Sunday, May 24, 2015

Leesha's Lacquer - Minnesota Nice Collection

Today I have swatches of a new-to-me indie brand called Leesha's Lacquer. This is her Minnesota Nice collection. Of five polishes, there are two glitter toppers that can be built to opacity on their own, and three colored shimmer polishes with sparkle.

Being from the Midwest myself, I love seeing a collection inspired by my area of the country! Since these dry semi-matte for the most part, all of my swatches are shown with a coat of Seche Vite glossy topcoat.


Minneapple


Minneapple is a very shimmery (almost metallic) burnt red/burgundy sort of color that is full of small gold and wine colored glitters. Regardless of all the shimmer, it isn't really brushstrokey.


The first coat is a tad streaky, but the second coat covers completely. It dries quickly, and is a little on the thicker side, but not to the point where it is unmanageable. 



Minnesota Nice


Minnesota Nice is one of the glitter toppers in the collection. I've shown three coats alone, and one coat over Wet'n'Wild Club Havana on my thumb.


This one is packed full of yellow-gold micro glitters, with small gold hexes, small wine hexes, small matte pink hexes, some gold holo hexes, and very light, beautiful, small-sized lavender circle glitters. It has a lot going on, but it is a great mix! It actually makes me think Thanksgiving, especially over orange, red, yellow, or brown. I like it!


The formula wasn't too thick. It dried pretty quickly and to that typical gritty glitter finish sans topcoat.



Up North


Up North is a pretty pine green shimmer (again, leaning metallic) base with small gold hex glitters and micro gold holo hexes. This one had the thinnest formula of the bunch but was still opaque in an easy two coats.


Dry time was consistent - fairly quick. The first coat wasn't streaky or patchy, but this one was a bit brushstrokey. The glitter does a really good job of hiding the brushstrokes, so it isn't very noticeable.



Babe the Blue Ox


For my swatch, I've shown one dabbed coat of Babe the Blue Ox over Wet'n'Wild Putting on Airs, and three dabbed coats alone on my thumb.


This one was thicker than the others, and it dried slowest of the bunch - about average - I think because of my application. This polish needs to be dabbed on instead of brushed on like a normal polish, otherwise you just pull the glitters off. So my coats were thicker than a typical coat of polish would be. 

BtBO would be a good candidate for sponging if you wanted to wear it solo at full opacity. The sponge would soak up extra clear base polish and give a better, thinner payoff.




Land of 10,000


Last but not least, my favorite of the collection! I can't really say anything different about Land of 10,000 than I already have about Minneapple and Up North. It is a lot like the other two colored polishes: two coats, quick dry time, easy application, a touch thick but still a great consistency.


This one is in an amazing shimmery blue base (less metallicy than the other two) with a slight scattered holographic effect and light blue glitters swimming throughout. It looks like there may be a touch of iridescence in there too, but I'm not quite sure.

Aptly named, it is like a gorgeous, glittering, clear-water lake on your nails! I'm a sucker for the blue polishes and I absolutely love this one!



Leesha's Lacquer can be purchased in her Etsy shop. While you're there, I recommend Ice Cream Cones and Red Viper. I just ordered both and I can't wait for them to arrive because they look ridiculously adorable and pretty, respectively!

The Minnesota Nice collection is available for pre-order May 28th, 2015, and will be up for sale on June 4th.

I also created a live swatch video showing just how these polishes apply, which you can see on my YouTube channel here.

*Polishes sent free of charge for swatching purposes - all opinions remain my own and are uninfluenced.*