Love Lime Crime - Love Vegan Beauty

If you have been following our DQN blog for a while you will know how much we love our Lime Crime nail polishes. So much so that they have featured in many designs over the past 2 years. They are the most fab polishes for nail art as they are really opaque and easy to work with. Even better they are 3 free, cruelty free, vegan, and they have UNICORNS ON THE BOTTLES! 

DQN is super happy to be working together with Vegan Beauty, another sparkly Aussie business that stocks amazing Vegan beauty products. Forget googling individual brands to choose cruelty free options, all the beautiful things you need are all in the one place. I mean come on now, there are holographic unicorns on the lipsticks...sparkle sparkle! 

Vegan Beauty stocks a huge range of Lime Crime products including lipsticks, eye shadows and the newly formulated Lime Crime neon pastel nail polishes.

Vegan Beauty has a great offer for DQN shoppers. 

10% discount store wide (excl. delivery) valid for 2 weeks 21/11 - 5/12 Code: dqn

You can find Vegan Beauty here:

Shop - Facebook - Blog 

Lets take a look down memory lane at some of the manis I have done using my Lime Crime polishes.

I think I seriously need to invest in some backups, after all they have reformulated so technically, its really like a whole new collection!

Thanks so much Vegan Beuaty for offering us Aussies a conscientious range of beauty products that not only make us look pretty but help us look after the animals xx

Rainbow Sparkle Nails with Fun Lacquer

A unicorn came and sprinkled magical rainbows of glitter on my nails. 

The good news is, even if you don't have a unicorn yet you can still have ALL THE SPARKLES!!! This technique is super easy. You need 3 key items: 

1. A beyond amazing silver chunky scattered holo polish. I used Fun - Lacquer - Queen (Foil Effect Holo).  I experimented with plain silver glitter polishes but the chunky silver holo definitely boosted the rainbow effect.
2. Some tinted nail polish colours.
3. A plastic sandwich bag. 

Dribble mix tinted polishes into little swirly blobs of colour on the sandwich bag. Leave them to dry for between 30min-1 hr. 

I did get little bubbles in my decals when they were dry but when you stick them on they are not noticeable at all, the sparkle hides the little imperfections. Pull them off a still tacky, don't let them dry out too much. 

Cut up the decals as closely to size as possible before applying to nail. If they are just tacky enough they will stick themselves but its good to run a swish of base coat over your holo around the edges of your entire nail to create a 'glue' outline to help stick down the edges of the decal. Photo below is before the decal is cut to size. 

Tinted Polish are speciality polishes but easy to find or make. They are see through polishes that kind of look like cellophane paper. I used all 4 polishes from the OPI - Tint Collection. If you want to see some other amazing nails using this technique go check out @ermahgerdperlish. Her's are stunning, STUNNING!! 

 You can make tinted polish by adding drops of opaque colours to clear polish but its kinda messy so just go buy some OK. They are great for those super chic see through lace designs that are popping up at the moment and for nail art in general. You can use them for reverse stamping and stamping decals too. 

Hope you guys like these nails as much as I do and try it out for yourself. I promise that you WILL walk into something because you cant walk in the sun without staring like a maniac at your own nails xx 

Resinail - new Aussie indie

New to the market, the first release polishes from new Aussie indie Resinail cater for a range of polish lovers; there's holos, thermals, glitter toppers and more, a little something for everyone!  Thank you Michelle for sending 3 fab polishes my way. Let's take a closer look.

The first polish I tried was this silver linear holo. Resinail - Fizzy Water. 4 coats direct sunlight.  Gorgeous sparkle but its very sheer so you need a few coats but look how beautiful it is! This would work well with silver undies. Its very comparable to a spectraflair topcoat. Rainbows! Rainbows! Rainbows!

Fizzy Water - 4 coats indoors with flash. I wish this polish was just a bit more opaque but then again you can wear it over lots of different colours so that's a bonus. The formula was consistent across the 3 polishes and the 5 free suspension base is great quality. The brush in the full size bottle was a good size and the polishes applied well. I also really like Michelle's bottle labels, I love that you can see the polish through the "R", its funky! Now onto my absolute fav. 

Ooooh dreamy! Fuchsia Fade (thermal) - 2 coats direct sunlight. Eeeee! Devine! This is a pic of the polish in transition from warm to cool on the tips. The cool colour is a bright cerise pink shimmer. In warm phase its a light musk pink shimmer. And I'm not a massive thermal polish person, but I really, really like this. For me this is the state the polish stayed in most often.

Fuchsia Fade (thermal) - 2 coats indoors with flash. This polish underwhelms in the bottle, its looks like a dirty pink shimmer but when you put it on your nails...BAM! It's so girly! Lets see what it looks like in cool state now.

Fuchsia Fade (thermal) - 2 coats direct sunlight. Cool colour state. Living in QLD I had to put my nails under the tap to get the polish to change to this colour fully. It's a dreamy barbie pink. Makes washing your hands just a bit too much fun!

Fuchsia Fade (thermal) - 2 coats indoors with flash. Cool colour. You can see on my pinkie where its starting to transition again near the cuticle. Its cause I'm so hawt! :P Now to the glitter topper.

Resinail - Tropical Treat, a silver and lime green scattered holo glitter topper in a clear base. It's a beautiful colour of green glitter and the holo sparkle is beautiful. This polish is again quite sheer. I tried it on its own and it definitely needs undies. I used China Glaze - I'm with the lifeguard which is a neon green jelly. I then put 3 coats of the glitter topper on to get coverage I was happy with. The glitter spreads nice and evenly.

Look at that sparkle! Tropical Treat - Direct sunlight

Tropical Treat indoors with flash. 

Michelle has released lots of other gorgeous sparkly Resinail polishes which you can check out at her store HERE.  Best of luck Michelle, can't wait to see what's next for Resinail. If I get a vote more thermals please :) 

Cruelty Free Nail Polish

*Updated June 2014*

Whether you are an animal activist or just a human being with compassion for all creatures great and small, its sensible to be informed about the products you buy and use. We hope this post helps you to become informed about the brands that test and that you will only support companies that manufacture and sell their products humanely.

This blog post is a work in progress which we will refine and add to as more information comes to light. We have researched these companies extensively through a number of sources including Choose Cruelty Free, PETA, Animals Australia and directly from the companies themselves. If you are in doubt about any of the companies listed please contact the company themselves for your own piece of mind. There is also a great app from Choose Cruelty Free  that can help you make informed choices when you are shopping.

CRUELTY FREE BRANDS

These are companies that neither perform tests themselves, ask other companies to test, or benefit from other brands' testing. [V] denotes a vegan brand, however not all products made by the brand may be vegan. Also brands without a V may also be vegan however I could not find information about them at this time.

·      Acquarella

·      A Beautiful Life

·      Adorn

·      a england

·      American Apparel

·      Australis

·      Barry M [V]

·      Beauty Without Cruelty

·      Biologika

·      Bourjois
·      Bundle Monster

·      Butter London

·      Catrice [V]

·      Catwalk Cosmetics

·      Chi Chi

·      China Glaze

·      Color Club [V]

·      Cult Nails

·      Deborah Lippman

·      Del Sol
·      De Lorenzo
·      Dermalogica

·      E.L.F. [V]

·      Essence

·      Face of Australia

·      Gellish (Nail Harmony USA)

·      GOSH

·      Hard Candy

·      Hopscotch Kids

·      Illamasqua

·      Inglot

·      Innoxa

·      Jessica

·      Kleancolor

·      L.A. Girl

·      Le Reve

·      Lime Crime

·      Lush

·      ManGlaze

·      Milani [V]

·      Misa

·      Morgan Taylor (Nail Harmony USA)

·      Nails Inc

·      Nail Tek [V]

·      Nina Ultra Pro [V]
·      Natio

·      Nfu Oh

·      Nubar [V]

·      Obsessive Compulsive Cosmetics [V]

·      Orly

·      Ozotic

·      piCture pOlish

·      Piggy Paint

·    Paul Mitchell

·      Priti [V]

·      Spa Ritual [V]

·      Seche

·      Wet n Wild

·      Zoya [V]

THE GREY AREA

The companies that may not perform tests themselves, but still either benefit from other brands' testing, or are owned by a parent company who does test on animals, or test cosmetic ingredients where required by specific countries laws (China). It's complicated!

·      Avon

·      Burt's Bees (Clorox)

·      Chanel

·      Covergirl

·      Essie

·      George by ASDA

·      Jurlique

·      Lancome (L'oreal)

·      Le Tan

·      L'Occitane

·      L'oreal

·      Mary Kay

·      Nars

·      Nicole by OPI (Coty)

·      Nutrimetics 
·      NYX (L'oreal)

·      OPI (Coty)
·    Pure Ice (Revlon)

·      Red Earth

·      Sally Hansen (Del)

·      Sephora by OPI 

·      Sinful colours

·      The Body Shop (L'Oreal) 

·      Urban Decay (L'Oreal)

·      Yardley

DON'T DO IT

The companies who DO test on animals. BAD BAD BAD!

·      Andrew Collinge

·      Anna Sui

·      Aramis

·      Aveeno

·      Band-Aid

·      Biotherm

·      Bobbi Brown

·      Bonjela

·      Braun

·      Cacharel

·      Cashmere Bouquet

·      Chapstick

·      Clairol

·      Clean & Clear

·      Clearasil

·      Clinicare

·      Clinique

·      Colgate

·      Crest

·      Decore

·      Disprin

·      Dolce & Gabbana

·      Donna Karan

·      Dove

·      Dior

·      Dufour

·      Durex

·      Elizabeth Arden

·      Estee Lauder

·      Eulactol

·      Fruitrience

·      Garnier

·      Gillette

·      Giorgio Armani

·      Gucci Fragrances

·      Head & Shoulders

·      Herbal Essences

·      Hugo Boss

·      Impulse

·      Johnson & Johnson

·      Kerastase

·      Kiehl's

·      Lacoste

·      Lancome (Loreal)

·      Lemsip

·      Listerine

·      Lux

·      Lynx

·      MAC

·      Max Factor

·      Maybelline

·      Michael Kors

·      Missoni

·      Miss Sporty

·      Mum

·      Nair

·      Neutrogena

·      Nice 'n Easy

·      Nurofen

·      NYC

·      Olay

·      Old Spice

·      Optrex

·      Oral B

·      Palmolive

·      Pantene

·      Pearl Drops

·      Pears

·      Pert

·      Plax

·      Ponds

·      PPS

·      Radox

·      Ralph Lauren Fragrances

·      Reach

·      Redken

·      Revlon

·      Rexona

·      Rogaine

·      Sally Beauty Supply

·      Sanex

·      Saturn

·      Savlon

·      Scholl

·      Sensodyne

·      Shiseido

·      Shu Uemura

·      Simple

·      SK-II

·      Speed Stick

·      St Ives

·      Stayfree

·      Steradent

·      Strepsils

·      Tampax

·      Tom Ford

·      Tommy Hilfiger

·      Tony & Guy

·      TREsemme

·      Vaseline

·      Veet

·      Venus

·      Vicks

·      Vidal Sasson

·      Viktor & Rolf 

·      V05

·      Waxeeze

·      Wella

·      Wella Balsam

·      Zest

If you believe the information in this post is incorrect please contact DQN at dqnails@gmail.com or comment below. We love hearing from you guys – things change all the time and we might have missed companies being bought out by bigger companies that do test - so when things happen let us know and we can adjust the lists.