Review: Julie G Frosted Gum Drops Collection (plus a tale of trivial tragedy and triumph)

Hello!

Today I have the new Julie G Gum Drops textured collection to show you. But first…I must share with you the sad, tragic news of my first nail mail fail.

I’m sure we’ve all been there…a package of polish we’ve been waiting for desperately finally shows up, but has that smell—the one that makes our blood run cold in our veins. That smell…the one that tells us the polish is now outside of the bottle, and not inside where it belongs. ‘How many bottles are broken?’ we wonder. ‘Maybe it’s only one!’ we hope, and we hesitantly open the box with our hearts in our throats and our pulse racing while we survey the scene of the mass polish-cide.

In my case, 4 of my 6 bottles of polish were smashed. One of them was only really cracked a bit, and I could keep the bottle intact. But the other three…::sobs::

Luckily for me, the polish had only begun to leak. In the case of one of the bottles, I was able to save pretty much the whole bottle. In the other two, I was able to decant about half of Sugar Rush into another bottle, and about 1/3 of Tangerine Dreams. Thank goodness I’ve been saving empties for frankening purposes! And of course, as luck would have it…Sugar Rush and Tangerine Dreams are the only two colors in the collection I’m really crazy about. Ah, well, c’est la vie, right?

I should mention that Groupon refunded the full order within 24 hours. Their customer service was great, and I’ll happily order through them again. But sadly they couldn’t send out another shipment, which was what I really wanted, because the deals are only good for a certain amount of time. My Rite Aid tends to not carry the new Julie Gs for ages and ages, and of course they’re $5 each there, as opposed to just over $2 each through the Groupon deal.  But this is a minor issue—at the end of the day, when I do manage to get my hands on another bottle of Sugar Rush and Tangerine dreams, I will still have paid a little less than the Groupon price anyway, to end up with a full set. So it works out in the end. Nail mail fail averted. :)

But enough about my nail misadventures! On to the polish!!

This collection has two types of textured polishes. Half of the collection has glitter added to the textured polish, and half doesn’t. In terms of bling quotient, the ones that don’t have the glitter come in somewhere between the Milani textured collection and the Zoya Pixie polishes—they aren’t quite as sparkly as the Pixies, but they have more flash than the ‘plain’ textured polishes. The ones that have the glitter—green ghostly goose gams on a stick, they are BLINGY. They approach the China Glaze Prismatic collection in terms of glitziness, imo. So let’s take a look at them first.

Here's Rock Candy, a concoction of light green-blue with silver glitter:

Julie G Rock Candy artificial light

Julie G Rock Candy direct sunlight

All pictures are two coats, with no topcoat. All of these applied very easily; I’m starting to really love that about textured polishes, they all seem to practically apply themselves. This was the first one of these I tried on, and it packed a punch, for sure. The best way to describe these is that if they were red, they’d look like sequined ruby slippers; if that’s what you like in a polish, the three glitters in this collection are definitely for you.

Next we have Blueberry Fizz, a medium blue that leans ever so slightly towards purple, also with silver glitter:

Julie G Blueberry Fizz, indirect sunlight

Julie G Blueberry Fizz, direct sunlight

Again, two coats, no topcoat. Another sequined-shoe-like wonder that will appeal to those of us polish fanatics that have glitter in our veins. :)

Then there’s Crushed Candy, a lilac polish with silver glitter:

Julie G Crushed Candy, indirect sunlight

Julie G Crushed Candy, artificial inside light

This is the last of the polishes with added glitter, and this will make you look makes your hands look like spring came to life in Las Vegas and then decided to dance on your fingertips. :)

Now we turn to the three polishes in the collection that don't have added glitter, they just have the frosted effect similar to the Zoya Pixies (but a bit different). Here we have Hot Cinnamon, a bright tomato red:

Julie G Hot Cinnamon inside artificial light

This is a pretty red that has a slightly faded look to it, and that sets it aside from other textured reds a bit, at least from what I've seen. I like this just fine, although it doesn't stun me like Sugar Rush and Tangerine Dreams.

I wanted to show you on one of the polishes the difference you see when you add topcoat:

Julie G Hot Cinnamon with topcoat

As you can see, a fair amount of the textured effect does come through, even with topcoat. Also, adding topcoat, at least Seche Vite, seems to brighten up the polish a bit and takes away the faded effect. So if you like the texture trend, but miss shine and durability, this line will work well with topcoat for you. :)

Next we have my absolute favorite of the collection, Sugar Rush! This is a stunning mix of reddish-orange and orangish-yellow, with the frosted texture finish:

Julie G Sugar Rush, indirect sunlight

Julie G Sugar Rush, indirect sunlight

Julie G Sugar Rush, direct sun

Julie G Sugar Rush, direct sun

Oh man oh man oh man. This is what the surface of the sun looks like in my dreams. I adore the blend of colors here and I wish more textured polishes were like this.

And to end our journey through Julie G, we have Tangerine Dreams, a yellowish-orange that is the most subtle of the collection, and none the worse for it:  

Julie G Tangerine Dreams, direct sun

Julie G Tangerine Dreams, indirect sun

I like the shade of orange they chose here, and I think the 'frost' adds to it nicely. It feels summery and bright, and makes me want and orange soda, lol. :)

A few final comments. As I already mentioned, application on these was beyond excellent. Removal, however, was another story, at least in the case of the glitters--they weren't as bad as an opaque glitter, but they were certainly a PITA. As for my thoughts about the whole collection, I think they did a good job covering a number of spring/summer colors in a small-ish collection, and I think the colors that have added glitter add something different from the other lines on the market. I personally don't care as much for the ones with the glitter, at least not on their own (yep that's a hint about a future post or two, hee hee), but people who love glitter will definitely love these, without question; it's only my own somewhat-conservative nature regarding glitter that makes me feel that way. I personally prefer the three without the glitter, with their more subtle frosty flash. :)

Thanks for stopping by--I hope this has helped you decided which one of these you want/need!

Hugs and love,
M.

(The polishes reviewed in this post were purchased with my own money.)