I'm not usually the sort to rush into posting a review, in fact I didn't even think 10 days would be long enough to trial a polish that claims to have a chip-resistant formula but after 3 days I think I have seen everything I need to see.
I usually go for bright coloured polish but I decided to step out of my comfort zone and see if I liked wearing a darker colour, and who doesn't love the chance to try out a new brand, as I personally haven't used Essie before. I wasn't too sure on the darker colour at first, but it has really grown on me!
My first thought, was I loved the brush! But the consistency was a little different to my other polishes. I found it went on quite thin but it wasn't very smooth going on, at least it was different to the polishes I usually use. It dried really quickly which is always good! After a few more coats I found it wasn't going very smoothly at all and it was coming out a bit patchy. It took four coats to get it to look like the rich chocolate colour I had pictured, before the fourth coat it was a dark burgundy colour and noticeably patchy. From a distance they look great, but up close I can see lighter patches even after four coats, but maybe that's just cause I know it's there. I didn't add a top coat over because I didn't want it to effect my experience with the polish, and it also has a nice shine without a topcoat so I didn't think it was necessary.
I had painted my nails about lunch time and by 7pm I already had minor chipping on both thumbs and a decent chip on my middle fingernail, which was very disappointing to see from a polish with a "chip-resistant" formula. But since then they don't seem to have chipped much more.
It's hard to give a product like nail polish a fair review after one use, there could have been many factors that caused chipping to happen so early on, maybe I was just too rough on them with my busy day! So I will definitely give this polish another try, just to be fair. My friend (also a BR member) loves the colour so I will be asking her to try it out and post her own review, hopefully she gets better results than I did!
So to sum it all up here's the Pros and Cons from my first use of this product;
PROS - Loved the shape of the brush - It dried quickly - Nice rich colour - Has a nice shine without a topcoat
CONS - Took 4 coats to get the full colour - Went on quite patchy - Chipping began quickly
When I first read about this particular shade it wasn't exactly getting accolades because it was a "flat brown". I thought it would make a lovely colour on your nails especially if you have darker skin so naturally I jumped at the chance to try it out.
The colour is a very dark brown with reddish undertones so the colour isn't completely flat and it does in fact look really flattering on my skin tone (NC44).
You can glam this shade up by adding a sparkly top coat as well. I opted to add a gold sparkle polish on my ring finger as a feature nail and it looks really lovely.
The quality of the polish is signature Essie, it's a great consistency, not too runny and goes on really smoothly.
Overall, I think this colour is perfect especially for autumn when you need to whip out the rich browns and coppery colours.
I really love this polish and am already thinking of other ways I can glam it up.
My verdict? This is a beautiful polish and it's a lovely rich tone which does flatter mostly darker skin tones. It would probably border on looking a bit gothic on lighter skin tones.
If you like rich browns then this is definitely a polish you should try out. Or maybe just try out a different shade and amp up your polish colours.
Tips: This colour does look very unfinished with just a single coat, so make sure you double coat it and use a great base/top coat to finish it off.