Nfu Oh 50 and 54

Yayyy, I'm finally done a big project at work! Of course, I thought I was done two nights ago, but it turns out I made a tiny mistake, that had a big impact (oops!), so I had to re-do everything last night and this morning. But now... now it's done (I hope.)

So here's another Nfu Oh post. I bought 50 and 54 on my trip, and had bought 40 from Fabuloustreet.com last year (when I was obsessed with SH Hidden Treasure).

Nfu Oh 54 layered over black - the flakies in this are actually a bit sparse in this one




Nfu Oh 50 over Zoya Pinta - flakies are wayyy more dense in this one. Almost SH HT dense.




Comparison: Nfu Oh 40, 50, 54 - that's kinda annoying, right? Anyway, I'm just going to keep 40, since I've already put a dent in it and it's in the most clear base.

I hope this was helpful, guys! HAPPY FRIDAY!!!

Nfu Oh 56

Here's another amazing Nfu Oh flakie that I loved more than expected:

Nfu Oh 56 over Illamasqua Rampage - I think this is fantastic! Like 51 and 52, this polish has small shimmer in addition to the flakies. I think it really adds a lot of depth.

I have a bunch of other Nfu Oh flakies to show you, but they all ended up looking really similar on the nail. I need to work up a few comparisons to make that post more helpful, so I may post something else before that goes up... maybe a haul post ;)

Hope you guys are doing well! This week is really dragging for me. I can't wait for the weekend!!! Even though I have nothing planned, I need to time to rest >

Nfu Oh 52

Last time I mentioned Nfu Oh 51 didn't excite me much... Nfu oh 52 on the otherhand totally blew my mind.

I wore it 1 coat over Illamasqua Phallic for these pics. It also looked great (and a bit different) over CND Urban Oasis.

Nfu Oh 52 over Illamasqua Phallic - OM NOM NOM NOM.

As a side note, this polish reminds me of Deborah Lippmann Across the Universe... Obviously they are totally different polishes. Maybe it was just the blue-green colour scheme.

Really amazing polish. You can get Nfu Ohs from fabuloustreet.com :)

Nfu Oh 51

I've always seen photos of this polish (often compared to Clarins 230 with flakies) but never thought I would have it. I picked it up in Seoul last month and here are the swatches. I tried it out on its own, but didn't like how it looked, so I layered it 1 coat over Zoya Pinta. You can get Nfu Ohs from fabuloustreet.com for $12.50 each (free US shipping over $25).

Nfu Oh 51 (over Zoya Pinta) - Actually, this didn't wow me as much as I thought it would. Maybe I just need to find a better layering combination.

Comparison: Orly Fowl Play and Nfu Oh 51 over Zoya Pinta - I think I prefer the Orly!

A while back, I tried to franken my own Nfu Oh 51, and this is what I had come up with:

Next to my franken: the recipe for the franken is about half and half Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Purple Pizzazz and Colorama Flakies plus a little red.

Comparison: Franken and Nfu Oh 51 over Zoya Pinta - As similar as they look in the bottle, they're much different on the nail. The Nfu Oh is way more packed with flakie-goodness.

Sorry I was MIA all week! I was away for a work conference just outside of LA. This is the view from my hotel room... such a gorgeous view!! The weather was amazing. Flying back into EWR was a real downer... lol.

The Face Shop BK901, Shimmery Topcoat #5 (?), and GR502

It's Friday! I meant to post earlier in the week, but work got in the way :/ It has been an extremely long and painful week at work... but hopefully this project will be wrapped up soon. Next week I'll be away for a conference (40 mins outside of LA) and I am crossing my fingers that I will not be required to work during the evenings there!

Anyways, here are the other 3 Face Shop polishes I picked up in Korea. I think these might be available in their US stores, though.

The Face Shop BK901 - (same number as the holo, but very obviously a different polish!) The bottle looked so promising for this one, but on the nail, a lot of the duochrome glitter drowns in the black base. Aw :( It reminds me of OPI Unripened / Sinful Colors What's Your Name. Formula is good, though. 2 coats.

The Face Shop Topcoat 05 over black - I'm actually not sure if this is the name. It has a tag on it and the only thing I can identify is the number '5' -.- Anyways, I think it's pretty clearly meant to be a topcoat. It contains little shimmery glitter particles that remind me of the glitter in ChG White Cap or CND Jade Sparkle, but very miniscule. I think it's very pretty! I took swatch pics of it 1 coat over black, but it is kind of difficult to see. I think it catches the light a lot better in real life :)

The Face Shop GR502 - WOW! One of my favourite polishes I picked up on vacation! It reminds me of Chanel Graphite (something I can only now admit to have been lemming) but without the awful price tag. I actually swatched Graphite on my nail at the duty free store in NRT, and compared it to this when I got home. From what I can tell, Graphite has a few larger gold particles that make it sparkle a bit more, but the base colour and finish is very similar between these two. As an added bonus, this Face Shop polish is way more opaque than the Chanel. Two coats!

DBF's parents are coming to visit this weekend since it's Canadian Thanksgiving (Happy Thanksgiving, my fellow canucks!). Is Canadian Thanksgiving always the same day as Columbus Day here in the US? I can never remember. I still need to clean up the apartment tonight, since I have been getting home late everyday this week, it's a mess!

Have a great weekend, folks!

Tony Moly (Mars, Neptune, Jupiter)

Hi guys :) Wow, is it ever cool in NJ today! I really like the fall season, though. Everyone at work is depressed about summer being over, but I am pretty happy about it. I hate being really hot and sweaty all the time -.-

I'm going to show you my Tony Moly polishes. I had seen these even before my vacation and was interested in picking up a few; although, I was unsure which ones. I stumbled upon my first Tony Moly store when we went to COEX the first time (actually, I think it was technically not in the COEX mall, but a side mall). Anyways, I went in to look at the polishes, but I actually wasn't sure which polishes were which. I looked for the planet names, but there were only number codes on the labels. Duhhh... the names were in Korean.

As I was browsing the rest of the store to see if I wanted to get anything else, a SA came up to me and started talking in Korean. After my "Uhhh" face, she started talking in Mandarin, and said "Is Chinese okay?" Now, I was born in Canada, but my parents spoke some Chinese at home and forced me to Saturday school (I'm sure some of you can relate, lol) so I can understand Chinese, but it is still my second language. I tentatively said "Uhh, yeah, it's okay..." and she asked me what I was looking for.

I said I was just looking around, and she followed me around the store explaining the benefits of some creme on the wall. From her description, I went "Oh.. BB cream?" Then, she picked up a rather expensive moisturizer and pumped it on my hand, starting to explain: "This is our new snail creme. It helps regenerate your skin... (continues in Chinese that I cannot even follow)". I go, "Ahh.." and rub it into my skin. I keep looking around and then she says something I don't catch in Chinese. She reiterates, "That redness in your face, is it your skin or did you smear something on it?"

D: BITCH, STEP BACK.

I only brought one blush to Asia with me, one of those NYC blush sticks. I said, "I 'smeared' it on." then I went back around to the nail polish, picked up the two I was interested and said "I think I'm just going to buy these."

I kind of feel like if I had said "Do you speak English?" instead of saying "Ok" to Chinese, she wouldn't have been so snotty to me.

That night, I looked up swatches of the Tony Moly polishes and realized there was one I still wanted to get. So, the next day, in a different area, I saw another Tony Moly store and I went in, hoping my first experience was just a one-off. The store was pretty busy so no one bothered me (other than to give me a basket) while I looked around. Nothing really interested me, so I just got the one polish and went out to meet DBF (who had started waiting outside every time I went into a cosmetics shop). He said, "You will not believe what just happened. A girl with really bad skin walked by and the Tony Moly girl at the door said something to her, then she looked really angry and stormed off!!"

-.-''

I hope you enjoy these polishes that came at the expense of me being insulted (LOL, and 5000 Won a piece, just under $5 USD each):

Tony Moly GT03 (Mars) - This is actually not my favourite, but it looked so cool in the bottle. 2 coats, with topcoat.

Tony Moly GT04 (Neptune) - I think this is my favourite. It is so complex! I wore it while in Korea but didn't have any topcoat with me... this turned out to be a mistake, because these polishes dry extremely gritty and dull without topcoat! 2 coats, with topcoat.

Tony Moly GT05 (Jupiter) - I like this one a lot too, but not as much as the green one. 2 coats, with topcoat.

The other two (Earth and Mercury, I think) didn't appeal to me, so I didn't buy them. I think I watched too much Sailor Moon when I was a kid, because I think GT04/Neptune should be Jupiter, and GT05/Jupiter should be Saturn! LOL. Ah colour associations.

So what do you guys think, worth the verbal abuse? LOL. If you are in the US, I believe you can find these on Ebay for about $10 (and without a snobby attitude).

Missha HGR01 and JBL01

Here are the two Misshas I picked up in Korea. I wanted to get more, but the other polishes in this series (same bottle shape/size) didn't impress me. There were some cute cremes in smaller bottles of the same shape, but I didn't want ones that didn't match ><

No humourous story to go with my Missha shopping trip. Well, other than DBF picking out a lipstick that looks terrible on me (be sure to see it on my next blog sale, LOL).

I also bought a pencil eyeliner and a liquid eyeliner at Missha, but both were a letdown. The pencil liner is not very opaque, and the liquid liner sticks to itself / flakes off (at least on my lids).

Missha HGR01 - I really like how this polish looks in pictures, but in real life, the blue duochrome doesn't appear that much on my nails. I'll need to give it a good test run, but that's my first impression of this polish.

Missha JBL01 - I saw several swatches of this as well, and it's quite interesting. There are green glints of this polish, that are very hard to photograph, but are much more apparent in real life. It's nice.

It's worth noting (if you haven't heard about these before) that these polishes:

a) have a ginormous paddle brush... I would say, even larger than the Sally Hansen CSM brushes which barely fit through the neck of the bottle,

b) have is a "rose" scent,

c) are in cute, slanty heart-shaped bottles, but they don't exactly line up very well in a drawer/box.

That's it from me now. Hope you guys have a great weekend. I really need some time to recoup; the two weeks back from vacation have been ridiculously busy at work!

The Face Shop holos

I'm about halfway through swatching my haul. I thought I would start off with posting The Face Shop holos I got! I'm not sure if these are available in the US stores and I'm also not sure if I got all of them. They came in pretty silver boxes, and I think cost about 6000 won (~$6USD). After a certain point, I stopped calculating how much I was spending in Korea... O_O

My experience at The Face Shop in Korea was much better than my experience at both the Manhattan and San Jose stores. I always feel unwelcome in the US stores and the SAs seem snobby, but they were so friendly and nice in all the Korean stores I went to (I went into about 5 stores). The girls at Tony Moly were the complete opposite, but I will save that story for when I post those swatches :)

The holo is actually a bit stronger than they appear in these photos, but not by much. As you know, I rarely take the time to photograph in real sunlight (my main defence is that in real life, I almost never see the light of day) so keep that in mind! :) Pictured are 2 coats and I quite like the bottles and brushes (wider than a ChG brush, but narrower than CND).

The Face Shop - RD301 - A real red holo? I guess so! It's a warmer red, leaning towards the orange side. This was the least holo out of the three.

The Face Shop - PP401

The Face Shop - BK901 - More charcoal-y than black. Somehow, I bought two polishes at TFS both with the "name" BK901. Not only are they too lazy to come up with real names, but they even re-use codes in Asia??? WTF?!

About a week before going on vacation, DBF and I decided we should watch some Korean dramas to get used to the sound of the language and maybe pick up a few words (as this is how we have come to know our Japanese vocab... tons of anime when we were in high school / college!!). We started watching Boys Over Flowers because I was familiar with the manga and it was available on Netflix. By the time we got to Seoul, we had watched the complete series.

The Face Shop was one of the first "road shops" I went to in Seoul on my trip. DBF and I were on our way to the Nfu Oh HQ and we stopped in here first. I hauled the polishes here and also picked up some black head removing clay. When I was checking out, DBF noticed a poster behind the cash register and said, "Isn't that Jihoo?" (one of the male leads in Boys Over Flowers). I said, "Oh my god, it is!" and the cashier turned around to see what we were looking at it. She went "Ohhh, Kim Hyun-joong!" and then said something in Korean (I only recognized the English word "poster". There were posters at the entrance, but we couldn't figure out if they were free). On the way out of the store, we looked up at the facade and noticed his huge face plastered everywhere! I kind of furrowed my eyebrows that a guy was advertising a cosmetics company... and that his skin looked amazing.

This isn't the exact store I went to, but I took a picture of another store later during the trip. Observe:

Anyways, I'm sad to be back, but vacation can't last forever, right?