Getting packages delivered is always a pain. I work late so I’m rarely up when things get delivered, and then I have to bolt awake and rush to get to the door. If I don’t make it before the mail person leaves I have to wait at least a day and then travel to the nearest post office outlet (a 20 minute walk). Today I literally fell out of bed in my rush to get to the door, which was hilarious. But it doesn’t matter because I made it to the door today and you know what was waiting for me? My July Julep Maven Box! Yaaaaaaay!
This is my first real month as a Maven, so I got to do the whole choosing-the-box thing at the end of last month which was fun. I stuck with the It Girl Box because none of the other colours jumped out to me and I didn’t really want the body oil. Plus the It Girl Box had a textured polish, and as we all know that’s one of my current obsessions. 🙂
So this month, this is what I first saw when I opened the box…
The theme for this month was The California Coast, and I think all the colours in the box generally fit with that theme. The back of the big card has haikus for each polish colour (cute!) and the small card has a quote. This quote doesn’t 100% speak to me but I’m still planning to put it up in my cubby at work.
Under that was my ‘extra gift’ for the month which was a 40 sheet package of Green Tea Facial Blotting Papers. Awesome! I tried them and they work as well as expected (aka good) and smell AMAZINGGG ohmygosh.
And under that we finally we get to the polish! The sun wasn’t playing nice today so these are all from my lightbox. It’s a shame because it means you can’t see the full spectrum for the duochromes. Oh well…
Tracy
Tracy is described as a sparkly ocean blue sea salt, and I loved it from the moment I saw it in the box. It’s a full-coverage textured micro glitter polish with flashes of purple and green, and it’s gorgeous! The texture is very fine and I think if you put a single coat of topcoat on top you wouldn’t even know it had ever been a textured coat. Pictured is three coats, but it’d be fine with two.
Angela
Angela is described as a deep sea blue molten with a chrome finish. It’s a lovely deep turquoise duochrome polish with flashes of deep purple, brown and blue in the right light. This applied like a dream, and what you see here is two coats without topcoat.
Nadia
Nadia is described as sun-kissed golden frost. It’s a yolk-y yellow with a healthy dose of gold shimmer. I like that the base colour and the shimmer are so similar in colour that even though you easily notice the sparkle it’s still subtle. Pictured here is 4 coats (!!!) with no topcoat, and you can still see a bit of visible nail line – if you’re gonna use this I would suggest a basecoat of solid white first. I don’t hate this colour, but it doesn’t go with my skin tone and it did weird things to my camera colouring. Might look cute with short nails, though.
Blakely
Blakely was the only add-on I decided on for this month, and to be honest I kind of regret it. It doesn’t look as nice in person as it did online, and I feel like I already own a similar colour. It’s described on the site as a purple and green molten with a chrome finish and was from the Bombshell Box. At the right angle you can pick up the duochrome sheen of dull silver and purple and green and even though it isn’t my cup of tea it applied really well. Pictured is two coats without topcoat.
In motion and in these pictures Blakely and Angela look completely different from each other, but in the right light they seem kind of interchangeable. :/ I wish I’d been able to capture what I’m talking about in these pics. I mean, in general you can tell that Blakely is more purple/green where Angela is turquoise, but you can’t tell that from looking at them head-on irl. Just a warning for anyone thinking of future purchases.
I think my overall favourites are Angela and Tracy. Nadia and Blakely aren’t terrible, but I could’ve done without them. What do you think? Any of these colours that you just need to own?
Thanks for visiting!! xx