LVX Winter Resort 2014

*press sample

Good morning, everyone!!  I hope your holidays have been wonderful so far.  I'm sitting here wishing I'd have requested today off to recover from all the Christmas festivities, lol.
So now that the Big Day is over and New Year's and the depths of winter are imminent, I feel like this new collection is highly appropriate-- it's LVX's Winter Resort 2014.  Winter Resort says complete luxury to me, speaking of those for whom "holiday" is a verb and December swimsuit shopping is necessity.  This collection is firmly grounded in the here and now, though-- it's a set of five deep and luxurious shades and one onyx-black texture that are easily taken from New Year's Eve through the chill of February and beyond.


First up is one that perfectly exemplifies that "beyond", and is on trend with Pantone's 2014 Color of the Year, Radiant Orchid.  This is Magenta, a warm, glowy, shimmery fuschia metallic.  It's a classic and not overly unique color, but the straightforward finish, rich monochromatic shimmer, red-toned warmth, and perfect formula made it a fast favorite of mine.  I used two coats plus one layer of topcoat.

Sappir is a cold, silvery dark cadet blue filled with the blue and fuschia shimmers present in inky blues like OPI Russian Navy and Zoya Neve.  Sappir is less saturated and more steely, more gemstone than ink and somehow more neutral.  It's fun to see a different take on the ubiquitous dark blue metallic.  Sappir's got an amazing formula, too-- I used two easy coats plus one layer of topcoat.

Avalon is gorgeous.  It's an ever-so-sightly dusty, very heavily copper-leaning mauve metallic with copper and aqua shimmers.  It's subtley glowy and singular in appearance.  I love how this one warms my skintone and because of the warm and cool balance of pigment, will look gorgeous on anyone, whether your skin pulls copper or mauve from it.  Another perfect formula-- I used two coats plus one layer of topcoat.

Graphite surprised me by not looking like much in the bottle-- it's a pretty basic (albeit on trend-- see Zoya Claudine and Cassedy) light-medium toned silvery pewter shimmer-- until you get it on the nail.  I love when the name of a polish perfectly matches the color, as is the case with Graphite.  If you were to color your nails in with your #2 pencil and topcoat it to make it glossy, this is what I imagine it would look like.  It's on the brushstrokey side which only adds to the pencil effect, in my opinion.  It's a cool and quite edgy way to wear metallic grey.  Perfect formula here, too (sensing a trend?)-- I used two coats plus one layer of topcoat.

LVX has also joined in on the textured trend with their own iteration, a satiny jet-black with gold microglitter woven throughout.  This is Caviar, a creme based polish with very fine textured bits.  It doesn't have that overly rough, dry, gritty feeling of the Zoya and OPI textures (so this won't bug those of us prone to battiness by the abrasive feel of the Pixiedusts and Liquid Sands).  It's more reminiscent of a fine glitter without the smoothing benefits of a topcoat.  The gold microglitters, which are quite noticeable in the bottle, are almost completely obscured by the texture as it dries-- they're that fine.  If you look closely at my photos, you can see a few peeking out and that is true to life.  Those glitters come out to play it you choose to topcoat Caviar, so it looks very much like Orly Androgynie, minus the colored hexes.  The big pluses to Caviar are its wear time, including tipwear, and how easy it is to remove.  The tiny textured bits that seem to hold the pigment in place also come off with remarkable ease.  It's the most user-friendly textured polish I've tried.  I used two coats. 

Last, but not least, is Scarlet, a stunning plum shimmer in a very dark grey base.  Scarlet is beautiful on, with a deep but subtle lit from within quality.  Two coats will get you full coverage, but three creates remarkable depth.  You see four coats here, and I'll get to that.  I've been spoiled by LVX, formula wise amongst other things, but Scarlet was thin and tricky, and I experienced a lot of pooling.  You'd do well to have your cleanup tools close at hand for this one, but that wasn't my biggest issue with this polish.  Topcoats seem to be fairly subjective but unless you're working with a super thick and quick drying formula like Seche Vite, you'll most likely experience reasonable cooperation between the nail color and topcoat.  I tried two different topcoats with Scarlet, one a glassy finish topper with a slower drying formula (Rica Glossy Glam) and the other, the lauded HK Girl Glisten & Glow.  I experienced shrinkage almost instantaneously with both, even as I wrapped my tips.  You see one very fresh coat of polish and topcoat over the three coats plus topcoat that I applied before bed the night before.  I suspect a thin topcoat like Out The Door might do the trick, as would foregoing topcoat altogether.  Dry time is minimal on these 5-free polishes and Scarlet is such a lovely color that it's worth it to find a way to make it work.

All in all, LVX Winter Resort 2014 is a luxurious, cohesive collection filled with easy to wear and surprisingly unique beauties and for the most part fantastic formulas.  These each retail for $16 for 15ml.  All six of these are gorgeous, but my top choices are easy-- Magenta, Avalon, and Graphite.

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Thank you for reading and have a lovely day ♥♥

*press sample