China Glaze Tranzitions Collection for Spring 2013 Review, Photos & Swatches

The China Glaze Tranzitions Collection for Spring 2013 includes six China Glaze Nail Lacquers ($7 USD / $8 CAD) that are a different formula from their regular nail lacquer. These polishes change color when a clear top coat is applied (China Glaze recommends their own top coat, but any will do). This limited edition collection will be available in January, 2013.

I was very intrigued by the collection at first- I thought it was such a cool, creative idea! Who wouldn’t want to play around with their nail polishes and get different colors when using a top coat… in particular I thought a monochromatic French manicure would look awesome, but other types of nail art would be easy and fun to do.

Well I was wrong. So wrong!

China Glaze Nail Lacquers in (L-R): Altered Reality, Split Perso-Nail-ity & Shape Shifter

China Glaze Nail Lacquers in (L-R): Duplicity, Metallic Metamorphosis & Modify Me

The shades include…

• Altered Reality: A metallic, mid-tone teal blue that changes to a deep teal with a top coat. The change is barely noticeable.
• Split Perso-Nail-ity: A mid-tone rose cream that changes to a deep, grape purple with a top coat. This one did have quite a contrast in shades, however the texture was unbearable.
• Shape Shifter: A dark, metallic purple that changes into a deep navy blue with a top coat. The change is the most noticeable of the shimmery polishes, but still hardly at that.
• Duplicity: A beautiful, light mint cream that changes into a deep green with a top coat- possibly the best out of the collection (but that isn’t saying much).
• Metallic Metamorphosis: A charcoal grey shimmer that turns into a slightly darker charcoal shade. The change is barely noticeable, probably since the polish is so dark to begin with.
• Modify Me: An aqua blue cream that changes into a deep indigo shade with a top coat. A nice contrast.

I believe this is the first time that I am completely unimpressed with an entire China Glaze collection (…or completely unimpressed with any nail polish collection for that matter). I get the concept- it’s cool, fun and playful… but it just doesn’t work.

The first problem, is that if you want a duo-toned effect, you can only put a top coat on part of the nail (or else the whole thing will change)- that decreases the strength and wear of your nail polish to begin with. It would have made more sense for there to be a “magic pen” or something of the sort that changed the color, but still allowed something as essential to a long-lasting manicure as a top coat to be used without a problem.

The next issue, is that when using the top coat, it almost melts the nail polish. It took me about 2 hours to swatch these 6 polishes, because I had to re-do almost all of them at least a couple times. You can see marks of thinning polish where the top coat has been applied in some of the designs, which made it a nightmare to work with.

Finally, as you can see by the swatches, the color change in the shimmery shades barely had enough contrast to be noticeable. The cream shades definitely had more of a contrast, but you could also see more of the imperfections caused by the top coat too.

The one shining light in the entire collection is that each of the polishes are beautifully pigmented, and I really do like some of the colors… so if you like the shades, you won’t be disappointed in their pigmentation. They are a little more thick than regular polishes from the brand… but as long as you don’t put a top coat on them, they’ll be fine.

China Glaze Nail Lacquer in Altered Reality

China Glaze Nail Lacquer in Split Perso-nail-ity

China Glaze Nail Lacquer in Shape Shifter

China Glaze Nail Lacquer in Duplicity

China Glaze Nail Lacquer in Metallic Metamorphosis

China Glaze Nail Lacquer in Modify Me