ALU’s 365 of Untrieds – L’Oreal Blue Marine Nail Polish
365 of Untrieds is my personal challenge to weed through the polishes in the ALU stash that I’ve been wanting to try but just haven’t gotten around to.
I only own one bottle of L’Oreal Paris nail polish and it didn’t come in to my collection until this past spring. Why is that? For starters, their core lineup of colors are so the opposite of me (pinks, reds, neutrals) that I never give it a second glance. Second, when I do happen to see some more fun colors, they usually resemble something I’ve seen somewhere else. I’m looking at you Passport to Paradise, aka Essie North Fork dupes. However, L’Oreal Blue Marine caught my eye on the seasonal makeup display shelf because of the duo-chrome promise made by a flash of blue-violet in the bottle. Let’s see if it delivered on that promise, shall we? |
Formula & Application: L’Oreal Paris nail polish is 4-Free (including formaldehyde resin) and free of camphor, which can be an irritant. The bottles have an interesting cap with its curved back that lays comfortably against your finger when polishing. The brush is flat, thin and long. It’s not as wide as OPI’s, which I find to be a plus. The bristles are flexible but dense so it doesn’t fan out too wide.
The formula itself is pretty thin and easily spreadable but it’s low on pigmentation. Even after three coats I could still hints of VNL (visible nail line). Also because of the amount of smooth glitter in the lacquer, it is a bit problematic to remove.
L’Oreal Blue Marine is a blue-green foil-esque shimmer. The color falls somewhere between a turquoise and teal and unfortunately, that cool duo-chrome look from the bottle was nowhere to be found on the nail. I wouldn’t go so far to call the finish a true foil glitter as the particles are much smaller and don’t look as sparkly on the nail.
In terms of color comparisons, LA Girl Rock Star Head Banging has a similar base color as Blue Marine though Head Banging is more vivid and certainly more glitzy. Another color cousin is China Glaze Watermelon Rind though it’s a bit darker with a more unique finish.
Bottom Line: While this is a color range I love, Blue Marine lacks the depth I was hoping for. Considering that I have two other polishes with a similar hue that I love, love, love, Blue Marine just doesn’t stand up against them. The thing is, I really liked the formula and application but this is a limited edition color. If L’Oreal wants me to stop and stare in the future, they really need to include more shades like this in their permanent line.
365 of Untrieds Stash/Share Verdict: I wanted to love this but it fell flat. SHARE!
L’Oreal Blue Marine was a limited edition release from Spring 2011 so I don’t know if it’s still available anywhere. If you like this color, I suggest you pick up LA Girl Rock Star Head Banging from LAGirlUSA.com or CherryCulture.com.
Thoughts on L’Oreal Blue Marine? Are you a fan of L’Oreal nail polish? What are your favorite colors from the line?
Disclosure: I purchased this nail polishFor more info view my Disclosure Policy.
Lisa N.
Ms Meatballhead
Birdie
Spa pediccure chairs
It’s a gorgeous colour, but I definitely think L’Oreal should make more colours besides pinks, reds and neutrals (even though I love pink!).
This color looks almost exactly like NOPI’s Iceberg Lotus, IMO.
I actually have and LOVE Blue Marine. I found that with a fourth coat(which sucks, I know, but it’s worth it!) it just explodes and looks fantastic. And I definitely see the purple flash in the right lights. I hate that it takes four coats, but I do love how it looks when it’s done.
I have it on my toes right now and have been getting compliments all day, actually!
This reminds me of the LA Color Craze Metallic Series Teal, which is a touch more silver.
Ive been wondering about that one being a charla dupe. I passed cuz i have charla and i suspected that it would be a little…less than desirable compared to the original. i picked up the orange and the pink instead and i completely agree that they both fall flat on the nail. oh but i *do* love the passport to paradise collection since i missed the essie’s the first time around.
I picked up Yellow Seahorse from that collection and absolutely loved the formula and brush, but the color was DEATH on me. I was automatically drawn to Blue Marine but resisted because I have similar colors. Yellow Seahorse was my first L’Oreal polish and based on the formula/brush alone, I will try others if they come out with colors to tempt me.
Your cuticles and nails are so perfectly flawless, what do you use on them. Do you have special procedures for them, they are so pretty.
Just wondering what your favorite cuticle oil is. Your nails always look amazing! I really enjoy your site!
Definitely prefer LA Girl to the L’Oreal. They look similar but the LA Girl definitely looks shinier and nicer. Glad to see you’re getting through your collection without stashing everything!!
(I’m kind of a new reader by the way, and your blog is one of the ones I read everyday! Love it!)
I find it’s pretty easy to tell how duochrome a polish will be based on the bottle. With this one, the violet only showed up in the angled edges, so I didn’t excpect to see it on the much-less angular nail…and wasn’t disappointed.
I do assume it would be flashier over black, though.
I just snagged this in a trade the other day. It fell really flat for me too. It’s similar enough to Headbanging and NOPI Iceberg Lotus that I plan to give mine away as well. What a shame for such lovely flashes in the bottle!
Agree it does lack depth. Like you, I don’t even look at L’Oreal polish for many reasons – mostly because we might have maybe 5 color choices at the Rite Aide in the town I live in. I only have one L’Oreal in my stash that I kept because it was just the shade I was looking for years ago and could not find…a black with the right amount of a sanguine red to it so that it is not one that shows dead black in light. I still have never found a really perfect dupe for that one shade despite all that came out pre grege days when all the blue/blacks and red/blacks were hitting hard.
wow! I have this and had a hard time getting coverage, too, I am impressed you got good coverage!
It is great as one coat over black: that blue that you see in the bottle comes through!
I have found that if you want a duo-chrome to really show its duo-chrome qualities, it needs to be layered over at least one coat of black (or another dark color). I own Blue Marine, and over black it reaches bottle color and I think it does have a subtle duo-chrome flash. Please revisit Blue Marine with this change, because it really is a rocking color!
It’s a dupe for Nicole by OPI Iceberg Lotus.
I purchased only one L’Oreal Paris nail lacquer from the Titanium collection, when I was looking for the perfect purple: it happens to be too dark for me (almost black), and it actually doesn’t last on nail: on the first day wearing it, I got chips!
I tried again on toes hoping it will last longer, and with the current 4 coat-manicure (base, two coats, top coat): no way, it’s not good stuff for me!
as much as i feel like i should love it (from looking at the bottle) i just don’t..
It’s super disappointing that the polish didn’t show up how it did in the bottle on the nail. That would have been a super pretty color. if it did. I still think it’s a pretty color but it is a little disappointing.
I don’t buy anything from this company because they test on animals…
So glad you swatched this! I saw it at CVS and have been tempted to get it for weeks, but now I can safely say I’ll pass.
If only I could wear more daring colors to the office! Alas, I have to stick with the boring reds, pinks, and neutrals….
I just can’t buy L’oreal when I know they test on animals
I didn’t realize until reading this post that I’ve never seen L’oreal nail polish before, I didn’t even know they made nail polish. I agree that the color isn’t intense enough.
I didn’t like this that much at first either. But then I happened to layer it over a dark brown Chanel my friend lent me (I forget the name…don’t know if it was Haute Chocolate or something else). It looked fabulous and had a nice duochrome effect.
I love this color, I wouldn’t have been if I saw it in the bottle but on your nails it looks great!
I totally agree that this polish falls kind of flat compared with some of the other duo chrome polishes you’ve tried in the last couple of weeks. I so admire your efforts to try so many different polishes and inform us. They’re not all winners!
This looks very turquoise-blue in the bottle but green on the nail.
Not sure whether I’m a fan, or not! Tough one!