A England, Burne-Jones Pygmalion collection
As an addicted of A England nail polishes, I am always waiting for the new collections with great excitement, curious to see Adina’s creations. This time I had the pleasure and the honour to swatch one of the newly launched collections by the British indie brand: the Burne-Jones Pygmalion collection(*).
This collection was launched in November 2018 together with the Return To Manderley collection. It is made of four nail polishes inspired to the Pygmalion and the Image series painted by the pre-raphaelite artist Edward Burne-Jones.
The Pygmalion series is made of four paintings that tell the ancient greek myth of Pygmalion and Galatea – a version of this story was written by Ovid in his Metamorphosis. The myth is about a sculptor, named Pygmalion, that falls in love with one of his sculptures and asks the goddess Aphrodite to bring her into life. Aphrodite listens to Pygmalion’s prayers and turns the marble statue into a woman made of flesh and blood, who then becomes Pygmalion’s wife.
The paintings represent four phases of this story. In the first one (The Heart Desires) we see the sculptor in a contemplative mood, just like he is thinking of his future creation. Then, the second painting (The Hand Refrains) shows the moment when Pygmalion falls in love with his freshly completed sculpture, that is turned into a human being by Aphrodite in the third painting (The Godhead Fires). The last panel (The Soul Attains) shows Pygmalion with his love – not anymore a sculpture but a real woman.
The four nail polishes of the collection are inspired to the four paintings, so they have the same name of the Burne-Jones’ artworks. They are all pastel shades that have in common the wonderful flaming holo finish (which is much more visible in real life than in my pictures!). Moreover, they all dry with a satin effect, but this can be made glossy with a top coat. Let’s see them together!
The Heart Desires is a silver leaning light blue with linear flaming holo finish. This is the nail polish with the most visible holo: there is a very strong rainbow in real life, which shows up only when the nail polish is completely dry.
Formula is absolutely perfect: opaque in two coats, quick-dry, easy to apply also thanks to the brush (shorter and wider than the old A England brushes). In my pictures you see two coats plus top coat.
The Hand Refrains is a stunning pale gold vaguely leaning green. To my eye, it seems to have also some silver inside. It has the flaming holo finish as well, which is again much more visible in real life.
I like it because it’s a completely unique and new colour, a shade of gold that was missing in the A England colour palette. Surely you don’t have anything like this in your collection 😀
Also for this nail polish, formula is amazing: application, drying time, smoothness…everything is perfect! Two coats plus top coat.
The Godhead Fires is my favourite from the collection: a dusty pink that combines the flaming holo finish to sparkling and luminous glitter. Moreover, the “flame” typical of this finish assumes a very interesting copper/rusty red colour.
It’s a complex shade, unique and surprising. I’d just like to warn you about the colour: don’t expect it to look just like it is in the bottle. From the bottle you may think of a rusty red, but on nails it is actually pink, and only the holo flame is rusty red.
Formula is the same of the other nail polishes, so I won’t repeat myself 🙂 Two coats plus top coat.
The Soul Attains is a pale lilac very delicate, tender and romantic. This is probably the one with the most evident holo effect after The Heart Desires: sadly my photos doesn’t show it so much, but believe me when I say that it’s very strong.
To be honest, from the bottle this nail polish didn’t attract me so much, but when I put it on nails I totally changed my mind. Seeing such a delicate colour showing a very strong holo made me fall in love with this nail polish, so I’d suggest you to give it a chance even if you are not totally sure about it. Personally I think this is one of the most beautiful lilac nail polishes I own.
Again, perfect formula, as I said for the nail polishes above. Two coats plus top coat.
These four nail polishes have very interesting colours that make the A England colour selection wider and richer. Even if at a first sight you may think that some colours are very similar to others of older A England shades, this is actually not true, as on nails they differ a lot one from each other. I did some comparisons to show you the differences with the similar A England colours I own.
First I compared The Heart Desires (2 coats, pinky and ring finger) to Carnation Lily Lily Rose (2 coats, middle finger) and Titania Fairy Queen (3 coats, index finger). As you can see they are all very different one from each other, in colours and finishes.
Then I compared The Godhead Fires (ring finger and pinky, 2 coats) to Mustardseed A Fairy (middle finger, 2 coats) and Rose Bower (index finger, 2 coats). As you see, the differences are very visible.
Finally, I tried to compare The Soul Attains (2 coats, ring finger and pinky) to A Midsummer Night’s Dream (2 coats, middle finger) and Anne Of Cleves (2 coats, index finger). I was very curious about this comparison because I had the feeling that The Soul Attains and A Midsummer Night’s Dream looked quite similar. Well, as you can see, I was wrong as they are very different one from each other. Does it worth having both of them? In my opinion, it does! 😀
Now I really think I told you everything about this new A England collection! I liked it very much, also because I know A England never disappoints me 😀 The flaming holo finish was newly introduced by the brand with these latest two collections, and I can assure you that it’s breathtaking (believe me, it is much more visible in real life!).
A England nail polishes are selled by various stockists all around the world. Personally I got them from the Italian nail shop Guerrilla Nails, which ships in Italy and Europe. There is also my 10% off coupon code (LADS10) you can use on this site, valid both on full-priced and discounted items!
Back to this collection, my favourite shades are The Godhead Fires and The Soul Attains. What about you?
(*) press sample
