OPI Liquid Sands in Vesper

Sand texture nail polish: THE current trend in nail polish. And it’s one which I finally like. The crackle trend was nice, but I didn’t really like it that much. Glitters, flakies, hologram nail polish: all great and dandy, but it still requires that extra top coat nice out of ten times. But liquid sands gives you the best of both worlds: a quick drying nail polish, with a glitter to it and an interesting texture.

Today I’d like to show you one sand texture nail polish from my collection: OPI Vesper from the James Bond collection, which was released earlier this year. I have several others (by OPI, Barry M and Essence), but this particular color to me, embodies what Liquid Sands polish is all about.

First, the color: Vesper is a deep, blackened purple with black glitter. In the bottle this polish looks like a cream, but you can feel grainy bits once you start using the brush. The color is mesmerizing and mysterious. Two thin layers will make it go purple (see my index finger), but go a little thicker and the color changes to an almost black (see my middle finger).

My second reason for liking this color more than the others is that I feel this combination: of a darker glitter in a slightly less dark base color works amazingly well. When I wore this on my nails last week, I couldn’t stop staring. The texture simply makes this color much more interesting to look at. These type of dark colors usually don’t show up nicely against my pale skin. OPI does several blackened reds and purples (Lincoln Park at Midnight, Midnights in Moscow, Every Month is Oktoberfest, etc) and even though they look nice when swatched, against my skin they all just look black. Such a pity. Yet, this does show up the way it should.

The only downside of these types of polishes is that they last about 3 minutes. I had several chips literally within a few hours. With a top coat the textured effect is eliminated, which defeats the purpose of using the polish, but it drastically affects the lasting power. No top coat does mean that it is easy to touch up as I simply took the polish and repaired the damage. I ended up having to take it off after two days.

I hope that OPI will soon come out with another interesting looking color. Or that any other brands come out with something worthwhile.

Do you have any sand textured nail polish? What is your opinion on them?