Nubar Fortress Collection Spring 2010

These have been out for a little while now so there's nothing brand new to see, but more pictures of polish are better than fewer, right? Hehe.

A surprising and unexpected set, if I do say so myself. I love the names of these!


Barricade. A medium-light grey creme. Not as much of a blue undertone in this one. I think this is the one that looks best against my skintone as well. Also reminds me of trying to get the Lantern Shield to drop.



Citadel. A light grey creme. Little bit blue toned. All these fortress-themed names... love them. This one reminds me of accidentally killing half the people in Garlaige Citadel while waiting for the gate to open. Oops.


Dark Castle. Nice black shimmer! Looks like black leather to me. Also a little bit of a blueish undertone.



Knight's Armor. Black base with silver glitter. This is the one I was most interested in from the promo pics but it's not as cool as I'd anticipated. I mean, it looks cool, but it's kinda... dull? The glitter doesn't sparkle. It's a little hard to apply smoothly and looks kinda lumpy when it dries. It looks much better matte than shiny, but I forgot to snap a picture of it with matte topcoat.

Marble Tower. Very light grey with strong blue undertone. It is somewhat similar to Citadel but Citadel is more neutral and this is more cool. Different light greys for different skin tones.



Palisade. Medium grey creme with strong blue undertone. This is a little bit like Rescue Beauty Lounge Stormy, if I recall correctly. I haven't compared them side-by-side, I'm just basing that on memory. This is a good alternative if you don't want to shell out $18 for a grey creme, the formula on this is actually pretty damn good despite it being half the price.


Silver Sword. A metallic charcoal-silver frost. Be careful with your brush strokes when applying this because they do stay fairly visible after the polish has dried. As long as you do straight, even sweeps with the brush you shouldn't have a problem.


Stronghold. Once they win, once they drop their guard, we will hit them, we will hit them hard... Totally one of my favorite songs for working out. Anyway. Dark grey creme with slight blue undertone. This one most reminds me of Obsessive Compulsive Cosmetics Dangerous, but this is a little lighter. Shark grey! Very nice, this one is my second favorite.

The formula on these was mostly excellent. The cremes were all very opaque and dense and applied flawlessly. The only ones that gave me trouble were Knight's Armor because it's so thick and kinda lumpy and Silver Sword which had a kinda strange airy texture. Silver Sword didn't apply badly, really, it' s just that it has such an odd texture, like... whipped polish or maybe like syrup? The other thing about these is that the cremes dry pretty dull. You will need a topcoat if you want them to be nice and shiny. Drying time was great, everything else was super. Nubar's new formula is really nice to use, it seems like they've made their shades lots more opaque then when I first started using Nubar.

This is a really weird collection if you think about it in the 'new seasonal collection' sense- I mean... eight greys for spring? But I see this less as a seasonal collection and more as filling out the gaps in their permanent collection. Cause... they didn't have many greys at all in their line... And now they have a grey for everyone. Lots of choices. Looks like they're really broadening their color variety this year! They've also done the same thing with reds, which I'll review shortly.

Overall, I dig this collection. I adore grey cremes even though I know they rarely look good on me. They're just so effortlessly cool and put-together looking. Grey creme is powerful. The formula on these was great, so I think I'll be putting a lot of these into my regular rotation. The only thing this collection seems like it's missing to me is the rare grey-tinged white. You know, that sort of super light grey shade? Like white with a little smoke to it. I would have liked one of those.

I'm noticing a trend now- Nubar frequently does monochrome collections. Purples, corals, greens, browns, greys, reds.... I'm dying to know what's next. Blues? I hope it's blues!!

(These were sent to me for review)