Finally, I'm starting my Drugstore Beauty Series! I can't think of a better way than to showcase a super-cute collection of nail polishes, the Wet 'n' Wild "Craze" collection. To be honest, I really hadn't thought about getting any cheap drugstore polishes, but I did read a couple of reviews on these. And,
Scrangie blogged---in a review on this collection, actually---that people should not overlook the cheaper polishes; in some cases they could be better than some of the higher-priced polishes!! Well, I immediately resolved to open myself up to trying the cheap stuff.
Last weekend, as I was cruising through a CVS I don't normally go to, I happened to spot the Craze collection. The bottles are so cute! They are rather little, with a cute white-on-black paisley-ish design on the bottles. The colors are bright and seductive. And at $1.99, I began going through and scooping them up!! Who cares which colors I was most interested in, I got one of each. Unfortunately, one polish, "Rustic," was missing so I ended up with eight polishes: 2 metallic, 3 neon, 2 super dark, and one glitter. A great collection!!
Let's take a look at these, then I'll give my review. First, the metallics.
"Goldmine" is a bright, metallic gold, above and below:
"Shield" is more of an antique gold shimmery metallic:
"Lust" is a shimmery bright, hot pink:
"Inferno" is a bright, hot orange shimmer.
"Jade" is a bright, limey green shimmer.
"Morbid" is a dark, shimmery blacked teal.
"Noctural" is a dark navy blue creme. One coat worked for me, and it still showed as blue.
With a flash to show the blue color:
"Glitz" is a purple glitter. The glitter is small and fine and includes a healthy dose of shimmery silver glitter and some additional colors. Two coats made for an opaque covering, but I used three to make sure. The surface is pure glitter! Seeing whether I had total coverage was kind of hard because of the major twinkling of the glitter, which also made photographing the color of it really difficult. Removal of this glitter was also quite a challenge as well.
I didn't really know why these polishes were supposed to be anything special. I began trying them on and taking pictures for my blog (and my personal polish catalog). When I was on the third or fourth polish, I realized: they were applying really nicely! The formula was thin enough but not too sheer, easy to manipulate, and with not too much streaking. Two coats did an excellent job, even for the glitter.
I really liked the short brushes, as well. I found them very easy to manipulate. I find that China Glaze has a rather thin, runny formula sometimes, and the problem I have is with drips that run down the wand onto the brush. The Craze brushes do not have the wand, so all the polish is on the brush and no where else. All in all, these polishes are great! I would recommend them as dupes for these non-traditional shades that one may not want to shell out Essie or OPI (or higher!) prices for.
My rating: On a *5 point scale, I give this collection a Euridice YAY! 5 out of 5 points.
*1 = Euridice NO! 2 = Meh! 3 = Okay 4 = Quite good! 5 = Euridice YAY!
