brazilian warehouse locations in the future as well. So in summary, yes we will ship international but they may take a few weeks to arrive. I’ll keep everyone posted here at Pretty Random, via Twitter and the Facebook page as well.

4. Will your items sell out?
Although there will be times when things go out of stock on our website, you can rest assured that it will be restocked. At present, nothing is LE or likely to be discontinued for some time so there is no chance that you will miss out.

5. How much will your items cost?
All products (lip gloss, eyeshadow and nail polish) are $9.95 AUD each. However, if you wish to buy matching coloured gloss, shadow and polish you can get 10% off. Same goes for all six polishes, eyeshadows or glosses. If you’re feeling super saucy and want one of everything, you can bag yourself 20% off. That’s a pretty sweet deal right there.

6. Are your items packaged?
Yes. We worked very hard on outer packaging. The boxes were designed by Leigh Young who also did my pinup girls. I love when my cosmetic items are boxed, so I wanted the same feel for my own products.

7. What payment methods will you accept?
We have Paypal set up initially, and we will be adding secure Visa and Mastercard processing via eWay within the next two weeks. All necessary security steps have been taken to ensure the safety of your information.

8. When will there be more colours?
We are planning the release of the next collection in mid-late July. Beyond that, there are Halloween and Christmas collections in planning stages.

9. Are you going to do other products besides lip gloss, eye shadow and nail polish?
While our main focus is nails (of course) the answer is a resounding yes! Just wait until you see what we have planned.

10. Your lip glosses are very bright. Are they wearable?
Absolutely! The glosses may look bright in the tubes, but they are actually quite sheer and go on the lips more as a lightly tinted sparkle gloss than full colour. They are also super moisturising and scented in the most delicious flavours!

11. What sizes are your products?
The nail polishes are 11ml, Glosses 5.5g and Loose Shadows 5g. The glosses and shadows are packed by weight, while the nail polish is filled by volume.

12. Do you offer sample sizes of your shadows?
Not at this time, but if there is enough demand we may look into this in the future.

13. Finally, where can I get these?
At the moment, we only sell via http://www.pretty-serious.com but I will keep you guys in the loop about further stockists.

I hope I’ve been able to answer your questions, but if you have any more please comment and I will be happy to answer.

Here’s to exciting times ahead!

Hey gang! Well first of all I’m happy to say after many many hours of packing and about 15 metres of bubble wrap, all of my blogsale items are finally en route to their new happy homes. Aussie girls, please let me know if you don’t get your packages by the end of the week. International friends, it can take up to three weeks to reach you depending on where you are. I really wish that someone would hurry up and invent Star Trek transporter technology.

If I have stuffed anything up, left anything out or accidentally mailed you my cat Raz, please let me know.

Raz likes to jump in boxes

Secondly, I’m all caught up again on Gumleaf Mafia administration. We’ve added four new members yesterday and I’m so thrilled to see that people are still interested in joining our growing family. Hooray for Aussie nail bloggers! Remember to let me know via the site if you are having a giveaway so I can list it in the sidebar. Also remember to check the site for info on sales!

Third, I’ve grown addicted to shopping at Dorothy Perkins. Want to see some of my latest purchases? Too bad, I’m showing you anyway.

The black sequin dress was only £7.00 on sale! All round excellent prices and fast shipping. If you haven’t shopped at ol’ Dotty P yet I’m telling you that you are missing out! Actually no – stay back. More bargains for me!!

Finally… and perhaps most exciting of all… I can finally reveal shots of all of the Pretty Serious Hello World collection! Six polishes, six loose eye shadows and six shimmer glosses! The glosses are scented too!

We are only weeks away from going on sale! It’s been a long time coming and I feel like it’s taken forever to get here but the time is almost upon us. Currently we are in the process of tweaking the shop site and having a photographer take product shots and then it’s all systems go!

The products will be available very soon at http://www.pretty-serious.com – I’ll be sure to let know know when the shop goes live so that you can scope out the products before purchase!

As for the future, work is already underway for the second collection from Pretty Serious Cosmetics which will be called Hit the Road. I’m very excited about the new shades and I can’t wait to show them off! I expect Hit the Road to ‘hit the store’ in July. But more on that later!

Everyone enjoy your week and I’ll hopefully get back to regular posts very very soon!

Shop! Shop My friends! Help me get all of this stuff outta my house!

I must mention though that I have to work tomorrow, so I will be unable to respond to any comments until tomorrow night. But I will do my best to approve all the ones I get immediately so you can all see in the comments what has been taken before I have a chance to cross them off the list.

Now, off to the blogsale with ye!

Thank you so much to all of you who snapped up my goodies! I have all packages packed and ready to go, but I have left them all unsealed just in case you all want to grab some more stuff from the lot that I’ll be listing in the next 24 hours.

If anyone who has bought stuff would rather me send right away rather than wait, that’s cool too, just let me know!

All packages are set to go out on Tuesday the 17th. If I haven’t invoiced you yet, I will shortly!

Thanks again guys! You rock!

Kaz

Guess what you guys, this time it aint no April Fools Joke!

I’ve filled my five Helmers so if I want to keep buying more stuff, then some of the old stuff has to go. This is probably about a third of what I have to sell, but photographing and listing it all is hard work! I’ll try and put the rest up over the next week.

All the deets are on the blogsale page so go ahead and take a look!

I’ve got something pretty darn spesh for you all today. Picture Polish most graciously sent me their latest collection so I could do terrible swatches of them and well… how could me and my manky cuticles refuse? Here they are!

The beauty that you see above is Picture Polish’s brand spankin new Opulence collection that goes up for sale this Monday. I’ve long been a fan of Picture Polish shades (Jealousy anyone! Phwoar!) and these new guys are a welcome addition to their already stellar lineup.

Picture Polish Mask-a-rade is a multicoloured iridescent colour shifting glitter in a clear base that works best as a top coat. The glitter is only just too sparse to work as a polish on it’s own, but over a dark base it builds nicely. This is two coats over NYC Night.

On the nail over black it reminds me of Butter London’s The Black Knight, but in spirit only. The glitter in this polish is quite unique. It’s like someone took all of the Ozotic Elytra shades, put them in a blender and came up with this. It’s wonderful and I can’t say I own anything that would dupe it without some serious layering.

Picture Polish Peacock is duochrome blue green glitter in a murky blurple base. It’s way more gorgeous in real life than my pictures suggest. Also, I can’t help but think of this anytime someone says the word peacock:

Little known fact, my little brother looks almost identical to Mark Wahlberg. So much so that he has people telling him that he looks like him ALL THE TIME. He’s sick of it but we all think it’s hilarious. Funnily enough, his name is also Mark.

Getting back on track, Peacock is beautiful but the formula can be troublesome if you don’t work fast. It dries pretty quick (which is a good thing) but it is also quite thick and I had some issues with drag. But honestly that’s much more operator error than anything wrong with the polish. It’s a lot like the China Glaze Halloween glitters from 2010 in both formula and application. It’s really stunning and for a much better swatch, check out Scrangie’s blog.

Picture Polish Monroe is nothing short of stunning. It’s a gorgeous sleek blood red jelly with a burst of linear holo particles throughout. It’s smooth and sexy and then you get this little bit of extra kapow when you get it into bright light or sun.

I have absolutely no complaints about the formula or application – this polish was perfect. It reminds me a little of China Glaze Rapture although this polish is much deeper and the holo is a lot smoother. I love Monroe a lot and I will be wearing it again.

Like I mentioned earlier, these polishes are from Picture Polish and go on sale on Monday! (Well PR told me Monday, but they seem to be available now!) And yep, they ship internationally. Go mad ladies! And while you’re at it, I highly recommend Jealousy, Heavy Metal, Marine and Vegas as well!

Ahh cheapies. I love you. Especially now that I’m not working full time and the business hasn’t launched yet (soon my pretties… SOON!). The thing that I love about Ulta3 polishes is that despite the meagre price tag of around $2.00 these polishes are quality. It’s nice to be able to pick up a little treat for yourself without breaking the bank and the two that I have to show you today are no exception.

Today I have Enchanted and Blue Marlin to show you. I’ve had Blue Marlin for a little while now but Enchanted is pretty much brand new. It was picked up for me and left in my mailbox by the beautiful Emma polish fairy. I’m not sure what the significance is of the black cap on the newer shade but honestly I prefer the white.

Ulta3 Enchanted is a blackened green with a purple base and a silvery green shimmer. Definitely a bruise-ish colour. In fact it bears a strong resemblance to Urban Decay Bruise (First on left), although the shimmer in UD Bruise is more emerald than silver.

For a cheapie it’s such a complex polish and definitely not something that I would have expected from Ulta3. The base is actually a very dark plum yet the polish is clearly green. I love that weird colour shift and Enchanted has left me well… enchanted to say the least.

Ulta3 Blue Marlin is a perfect cornflower blue jelly. I love shades this colour and this reminds me a lot of Sally Hansen Pacific Blue that I fell in love with two years ago although this is a tad more vibrant and Pacific Blue is a straight up creme.

Because of the jelly formula there is a little VNL but I’m not really bothered by it. It only seems to be visible on certain angles and the colour payoff is so worth it. This was only two coats so perhaps with a third the VNL would have disappeared completely. A great polish for the price.

You can usually find Ulta3 bins at Chemists – they really aren’t too hard to find. If you want to find a stockist near you, just contact their distributor The Heat Group and they should be able to help you out.

Every girl deserves a treat every now and then. Even if it only costs a couple of bucks.

Even though I have not yet collected all of the zings it seems I have stumbled on to a new obsession. Revlon Color Illusion. And in an even stranger turn of events I actually only own two of these. I normally wait until I have a few more in the collection to show them to you, but I have a feeling this hunt is going to be a difficult one.

There were two distinct collections of Color Illusion polishes from Revlon, the first dating back to 2002. First was the original Color Illusion line – a collection of duochrome metallic shades, which was followed up by Color Illusion Sparks in 2003 – these were still metallic duochromes but they also had foily glitter particles.

Like I said earlier, I’ve only got two of these, and you can click the link for larger pictures.

Scrangie has recently swatched two of her shades – Lilac Beam and Steel Magic.

I’ve done a little homework and I have discovered what I think to be all of them, but if you own a Color Illusion shade that isn’t on the list by all means let me know! I’d love to track down all of these babies one day! I’m potentially missing one of the Sparks shades so any info would be helpful! Names in bold are owned by me and pictured above.

0771-01 Pearl Flash
0771-02 Blue Illusion
0771-03 Pink Prism
0771-04 Russet Flicker
0771-05 Champagne Shimmer
0771-06 Plum Flip
0771-07 Steel Magic
0771-08 Silver Switch
0771-09 Mocha Mirage

Sparks
3244-01 Mauve Twinkle
3244-02 Pink Crystal
3244-03 Crimson Sparkle
3244-04 Lilac Beam
3244-05 Cocoa Shimmer
3244-06 Golden Glimmer
3244-07 Fireside Glow
3244-08 Purple Twilight

Hopefully I can gather enough of these to do a reference guide soon!

Edit: I found these pics on Trans World Gifts – an etailer that used to have them for sale.

Top to Bottom: Pink Prism, Russet Flicker, Champagne Shimmer, Plum Flip, Steel Magic, Silver Switch, Mocha Mirage.

I’m not sure what the significance is with the white caps versus the pearl ones – maybe different countries of production/sale? I know my bottle of Steel Magic has a white cap and this one here is pearl.

L to R: Lilac Beam, Fireside Glow, Purple Twilight.

Edit again: The lovely Dana from Polished Claws Up sent me a shot of her bottle of Pearl Flash. Click the image for a larger pic.

It feels like forever since I’ve either had the time or my nails were in good enough condition to do so. Finally the stars and planets aligned and I have some new stuff to show you! Eeee! Did you miss me? I sure missed you guys!

Yep, new Chi Chi’s. Chi Chi is a brand that I will find eternally hilarious because they allow me to say things like “I’m going to show you my Chi Chi’s” or “Check out those Chi Chi’s”. And I am a huge child so you know, it works well. I picked these up from Myer over the weekend. I’m not one to usually pay full price for Chi Chi ($12.95 seems a tad steep to me) but the moment I laid eyes on that green I knew we were in love and we needed to be together forever.

Bump & Grind is a gorgeous mid toned pink purple, despite the fact that it has an utterly abhorrent name. Really? Bump & Grind? Gross. Sometimes you really disappoint me Chi Chi. What about this polish says sweaty gyrating at a seedy nightclub to you?

Naming issues aside, I actually really love it. My boyfriend picked this one out and he has a habit of picking colours that I would normally pass over on first glance but I end up adoring. So when he picks up a colour and says “I like this one,” I tend to listen to his wisdom nowadays. The boy has an eye for colour. It’s got a slight pink duochrome around the edges. Just lovely.

Next up is Everyday I’m Shufflin, which is yet another name I don’t understand. Is it something to do with current music? Because I’m old and I don’t listen to the radio. But honestly, will you look at this beauty? I wouldn’t care if Chi Chi called it Dog Poop I would have bought it. Amazing shade.

I believe it might be a dupe for Bloom Bianca, but for a fraction of the price. It also looks a lot like the Max Factor mini Emerald shade which I wanted really badly but couldn’t get my hands on. If you don’t have Bianca/Rimmel Mania/Max Factor Emerald then I highly suggest you get this one before Chi Chi discontinue it like they did their other awesome green Show Me The Money.

That’s all I’ve got for today – I really need to spend the evening tonight catching up on emails, Gumleaf Mafia admin and blog comments (both mine and other peoples!). Catch you tomorrow cool dudes!