1.10.13

Shades of Phoenix Dia de Muertos Halloween Trio: swatches & review


The lovely Teneil from Aussie indie brand Shades of Phoenix has been kind enough to send me her new Halloween polishes for review. These are my first Shades of Phoenix polishes and they certainly won’t be my last!

Click the link below for HEAPS of swatch photos and review!




Full size Shades of Phoenix bottles now come in cute little boxes! I love these, they really make the polishes extra special.


This Halloween trio has been inspired by Dia de Muertos (Day of the Dead), aka Mexican Halloween. These three jellies are named after different aspects of this holiday that celebrates the life of those who have died.

The formula for all of these polishes were of good consistency but the glitters were a little sinky so I would recommend inverting the bottles 20 mins before use so that you get a great glitter payoff!


First up is Mictlan! Mictlan is named for the underworld of Aztec mythology.


It has a lovely deep purple/blue jelly base and is filled with blue iridescent micro hex; violet dots; and yellow, blue & red squares & hex.
For my swatches, I used three coats of Mictlan on its own (no need for undies!). If you have shorter nails than me, you would probably only need two coats.









Next is Calaca! A Calaca is a colloquial Mexican term for skeleton. During Dia de Muertos, the Calaca are depicted as joyous and festive and represent happiness in the afterlife.


Calaca is a Limited Edition burnt orange jelly that is packed with multicoloured hex, tiny orange hex and large holo rose circles. Large circle glitters are notorious for refusing to stay on the brush and it can be really difficult to get them on to your nail! To combat this, Teneil has come up with the great idea of including a little bag of extra glitter!


Make sure you open the bag before you start painting your nails! I learnt that lesson the hard way... 
To apply these, I used a small brush dampened with water to pick up the glitter and place it on the nail between coats. 

For my swatches, I used three coats of Calaca over a white base to show how bright this polish can go! You can also wear it over an orange, red or black base and get a totally different looking polish!







Finally, we have Catrina. Catrina is named after La Calavera Catrina, an iconic female hat-wearing skull that has come to represent Dia de Muertos.


Catrina is a lime green jelly filled with fluro green, emerald, light green, and aqua hex in different sizes as well as some light green squares. As with Calaca, this jelly is designed to be worn over a base colour. You could use black, green or white and end up with completely different looks. 

For my swatches, I used three coats of Catrina over white. You really only need two coats but I wanted to build up the glitter. 






I love how bright it is! The photos don't show it well but it was so bright it was practically glowing! Congrats to Teneil for creating a green that I actually like haha.

The Shades of Phoenix Halloween Trio is available NOW for Aussie ladies from the Shades of Phoenix etsy store. They can be purchased individually for $9.50 for a 12ml bottle or you can buy the whole set for $25 (bargain!). The set will also be available later this week for those outside Australia from Mei Mei's Signatures.

Product provided for my honest review. Read my Disclosure Policy for full details
Caitlin, xo


1 comments:

Jade Carver said...

Mictlan is calling my name. Such a sucker for green and purple - especially together!

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