Review: Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear nail color in "Blue Me Away"

 

I picked up a Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Nail Color in "Blue Me Away" after being utterly entranced with this display last week.  This is a shade of blue unlike any other in my collection, and since I'm obsessed with blue nail colors at the moment, it just simply had to be mine.  The pic above, taken in full sunlight, is pretty darn close to the shade in real life.

Here's a pic taken in my living room (night time, indoor lighting):

Now as you can see, this color is pretty darn opaque. I used Orly Bonder as a base, two coats of "Blue Me Away" and a run-of-the-mill Revlon top coat.  I will tell you that the consistency of this polish is very thick. I'm not sure if it's the formula in general or just this particular shade.  After painting one nail, I had to stop and add a few drops of nail polish thinner to the bottle, but after that it worked like a charm. Honestly, I think every nail polish owner should invest in a bottle of thinner--it comes in so handy to revive old nail polishes that, ultimately, it pays for itself.  Anyway, back to "Blue Me Away."  I was able to achieve a totally opaque color with just two coats and I didn't experience any streaking, bubbling or clumping. One complaint I do have is that the brush holds A LOT of polish so you do have to wipe the brush a lot on the opening to get the amount you need for each nail.  But other than that, I am super pleased with this polish in terms of performance.  I was sort of expecting to see chipping after one day, but here are some pics of my nails after three days.

slight wear on the tip of one nail:

And as you can see in this pic, I got a serious chip on my pinky on day three, but I think that's due to a lot of keyboard usage because this seems to always happen on my pinky no matter what I'm wearing. 

Final Analysis: I would definitely purchase more of these Sally Hansen Extreme Wear Nail Colors.  The price, at just $3,  can't be beat for the selection of interesting colors offered. But if I didn't already own a bottle of nail polish thinner, I wouldn't do a manicure using this polish as-is.  It definitely needs to be thinned, but once you get it to the right consistency I think you'll be very pleased with the results.