Kleancolor recently released thirteen spring pastel shades. After seeing polishes come in the mail with names like “sexagon”, “twinkling cappuccino”, and “jailbait”, Mr. NB was beside himself with joy at how straight-forward this brand’s labeling department is.

In this collection there are six opaque shades and seven sheer shades.

Opaque:

Pastel Blue, a true baby blue that turns to pastel periwinkle under certain light.

Pastel Teal, a tropical water pastel blue.

Pastel Pink, a light carnation pink.

Pastel Orange, just like a creamsicle! (think Lime Crime’s “Cosmo-Pop” lipstick promo swatches)

Pastel Purple, a pretty straight forward true pastel purple.

Pastel Yellow, a beautiful buttery color.

Sheer shades: sheer pastel white, sheer pastel nude, sheer pastel pink, sheer pastel purple, sheer pastel brown, sheer pastel cocoa, sheer pastel gray. (Can you tell I’m not that excited for those?)

So today I have swatches of all six opaque shades!

Pastel Blue

3 Coats, 1 Coat Seche Vite Topcoat

“Pastel Blue” is on the thinner side of these six shades. I would give it a 4/10 on the streak scale, needing three coats to even it out. It offers average drying time and is one of the easier colors of this collection to work with. What I love about this color is it turns pastel periwinkle-sque under certain lighting conditions:

Pastel Teal

3 Coats “Pastel Teal”, 1 Coat Seche Vite Topcoat

In their bottles, I couldn’t see a very substantial difference between “Pastel Teal” and “Pastel Blue”. On the nail, the differences are certainly amplified. “Pastel Teal” is what I would describe as a tropical water blue, only pastel-ified. The formula was tricky and left much to be desired. It was pretty thick, lumpy and streaky. It also had the longest drying time of all the colors. I would give it a 6/10 on the streak scale, also needing three thicker coats to even out. However the color is gorgeous and one of my favorites in this lot.

Pastel Pink

3 Coats “Pastel Pink”, 1 Coat Seche Vite Topcoat

“Pastel Pink” is what I would describe as a light carnation pink. It is the sheerest color of the lot aside from orange, however it only needed three normal coats to turn fully opaque. All around average on the formula and a pretty self-explanatory color.

Pastel Orange

3 Coats “Pastel Orange”, 1 Coat Seche Vite

How many of you have seen Lime Crime’s promo swatches for their lipstick “Cosmo-Pop”?

From what I’ve heard this lipstick is not so much sherbet as it is macaroni-cheese-powder-orange, but that’s beside the point and I don’t know first hand. Kleancolor “Pastel Orange” is pretty close to what you would have expected from Cosmopop’s promo images; beautiful, summery, creamsicle, push-pop, delight. “Pastel Orange” was pretty easy to work with and all around average on the formula.

One interesting point to mention is this particular color’s smell. Kleancolor nail polishes in general are pretty notorious for olfactory searing (not literally, of course). They are much stronger than normal polish which actually doesn’t bother me as: A. They’re $1. B. The smell is only from the bottle, when the polish is still wet. C. Did I mention $1? D. They don’t name their polishes “under-age aardvark licker” and other misc un-puny nonsense.

This orange polish smelled…fruity. Super radioactive chemical soap fruit, mind-you, but fruitier none-the-less.

Pastel Purple

2 Coats “Pastel Purple”, 1 Coat Seche Vite Topcoat

“Pastel Purple” is a true light purple color. The formula is thin but not sheer. There were no problem with streaks and it’s ease of application I would put around a 3/10 (10 being the worst).

Pastel Yellow

3 Coats “Pastel Yellow”, 1 Coat Seche Vite Topcoat

“Pastel Yellow” is another of my favorites from the bunch. Everyone that knows me knows the color yellow and I have never got along. I don’t know, I just don’t “get it”. I even left it for last so I could frown at it while swatching all the others first. However it turned out to be a smooth butter color. Surprisingly easier to wear and more complementary than I anticipated. Yellows tend to be streakfests and this one wasn’t too bad. Using a light touch and minimal strokes, I found it to be pretty average as far as yellows go with the end product satisfactory.

Overall, I really like these polishes. I’ll be honest and let you know I’m also biased in that I really love pastel colors in general. I’ve found the trick to Kleancolor is using a light touch and as minimal brush strokes as possible. With these six colors in particular, I would strongly advise having a good fast-dry top coat on hand as well.

Kleancolor nail lacquer can be found online for literally $1 (including shipping) with formulas and color that can’t be beat for that price. I’ve read many reviews in which customers have stated “if it wasn’t for the smell, these would be on par with China Glaze formula/color wise”. I haven’t tried enough of them to make such a bold claim but I will say that I think it’s a fun brand and recommendable. Here is one link on Amazon where you can pick your own colors (I love when you can do that): KLEANCOLOR LACQUERS

What’s your favorite? Teal and Orange take the win for me.