NYC Expert Last : 165 Carrie'd Away

Things have been a little quiet here at Glitter Mountain : I had some offline drama to deal with and it took me away from the computer (and from polishing my nails) for a while. Sorry about that; I'm back now!

Today I'd like to share a new-to-me brand: New York Color, or NYC. This brand has been around for ages, but it's only recently that I managed to find a shop that stocked it - and how excited was I to discover their polishes are all as cheap as chips, yet there were some really nice colours amongst them! My nails were a bit stained at the time, which made it hard to go 'bare', yet I knew I wouldn't have time to look after my nails much for a while, especially anything that takes as long as buffing out stains. What to do?

Enter NYC Expert Last, in Carrie'd Away. 

This pretty shell pink/nude colour was supposed to cost the princely sum of £2.48, hardly bank breaking in the first place, but I got it on special offer so it worked out about £2. I wasn't expecting too much from anything that cheap, but when I got home and tried it out, I was amazed! 

Firstly, the bottle and brush. I wasn't too keen on the shape - the top is bigger than the bottom, which made it look a bit odd and wasn't too comfortable to hold, but it wasn't unbearable. The brush was reasonable: nothing fancy about it, but nothing unpleasant either. It held the right amount of polish, didn't splay too much, wasn't too stiff etc. It did the job it was meant to do.

Secondly, the formula. This polish is very sheer: don't come calling at Carrie'd Away's door if you're not a fan of seeing your nail line, but I don't count that as a bad point since this is the kind of colour where you're supposed to have VNL. It's like a french mani, but more subtle, without the full on white tips. (It'd also make a great polish for an actual french manicure; just add white tips and you're away!). Pictured here are three coats over nail envy:

I like the colour a lot; it's close enough to my skin tone to look nice and clean, not too pink, not too peachy, and I can see me using it a lot as a palate cleanser as well as for when I want that bare nail look without actually having bare nails. 

Since it's sheer, it also tends to be a little runny; watch how much you're loading on the brush or you'll flood your cuticles, but as long as you use a moderate amount and aim for thin coats, it's not a big deal. Drying time isn't bad, and as you can see it dries nice and glossy (this picture was before topcoat). 

The real surprise for me with this polish was how long it lasted. I kid you not; it stayed completely free from any signs of chipping OR tip wear for a whole week!! SEVEN DAYS! In the end I had to take it off because it started lifting around the cuticles (out of sheer old age!), but still not a single chip or flaw on the tips. I'd used a coat of Orly Sec'n'Dry as topcoat, but I use that for almost all my manicures and whilst I'll admit it does make things last longer, I work in a job that requires a LOT of typing and even with the Sec'n'Dry, the only time I've achieved more than a couple of days without at least a bit of tipwear was with Essie Bordeaux. For a polish that costs so little, I find this utterly amazing; I'm excited now to try the other colours I picked up along with this one!