My Beauty Essentials - Fast & Fruity Nail Polish Remover

I'm thinking of making 'My Beauty Essentials' into a mini series, just so I can show you lovely lot some of the beauty products that I've been loving lately. First on the list is this Fast & Fruity nail polish remover, it's similar to this nail polish remover from Bourjois, which costs £4.99. I find that pretty steep for a nail polish remover - especially when this baby will do the job for only 85p!

Nail Polish Remover - Home Bargains

This product comes in a small tub with a sponge inside, there's a slit cut through the middle of the sponge to stick your finger in. All you have to do is twizzle your finger around a bit and voila, your nail polish is gone! I've found that this is much better than the traditional cotton wool method, the sponge is pretty abrasive so is really effective at removing polish. It's pretty good on glitter polish too, I find that it breaks it down much quicker than other nail polish removers. It's also acetone free so can be used on false nails.

The only downside to this is that it gets dirty quite quickly, if you wear a lot of dark coloured polish it'll need replacing pretty quickly, though as it's so cheap that doesn't really matter. It also absolutely stinks, this one is supposed to be peach flavoured but there is nothing peachy about it. It has me gagging and coughing if I leave it open too long - I wonder if the Bourjois version smells any better. Oh, and don't try and stick your toes in there - it doesn't work, this product is strictly for fingers only!

Speak soon. x

Barry M Croc Effects

According to Barry M Croc Effects is a 'stunning development following the best selling crackle range.' I was never a huge fan of the crackle polishes, although I did try them out. I just always thought they looked a bit tacky and a little bit like chipped nail polish rather than the intended crackle effect. I did find it fascinating watching the cracks appear though.

I'm always one to get excited over new beauty products though so I had to have a go of this. Everyone else seemed to have the same idea though - both the Boots stores I tried were sold out so I had to buy it online. I wasn't best pleased with this because I'm so impatient and wanted to try it out that very second.

It's a bit different from the crackle polishes in that you have to apply it over a coat of tacky nail polish rather than applying over completely dry polish. You also have to apply a really thin layer to get the best results. The cracks appear a lot more slowly than the original crackle polish but it was quite entertaining watching them appear (one of those 'wowwww, how do they do that' moments). It took about three minutes in all for the pattern to form.

I do like the pattern it creates but I still can't get over my issues with tacky crackle polish. I think that's because I used Barry M Bright Red as a base colour and I just don't like the black against red. I think it would look better over a gold perhaps or over neutral colours as that would give a more animalistic effect. I think I've got some experimenting to do.

A slide downside is that this seems to chip really easily, I've had it on my nails for about two hours and there's already a chip in my thumb. Maybe a top coat would've prevented that though. Another issue is that you have to get your application just right if you want the cracks to appear in the same way on all your nails. You can see on my middle finger in the photo that the cracks haven't appeared as nicely as they have on the other nails. Very annoying, especially for someone like me who likes her nails perfect.

I do much prefer this to the original crackle effects polishes and I hope they bring out a few more colours. Not the usual pinks and blues though, perhaps a dark brown or a grey. Something that will really bring out the animal effect because let's face it, you don't get pink crocodiles.

Speak soon x