My current week of quarantine has been: chaotic and indulgent. I’m fully losing it, you guys. I’m going bonkers with no end in sight for my strict no-humans policy, and I’m definitely over-indulging. Good food, good wine, and good nail polish (hello, Zoya Corinna)… nothing can stop me. I let myself take dumb, golden hour photos of my cat after the rain this week. My cat! For twenty minutes! (She didn’t love it.)
I wasn’t looking forward to trying the Zoya Splash Summer 2020 collection (this is Collection B, from Nail Polish Canada), but I said yes to a sample despite myself. Everything has been so bland recently—so repetitive. I finally figured, well, I haven’t reviewed a new nail polish in a couple of years. What could be the harm?
It turns out that the harm is that I left these polishes on a mirror after photographing them. When I woke up the next morning, the sun had come up through the kitchen windows, boiled one of the nail polishes, and burst it open.
Epic.
The Zoya Corinna review
All you really need to know here is that Corinna is fabulous. It’s exactly my style: sheer and sparkly. It bestows an air of professionalism with next-to-no effort, and even the shakiest, most arthritic hands can’t make it look any less than professional.
My gripe with nail polishes is that they’re often either messy or hard to apply. Darker shades stain your skin when you remove them, but creamy shades go on streaky. Corinna has neither of these problems. With a translucent base and just the right consistency, it’s thin enough that it settles without streaks, but thick enough that you really only need one coat.
And voila! Just like that, you’re ready to go. Zoya Corinna leaves your nails looking polished and glossy, with a wet-look sheen. I like it best over a grey polish—this is a discontinued one with a rubber finish from Trust Fund Beauty, but Zoya Tove (Satin) is a close match.
Peely Base
Animal Crossing summer nights in blue (Zoya Maren)
Quarantine has been so odd this past week that I’ve even come out of my shell in Animal Crossing. I spent all spring and the first half of summer in the same outfit (cropped t-shirt, grey slacks, beige fedora), but I came bursting out of my shell this week. There are, after all, no consequences under Canadian quarantine.
My avatar sprung out of its fedora, ready to take on the world, and I cycled through a few outfits (leather jacket, watermelon everything, and a Victorian gown) before finding my new one. It’s bright blue. Like, eye-searingly blue. A blue collared tee with blue pants, blue shoes, and a blue ribbon in my pigtails.
Luckily, there’s something in the Zoya Splash collection for that, too. It’s Zoya Maren, and I have a secret for you: it won’t stain if you never soak it off.
I added the Holo Taco Peely Base to my nail kit last winter, on the recommendation of Angela (an ex-beauty blogger that older readers may remember from Do Want Makeup). It’s phenomenal. Right now, a single bottle is about $35 CAD if you include shipping and duties, and I can’t even begin to tell you how worth it it is.
Imagine: a world where you never have to deal with stained nails ever again. You just have to use a different base coat, and either peel off your nail polish when you’re tired of it or wait for it to come off on its own.
Folks, the pandemic life may not be a dream, but this sure is.
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Disclaimer: The products mentioned in this post were sent in by Nail Polish Canada for editorial consideration.
