Estessimo Tins - Swan Lake

This was 3 coats.

Estessimo Tins is a Japanese nail polish brand that is not actually sold locally (at least, at prices that are not exhorbitant) but I managed to get this one from a local blogshop and I am in love! So much so that I took way too many pics:







As I cannot read Japanese and I find their 'collections' very difficult to keep track of, I'm just going to be satisfied with saying that this is called Swan Lake. In my opinion, I think this would've made a way more epic official nail polish for the movie Black Swan than Zoya Bebe, which was more of a ballet leotard shade of light pink. I get the theme and all but come on, Black Swan was way not girly and feminine.

Swan Lake has a dark grey base, with some fine shimmer inside that really redefines my notion of 'duochrome'. It changes colour freakily. Though I would say the dominant shade is still a sort of dusty teal-blue, the purple hue it changes into at another angle is definitely not far behind. And when the light hits directly onto the nail, you really see this awesome bright teal colour, leaning almost towards green. And yet, all these awesome colours are muted and faded in its dark grey base, giving it a really ethereal feel.

I think I don't even need to explain why this polish would've made a better official polish for Black Swan. The now-you-see-it-now-you-don't shades of the polish, the soft, faded, dusty look and its graceful but possibly-sinister colours - everything spells out that movie.

And here it is with flash:





Doesn't it look completely different from the ones taken in artificial light?!

Anyway, it immediately reminded me of my other purple/blue duochrome, Orly Royal Velvet, so I pulled it out to compare...







2 coats of Orly Royal Velvet.

Obviously, they are worlds apart. Next to RV, Swan Lake looks dusty, antique, faded, sun-washed - ghostly, even. Not to mention, Royal Velvet's predominant colour is a royal deep rich purple, where that of Swan Lake is the teal-blue flash that I spoke about earlier. The colour is so much richer in Royal Velvet because that royal purple is its base, whereas in Swan Lake, the base is a dark grey as mentioned, and that really desaturates the colour a lot, but it suits the soft and ghostly feel of the polish, to me.

Another thing I have to point out is that while normally I would call Royal Velvet a duochrome, it looks nothing like it next to Swan Lake. Swan Lake's duochrome is so crazy that you can see both purple and blue at the same time, sometimes, and it almost makes you a little dizzy looking at it. I actually suspect that it's because your left eye sees blue and the right eye sees purple. What?! That is seriously crazy.

This is my very first Estessimo Tins polish. I bought it from Tammy's nail blog, and it cost S$15. The formula was good, although a little on the thin side since I required 3 coats to build it up, but no major problems.