花見 Hanami

  ***Remember to subscribe! I'll be holding my first giveaway at 50!***

My plan was to only do one pink post for Breast Cancer Awareness Month (BCAM), but on Monday Rainbow Honey announced that they would be supporting BCAM, and what do you know, on Wednesday I received my Rainbow Honey nail mail. Put two and two together and you can work out what's coming...'Think Pink - Part 2'.

Full sunlight

Full sunlight - see that iridescent shimmer!

Full sunlight

This is 'Hanami' ( 花見) which means 'flower viewing' or 'cherry blossom viewing' in Japanese (once again my Japanese classes are coming in handy). Here I've layered 'Hanami' in a gradient effect over OPI's 'Got A Date To-knight!'. I originally swatched this over a darker pink in an attempt to use a polish that wasn't featured in my last post, but the glitter just got lost. 'Hanami' definitely looks most effective over a light base.

'Hanami' is a "beautiful blend of rose, pink, white, and iridescent glitters in a sheer and shimmery pink base" (Rainbow Honey website). There are medium sized hexes and small glitters in shiny rose pink, and smaller hexes and shredded pieces in matte white. The combination of shiny and matte glitters is interesting. Application of 'Hanami' was great, no fishing for glitters and no need to place them on your nail as coverage is even.

My only gripe? The reason I fell in love with 'Hanami' was those amazing iridescent glitters that flash lilac purple. These are particularly prominent in the bottle, but not so much on the nail. I'm guessing this is simply because the polish has more depth in the bottle than on the nail. I almost wish this polish had some small lilac coloured glitters in there so that the lilac was still as prominent on the nail as it is in the bottle. To show you what I mean, here's a bottle shot of 'Hanami' taken from the Rainbow Honey facebook page.

Bottle shot (taken from the RH facebook page)

Beautiful right? It's still a very pretty glitter and I definitely recommend it, just don't expect the lilac flashes to be so prominent on your nail unless you really build it up. Personally, I'm more of a one-coat-of-glitter kind of girl. I did play around with a matte top coat which brings the lilac out more, so that's another option you can try.

So, after all of that you've probably forgotten what I said about Rainbow Honey supporting BCAM. During the month of October, for every full sized (15ml) bottle of pink polish sold, Rainbow Honey will donate $1 to the Breast Cancer Research Foundation. You'll also receive an awareness bracelet. If you want to know more about this you can read Rainbow Honey's blog post here.

The Rainbow Honey pink polishes include:

• Pinkie Promise (Equestria Collection)
• A Little Kindness (Equestria Collection)
• Unstealable Jewel (Chrono Cross Collection)
• Ephemeral (Sakura Matsuri Collection)
• Hanami (Sakura Matsuri Collection)
• Sakura Matsuri Namesake (Sakura Matsuri Collection) - see my swatches/review here

The full size (15ml) polishes are $10 each, and international shipping is $16.95 for up to 10 bottles. If you're lucky enough to live in America where Rainbow Honey is based then shipping is $5.95. If you've been considering getting some Rainbow Honey polishes, now really is the time to do it, and there's no need to feel guilty because you're giving back to a worthy cause :)

For anyone who hates pink, you're probably sick of the millions of blog posts parading pink nails at the moment (even if it is for a good cause and to raise awareness). I promise there won't be a trace of pink in sight in my next post!