It’s blizzarding and snowing here the entire day as I swatched these, so I think it’s perfect for reviewing the last winter collection I had to talk about. WINTER FINALLY TRULY CAME TO CHICAGO. We’ve been in a cold snap, and all I’ve been saying if it’s going to be this cold, I want some snow to make it better. And it came true! We had big beautiful flakes just dropping on down and even as they pelted me in the face while I was waiting for the bus, it was just what I asked for. Call me nuts, but I love some snow for the winter.

Now, as I said with winter, I had one final winter collection to review!  (They’re already showing spring polishes and my god you have to be a season ahead to be on time). But it’s a WINTER REVIEW here!

This is the Essie collection for Winter 2018. And it’s of course a traditional 6 piece collection. I picked these up from transdesign.com. They had the best prices for Essies and their shipping is always so fast and well packed! Do recommend.

Now let’s get into the polishes!

There are 3 cream shades and then 3 shimmery/metallic shades. These also have the wide brushes that I talked about in the fall collection. It seems that every brand is switching over to wider brushes, and I for one am fully here for it. I even have skinnier nails, and it’s just so much easier to paint a smooth easy coat on with them.

I’m starting with the 3 shimmery ones first.

First up we have ‘Polar-izing’. This is a light shimmery baby pink, with a light green flash to it. This is one of those that with just 1 thinner coat, you get a more “perfected” nails look. But this builds up to fully opaque with an easy 2 coat formula. That 2nd coat also makes it brighter on the nails. As you can see, because of the shimmery formula, there are some brushstrokes, though they’re less noticeable because of the flash.

‘Glow with the Flow’ is a shimmery medium blue shade with a bright purple flash. This had a more sheer 1st coat, so it will definitely need more than 1 coat. Two coats got it built up easily though, and it was a smooth formula to work with.

‘Million Mile Hues’ might be my favorite of the bunch. This is a super bright, more yellow toned gold metallic shade. This can be built up in 1 easy thicker coat, or 2 thinner ones. It just absolutely glows on the nails and I so love it. There are microscopic green glitters throughout that are more noticeable in the bottle, but they’re lost (I do wish they were more apparent). But I still love this and its perfect for dreary winter weather.

Now onto the 3 creams!

‘Just the Way You Arctic’ is a gorgeous dusty lilac shade. This was almost opaque in 1 thicker coat. I did 2 thinner coats here. It’s a beautiful smooth formula and it’s so easy to control and paint on. So in love with the color and formula of this one.

‘Hear Me Aurora’ is a deep burgundy cream shade. I’m slowly coming over to the side of reds, and this one is helping me. I do love a good deep red cream shade. This had a thicker formula so it was opaque in 1 easy coat. It was easy to control, but because it was thicker, it could skip a little if there wasn’t enough on the brush. It’s thicker so you can load up the brush without it flooding the cuticles.

Last but not least is ‘Sights on Nightlights’. This is a super deep purple shade. It’s got just enough purple in it to keep it from looking like a straight black on the nails. This was pretty well opaque on 1 coat, though I did a 2nd to cover some last uneven patches I had. It’s very pigmented, so especially with the new wider brush it can get a little messy. I had to do some cleanup around my cuticles, and they were a little stained so you have to be more careful with this one. But it’s the sort of deep vampy shade I’m still loving for the winter.

And that’s the last Essie collection for 2018! This was full of beautiful easy formulas and I loved the more unique colors they put out for a winter collection. Especially with their new wider brush, I’ve been loving their polishes – they’re so easy to paint on the nails. Did you see any colors here that you liked?

 

Can’t wait to see what 2019 has in store for us polish wise.

Even though I’ve been loving deep vampy shades still, I can’t wait to get into the spring collections and pastels. As I said, they’re already being released and advertised, so I gotta get into them soon!

And as always, stay tuned for lots of reviews coming your way. I’ve really been into single shadows lately, so how would you feel about a “Single Shadows Week”? – a week of posts about singles I’ve picked up from different companies along the way. I’ve been loving playing with them, and I would love to talk about my favorites and misses from each one.

I’ve also been posting some of my untried Zoya shades on my Instagram for #ZoyaJanuary! I’ll do a round up of all the shades I wore this month at the end as well. Lots of things coming up!

 

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