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Wednesday 11 July 2012

Mystical Flying Dragon


Claire's - Mystical (1 coat)
China Glaze - Flying Dragon (3 coats)
Seche Vite, Essie - Grow Stronger

I decided to start using a rating scale for better comparison when I'm trying to review polishes. I think most of it is pretty self explanatory except maybe color quality. Color quality I admit is somewhat subjective and is basically how stunning I think the color is, combined with how unique the color is.

Claire's - Mystical: 8/10

Color quality: 8/10 Blue and purple microglitter in a clear base. Very pretty but not entirely unique. Reminded me of Sinful Colors - Frenzy which I haven't been able to find although Mystical is more purple (I would say 70:30 purple:blue ratio) whereas Frenzy looks more blue.  
Application: 9/10 
The clear, gel type base is a little thick, but is very easy to work with and spreads out well. Brush is medium width and rounded and fans out nicely for good coverage. It wasn't very gritty and was smooth with one coat of Seche Vite.
Pigmentation: 8/10
Covers your entire nail in microglitter in one coat. Definitely not a sparse glitter. Delivers a lot of impact with one coat.
Wear Time: 7/10 
I wasn't sure how to rate the wear time on this polish. I had a major chip on my right thumb after 2 days, much faster than when I just wore the base of China Glaze - Flying Dragon on its own. However after 6 days (I was lazy) my other 9 nails were still fine, with very minimal tip wear (by that time half the polish on my thumb had come off). I did change my base coat though from OPI Nail Envy to Essie Grow Stronger so not sure if that had an effect with my thumb chipping.
Value: 9/10
Price is $5 CAD but they're usually buy 1 get the second half price so it's really $3.75 as long as you buy 2 ($5.00 + $2.50 = $7.50 / 2 = $3.75). These Claire's polishes are probably the cheapest polishes I have and I was really impressed by this. Maybe I was just wasn't expecting much. The only flaw I found with it was the wear time but for $3.75 I'll still consider it a good deal.



China Glaze - Flying Dragon (neon) 7/10

Application: 7/10
I really like China Glaze's slim brush which allows for good control. The formula on this polish was really strange. The polish would look smooth when it went on, but then it would shrink as it dried and become lumpy. The way it behaved was very similar to crackle/shatter polishes although to a lesser extent. On the plus side it dried ridiculously fast. It dries matte so you can tell really easily when it's dried. It would be completely dry by the time I was 2 nails down so that's probably around 20 seconds. I would have only given it a 3 for application if it didn't dry so fast.
Pigmentation: 9/10
Very pigmented. Probably could get away with only one coat if it didn't shrink as it dried.
Longevity: 8/10
4 days before any chips, only minor tip wear
Color Quality: 6/10
Looking at the bottle, I was expecting a more vivid, interesting color. A grape purple with magenta and blue micro glitter. The micro glitter wasn't very visible on the nail which was disappointing. Not a very unique color either.
Value: 7/10
Retails for $8 but I've heard you can get it for $4 online (if you know where, please let me know!). I bought mine at Sally's for $8 but it was buy 2 get 1 free so $5.33 (8x2=16/3=5.33). I wasn't really that impressed with this polish with the shrinking issue, and the glitter that is not very visible yet makes the polish difficult to remove (as all glitter does). The main selling point of this polish is the incredible drying time which allows for a quickie mani. Although the color isn't very interesting or unique, I'll probably use it regularly as a base color because of its incredible drying time. You can safely layer it under other polishes without worrying about getting dents because the middle layers aren't dry. 

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