Ulta3 - Melted Marshmallow

I recently spotted this Ulta3 shade mixed amongst the others in the big polish bin at my local chemist.  It was a shade that I didn't have in my collection, it is made in PRC (which means it's newish) but it was never released as part of any collection.

Melted Marshmallow is your classic very pale pink pearl polish with a fantastically frosty finish.  Urrgghhh, really, I can't believe polish companies still make shades like these.  But I guess someone out there likes them and keeps buying them, otherwise they wouldn't keep making them (well I guess I just bought it too, so maybe I'm perpetuating the demand)

This was three coats of Melted Marshmallow, applied very carefully so as to minimize brush strokes as much as possible.  Just looking at the bottle I knew I wasn't going to like this polish much, and after the first brush stroke I was right.  But, and I can't believe I'm going to say this, at three coats it actually looked ok. 

Do you have any classic frosty shades in your collection?  If so, did you buy them in the 1980's or were they just a buying mistake :)

Aussie Christmas Challenge - BBQ and Ulta3 Citrus

Here are my ugly and sucky BBQ nails for today's Aussie Christmas Challenge.  The base is Kleancolor metallic orange with a glad wrap (saran wrap) design using Pretty Serious Santa's Sunburn, Kleancolour Metallic Yellow and Black.  I then did some black lines stamped (very crookedly!).  It's meant to be the glowing coals under the hot grill!

Yeah, lets just move on to some other swatches shall we? Nothing to see up here!

I figured I would show these swatches today given my shitty effort for the challenge.

These are the Ulta3 Citrus polishes.

Tangello - A bright neon orange creme.  This is three coats with Seche Vite.  The formula on this was pretty good.  A nice bright neon that doesn't need to be layered over white.

Here is a quick comparison with Tangelo from last years Summer collection, close but they are not identical.

Atomic OJ - this would be my favourite from this collection.  Its totally unique amongst all my Ulta3s and in my entire collection.  Imagine this colour more neon and less yello - more the colour of orange juice - atomic oj really is the perfect name.  It's like some crazy radioactive orange juice!

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Fruit Punch - a pink toned red creme.  I did three coats here just to make sure it was smooth and even.  The formula was ok on this, but not great.

There are a few Ulta3 shades that are similar to this one.  Pink Colada is the closest, but personally way better because it's a one coater.  Coral Reef from the recent Candy Cane is also quite similar at three coats.

Fresh Squeezed - I quite honestly really disliked this one.  This is four coats and it was still streaky and transparent when viewed in the sun.

Here is a comparison of my similar Ulta3 shades.  Fresh Squeezed is at four coats, the others are three coats.  Honolulu was the most opaque and the one I like best.

The citrus collection also doubles up on a previously released shade - Tahitian Lime.  Tahitian Lime wasn't much of a favourtie colour last time I wore it, so I didn't want to swatch it again.

Another Ulta3 Nail sticker design

Here is another set of the Ulta3 nail stickers that I tried.  The design has a combination of raised gold droplets together with gold mesh design.  The stickers themselves are translucent, so your base colour shows through the little diamond shapes and around the droplets.  I chose to wear them over a black base.

When I first applied these, they were lovely and smooth, but I decided to add a coat of Seche Vite to seal in the tips and help stop any lifting.  Unfortunately, this caused the tips to wrinkle up a bit, and created some creases in the sides too.  The following day the Seche Vite peeled off in a large sheet off every nail.  It lifted off up to the textured part, where it ripped like perforated paper.

The instructions don't say anything about adding a top coat to the stickers, but I thought, at the time, it was a good idea. In the future though, I wont be adding Seche Vite and I will see what the wear is like and if the tips peel.

This is what the packet looks like.  It comes with 16 stickers, costs $5 and I use the five largest sizes.

Has anyone else tried these Ulta3 nail stickers yet?  What was your experience like.

I still find them rather thick, especially compared to the PERL strips that I reviewed (and have since purchased various other designs.)

Ulta3 Candy Cane - Summer collection Part 1

As many Aussie girls would already know, Ulta3 recently released a candy cane full of new shades.  The candy cane only costs $12.95 and it has 10 polishes in it.  Which is truly unbelievable value for nail polish here in Australia.  If you are looking for a local stockist, check out the Ulta3 Stockist Locator app on their Facebook page.

Today I have part one of my swatches, the top row of five colours.

Photo credit: Not exactly sure, taken from Aussie nails - please let me know if its yours.

Exotic Canary - 4 coats + Seche Vite top coat.  Bright yellow creme, but not neon.  It's definitely tweety bird yellow, so the name certainly suits the polish.  A slightly darker yellow than frangipani.

Tangerine Tango - 3 coats + Seche Vite.  A very bright orange creme. More orange than carrot top.

Peach Paradise - 3 coats + Seche Vite. A salmon pink coral shade.  Quite similar to the made in Australia version of watermelon, but a little lighter.

Coral reef - 3 coats + Seche Vite. Bright yellow toned red creme.  Looks similar to the made in Australia version of Scarlet.  Still some tiny visible nail line at three coats, which means maybe this is a bit jelly like.

Pink Hibiscus - 2 coats + Seche vite. Bright pink creme. There are quite of lot of Ulta3 pinks that are similar to this shade, Party Shoes and Bo Peep would be the closest.

Unlike many of the new made in PRC Ulta3s, these were all quite thin and not really opaque at all.  Most needed three coats and the yellow needed 4 coats. But having said that, this year's candy cane is so much better than last years, simply because it actually contains new shades.  Last years was just a fancy christmas way of selling 10 existing colours.  

Part 2 tomorrow.

Ulta3 summer gelato collection

Here is the latest collection from Ulta3.  Canberra girls, I grabbed mine from the chemist next to Coles in the Gungahlin town centre.  I was surprised to see another Ulta3 release this summer, given they released eight polishes in spring. Usually they only do two collections a year, maybe they are going to up that to one every season.  I sure hope so.

The Ulta3 gelato collection is a set of six creme polishes.  They are not brights and they are not pastels, they are somewhere in between.

First up is Violet Crumble.  Arrrgggghhhh Violet Crumble *wipes drool from mouth* I can't remember the last time I had one of those. And now, damn I wish this polish was that metallic purpley blue from the Violet Crumble wrapper, that would have been totally awesome. Sadly it's not, instead it's dusty violet colour which is still pretty, just not awesome.  This was three coats (and it needed all three!) with no top coat.

Blue Heaven.  Oh yeah baby, this really is blue heaven.  I totally love this one. There was a serious lack of decent blue cremes in the Ulta3 range, so this one fills a big hole in my opinion.  This was three coats and a coat of Seche Vite top coat, again two coats were a bit streaky.

Kiwi Kaos - I'm surprised to see a green in this collection, given that they did three greens in the last collection.  This is a toned down green that is quite wearable, unlike the rather hideous Frog Prince. This was three coats with no top coat.  I really shouldn't have been lazy on this swatch and added the top coat, cause it would have looked so much better with it.

Lemon Tart - Very pretty light yellow.  Streaky and horrible to apply.  This was four coats with SV top coat, but once it dried it was great and very nice on the nail.  This is the last one I swatched and I wore it as a full mani.

Mango Mayham - rich orange creme, but not neon or ultra bright like tangelo or tahiti.  A unique colour in the Ulta3 range. With a name that includes the word Mango, I was expecting something more yellow, like mango flesh, mmmmmmm I have one on the bench I might go eat now! This was three coats with Seche Vite top coat.

Strawberry Sundae - A medium bright pink creme.  Ulta 3 have a stack of pink cremes so I'm sure it's similar to something they have already released, I'm just not sure which one yet.  I'm not a huge pink lover, but I'm really feeling this one at the moment.

The formula on all these was only OK.  Very much like the last collection.  Runny, but thick at the same time.  I had a lot of trouble with the brushes from these polishes.  The Ulta3 brushes used to be delicate and smooth, but I found these rather stiff.  So much so that the brush left drag mark ridges through the polish as I wiped it over the nail.  I had this same problem with the spring collection.  I'm guessing they are probably using a lower quality brush now that the polishes are made in China, rather than made in Australia like all the previous polishes.

Despite the weird formula and crappy brushes, I totally love the colours.  I also love collections like these that just go together and look like a set.  They almost did this with the Spring collection from 2009 which were almost a set of pastels, except with Hot Spring and Spring Break. 

Over all, yep they are totally worth their $2.25AUD price tag and are a great addition to my nearly complete set of Ulta3 polishes.

If anyone wants comparisons swatches just let me know what you want to see.