Trending Nail Color

Layla Hologram Effect Holographic Nail Polish JADE GROOVE Swatches & Review

by maureen · Published April 17, 2012 · Updated January 14, 2018

Today I am so, so very excited to present swatches of another Layla Hologram Effect Nail Polish. This time in 05 JADE GROOVE!

(I’ll also follow this up with a post comparing Jade Groove to another Layla holographic nail polish “Mercury Twilight”)

Are you asking yourself why the Asian theme? Because this is Nailblog, where anything goes. And I can.

Follow the jump for swatches…oh so many swatches..

Jade Groove

Renamed by yours truly. I know I’m not the only one who has far too many associations with the word “groove” to ever take it seriously. For me, “groove” conjures up thoughts involving bad late night tv sitcoms about hip young women’s dating and feminist dilemmas. Or the obvious movie. Or the other obvious llama movie.

But simply the word Jade? *angels singing* Jade is emperors, the most gorgeous of milky stones, geisha, ginger root, metaphysical properties and stories involving Kwaidan (Japanese ghost stories) and Yokai monsters. …and Big Trouble in Little China.

Model’s Own has their “Beetlejuice” line (which many argue is or is not related to the movie) so I take this moment to IMPLORE a lacquer company out there to release polishes related to Big Trouble in Little China. We need the Lopan collection!

The work of Patt Whelan. Can be purchased here: http://www.PattWhelan.etsy.com

Hah, I had to.

ON TO THE SWATCHES!

Full sun:

WITH FLASH:

OMG THOSE RAINBOWS

NO direct nor bright light sources:

Without any direct and bright light, holographic polishes turn into muted base colors (as in the above picture). Jade groove turns into a greyish, muted, flat silver.

All swatches used 5-6 thin coats of polish with no topcoat. BUT WAIT! It’s not as bad as it sounds. Layla Hologram polishes are not like most lacquers.

They dry extremely quickly. Paint one nail after the other and when you reach the end you can already go back and make another round.

They are extremely thin. It does feel thick nor appear thick, in fact the opposite. This is one reason why many holographic lacquers amplify imperfections:

You can see how it highlights some peeling I’ve been experiencing on my index finger. Normally just one coat of regular polish would hide this.

Due to a number of reasons, including the fact these polishes don’t provide any additional strength to the nail, these lacquers are what I consider special-event colors. They don’t last very long, a couple days at most, before peeling and tip wear begin (the thinness of the formula prevents them from chipping).

A little excerpt from my previous review:

This polish literally steals the sunlight, beams it into some futuristic loading dock, little hob-goblins re-forge it, and then they shoot it back at you in prisms of lucid liquid rainbows. This is the stuff Lisa Frank stickers and trapper keeper binders dream of.

While not a US based polish (Italy); fear not, fellow US residents! For I bring to you..the INTERNET!
I have seen several venues offering this polish including Ebay and Amazon along with websites such as aveyou.com. Ulta will have them in-store come May although several locations have stocked them early. They can also be found on the Ulta.com website.

If you can’t wait that long or (like most people) are finding them to be sold out, they are still available on Amazon: HERE

Layla Cosmetics sells a two sided OEM Buffer along with the polishes. This buffer is intended to be used underneath and I have even seen many refer to it as “required”.

Side one of the buffer is to be used to buff away ridges. Side two of the buffer is used to “shine” your nail. I do not find the buffer to be necessary. For these swatches I did NOT use the buffer.

Another hot topic involving holographic polish is cuticle drag and balding resulting in the assistance of a base coat. Personally, I have found base coat results to be entirely negligible and do not use them. The only time I have experienced any drag or bald spots is when I am trying to do a coat over a previous one which wasn’t allowed to dry fully. So I consider that to not be a holographic polish problem but one which occurs with all polishes.