Chimera Swatches & Review

Recently I was given the opportunity to try a higher end polish brand from Australia called Chimera, www.chimeracc.com.

As stated from the Company:
Chimera was established in 2008 and was launched to to compete with labels in the Australian market as well as the international stage. This company boasts over 130 colours and offers pearls, neons and glitters.

SO WHAT IS SO GOOD ABOUT OUR NAIL POLISH?
• POLISH - All our nail lacquer is hand mixed in small batches to reduce waste and help maintain the polish integrity. The pigments are high-grade powders, dyes and liquids sourced from all the world's largest providers of these products.

• BOTTLES - Like our base materials, are of the highest quality glass available internationally.

• CAPS - Soft rubbery material that is easy to grip and comfortable to hold.

• BRUSHES - Are of a finer filament than stock brushes used in most polishes. This allows our range to benefit from a 330 strand configuration (vs a standard 220 strand) which means a softer, more luxurious feel for you during application.

• AGITATOR BALLS - We only use high-grade, polished stainless steel. Each bottle now contains 2 agitator balls as standard. You expect polish to last (if kept properly) for years - why shouldn't that bottle of polish still deliver years from now? Better still, stainless steel means absolutely no risk of rusting to spoil the polish.



First up is my fav of the bunch, Number 122, a super cool metallic Brown with loads of silver glitter shimmer. This is a unique color to me and the only type of it in my collection, so I was super rapt to have this one. This was a super gluggy formula and definately needs a few drops of thinner, but on the upside of this glugginess, it only took one coat for complete opaque-ness.



Number 6. An in ya face super neon yellow. This was 2 coats with no white base coat! Lookee at that color!



Number 113, a Burgundy with bronze shimmer. Again, this was only a 1 coater. A nice color but not unique.



Number 125. A metallic light blue. This was my second fave as I didn't have a color like this also before. Opaque in 1 coat and super sparkly in the sun...wonderful.



Number 130. Bright red with massive amounts of gold shimmer and shine. This is absolutely beautiful in the bottle and on the nails the golden shimmer is noticeable...just not in the pictures. This is an almost exact shade to Ulta3 English Rose.



Number 33. A bright Fuschia Pink. This is not a unique color, BUT it was opaque in 1 coat and had a terrific glossy finish when dry, unlike other branded bright pinks which tend to dry semi-matte.



Number 4. Burgundy shimmer and my bottom fav on the list! It's nice but you could find one similar in every brand. Again this was 1 coat.

Chimera Fast dry Top Coat. This is exciting for me as I have been trialling this for several days and I think I'm in love with it. It's a little hard to explain what makes this formula different but I'll try! It dries as quick as Seche QD, and is wonderfully thin and once dried it looks like a normal topcoat. But when you go to remove it, you really have to move those fingers to wipe this off. It's like it gives the nail a coating of gel. Clear as mud?
Usually my manicures have tip wear within hours, depending on brand, but after using Chimera, tip wear was non existent and NOTHING chipped after 3 days. There was also no shrinkage like Seche QD is famous for. I will be interested to see how this forumla goes after a few months and see if it thickens up, so I will keep you posted.

My take on this polish. As you have read, most of these swatches were 1 coaters. To me it's almost impossible to find a 1 coater polish, let alone swatch 7 of one brand to find nearly ALL are 1 coaters. Some of the colors were unique, others were not. The retail price on these is $14.95 AUD which is at the higher end of the polish scale for us Aussies, but they have regular specials and discounts. 15ml in each bottle so you get a nice amount for your $. You can also join to their Newsletter and Facebook page for exclusive discounts. IMO, their formula and certainly their topcoat is worth $14.95.

The website is also interactive with a 'PlayTime' button up the top. Here you can change your skintone then try on the polishes to see the color up close. Going on my bottles and the website pics, they are pretty close to each other. The bottle pics can also be seen in superbig sizes and then a Zoom feature as well which is fantastic, and a welcome change to the normal sample pics the size of a 5c coin!