Collection 2000 Hot Looks - Spangles

I must apologise for not posting much recently; it's all been a bit manic here with the lead up to Christmas, mad shopping and trying to get work done so I can have 2 weeks off, and quite frankly, swatching hasn't happened much! I've painted my nails intending to photograph them, then life happened and by the time I had the opportunity to take pix, the polish was all chipped. Anyway, hopefully I can make up for it with the posts I've got lined up waiting for you :)

Today's polish isn't even slightly festive looking! I wanted to post lots of Christmassy swatches but nearly all my gorgeous festive polishes are the kind that my camera refuses to work with. So here, for your viewing pleasure, is a polish with a festive name but a very non festive appearance. Yuletide sparkle will have to wait until the new year (4 days til the new camera, people! I'm so excited I might burst!)

Spangles is one of Collection 2000's Hot Looks polishes, which means cheap and cheerful, quick drying, brightly coloured bottles with a teeny price that more than makes up for any other failings it might have. This one is a particularly bright shade of Acid/Lime/Shrek the Ogre Green (did anyone else expect it to be glittery with a name like Spangles? I know I did, but hey ho. Not the first time a polish was oddly named).

It applies a bit weirdly - I don't know if my bottle was just old, but it tended to be a bit gloopy and even stringy in places. Despite the gloop, it still needed three coats to be properly opaque due to its tendancy to dry patchy and show VNL. Drying time was average; not particularly fast despite its fast dry label, but not painful either. Once dry, it was actually pretty decent to wear - although in these pictures it looks a bit blobbed on and uneven, it actually looks much smoother in real life, and it wore well without chipping for two days.

Now, I know it kind of gives me red lobster hands (mmm, attractive), and maybe lime green isn't really my colour, but I actually quite like this polish. It's cheap and cheerful, a fun and unusual colour, and it makes me smile. It's not the best formula I've ever seen, but it's not terrible either and at the grand price of £1.79 you can't really complain!