Review & Swatches: Pure Ice Nail Colors

The products featured in this post were provided to Nouveau Cheap by the brand. For my full disclosure, please see the bottom of this blog post.

Recently I received some older and new-for-2013 shades from Pure Ice for review. Today I'd like to show you swatches of all seven shades I received, plus my thoughts about each color. 

For those of you unfamiliar with Pure Ice, these polishes are made by the company Bari (recently purchased by Revlon). Their formulas are Big Three Free and not tested on animals (per their website). You can purchase Pure Ice polishes here and they retail for $1.99 each. You can also purchase Pure Ice in stores like Walmart and select Walgreens locations.

Let's take a look some swatches...

(no top coat was used for any of the following swatches)

Bikini (NEW)

Bikini is a lovely sky blue creme with a touch of periwinkle. This shade required three coats for perfect opacity, which is what you see above. The formula is thin and a bit watery, but very easy to work with. I adore colors like this, so I'm pretty biased--I just gravitate toward pastel blues.

Feisty (NEW)

Feisty is a lovely pinky-magenta-rose creme. This is practically a one-coater with a lovely consistency. I applied two coats for what you see above.

Home Run

I believe that Home Run came out in Summer 2012. This is a mint green creme and unlike many pastel mints in my collection, this one only required two coats for perfect opacity. The formula is a bit thin but, again, very easy to work with.

Kissy Kiss (NEW)

Kissy Kiss is my favorite of the bunch. This is a gorgeous cornflower blue jelly-creme (aka "crelly"). It's got that squishy look to it that I adore, and the color is a true cornflower (it doesn't veer into purple). Once again, this one has a thin, watery formula, but it is surprisingly opaque after two coats (I applied three for the pic above). Stunning. 

Note: all of the cremes above are now available for purchase on the Pure Ice website.

And now, on to the glitters...

Never Satisfied, Over You, Sexy Mama

Never Satisfied (NEW)

Never Satisfied (NEW)

One coat over Bikini

Never Satisfied is a pretty mix of small teal hex glitter and chunky gold and pink hex glitter in a clear base. The glitter applied pretty evenly and I only needed to use my brush a few times to move a few bits of glitter around for more even coverage. This is a new release for 2013 but it's not available for purchase (yet) on the Pure Ice website. I have heard that it's been spotted in-store at Walmart though.

Over You (NEW)

Over You (NEW)

One coat over Feisty

There is just no way that I could capture what this polish looks like in real life. From a normal viewing distance, the dominant color is teal, and there's so much glitter here that it almost creates a foil-like effect on the nail. It's absolutely stunning and not nearly as busy-looking in real life as it appears in extreme close-up. This polish consists of glitter that flashes blue and teal. In addition to blue/teal chunky hex glitter, there is also blue/teal bar glitter and smaller blue/teal hex glitter. And if that's not enough, there is also fine pink hex glitter here (which you can't really see in my swatch because I applied this polish over a pink base coat).  This was a very easy glitter to apply--so much glitter adheres to the brush when you pull it out of the bottle (no need to go fishin' for it!) and it applies quite evenly to the nail. I'm betting you could get full coverage if you used two coats (that would be super blingy).  This is a new release for 2013 but it's not available for purchase (yet) on the Pure Ice website. I have heard that it's been spotted in-store at Walmart though.

Sexy Mama

Sexy Mama 

One coat over Home Run

Sexy Mama was part of the Runway Trends Collection from Fall 2012. You might still be able to find it in-store at Walmart, but it's not available for purchase online. This is a pretty standard multi-colored chunky hex glitter polish, with smaller silver hex glitter and fine silver glitter. I stumbled across a gorgeous manicure using this polish here (I never thought to use a mate top coat over this type of glitter polish but now I can't wait to try it). I only needed one coat for what you see above, but the clear base is a bit thick, so I did need to fish for glitter and dab the glitter on strategically with my brush.

Again, you can find the creme shades featured in this post on the Pure Ice website, and I believe they're also now at Walmart stores. For the glitters, Never Satisfied and Over You are not yet available online, but I have been told they're starting to show up at Walmart. Sexy Mama was a Limited Edition shade that you still might be able to find in random Walmart locations.

FINAL VERDICT: Overall, I'm very happy with all of the shades that I received for review. I didn't have any problems or issues with application for any of these polishes and they all had decent dry times as well. The stand-outs for me are Kissy Kiss (cornflower blue crelly) and Over You (teal and pink glitter bomb). If you could only purchase two of these polishes, I would definitely suggest those two.

Do you own any Pure Ice Polishes? What are some of your favorite shades? 

A sample of this product was given to Nouveau Cheap for editorial purposes, either directly from the manufacturer or from the agency that works on behalf of the manufacturer. All reviews on NouveauCheap.blogspot.com are the honest opinion of its author and editorial samples do not, in any way, affect the outcome of product reviews.