Le Métier de Beauté East Meets West Nail Lacquer Collection Fall/Winter 2011

Messy Wands and The Ultimate Makeup have had us all drooling over Le Métier de Beauté’s East Meets West Nail Lacquer Collection for Fall/Winter 2011 for weeks. I was initially under the impression that the Fall/Winter Silk Road Collection would be limited to the new lip and eye kaleidoscope kits, both of which I felt would be too warm-toned for me. After seeing more news, I was happy to learn that Le Métier has quite a few other items scheduled for release this fall to choose from including nail polishes, lip cremes, plus deep wine colored lip & nail sets (see a few sneak peeks at Best Things in Beauty).

All four shades were kindly sent to me by Le Métier as samples for review. I already had my eye on Anatolia  the moment I saw it on other blogs. From the outset, it appeared to be a shade I suspected would rival the long discontinued Tulipe Noire by Chanel. After testing all four shades out, I was surprised to discover that I was most drawn to the chocolate and copper instead of the plums and reds (scroll down for more details).

Dynasty is a fuchsia red shimmer. With one coat a blueish sheen is more visible but with two coats, the color transforms into a deep reddish fuchsia. The formula with this shade was the best out of the fall shades with a smooth easy-to-apply consistency. It does require two thin coats for an opaque finish (one coat isn’t quite rich enough for my preference). The shimmer is very tiny in this so there are no streak marks and the result is a smooth shimmer. Dynasty has a thinner consistency than most nail polishes I’ve tried so I found it dried very quickly.

Urban Dweller is one of my favorites for the color. It’s a rich shimmery chocolate with gold. I love that the brown has just the right amount of plum to prevent it from being too warm. The gold shimmer prevents this from looking too dark. The only downside I found was that texture of this shade is a bit thick making it trickier to apply for me. It’s still easily manageable – just apply with a few single layer strokes and let it dry completely before running the brush over the nail color for a second coat.

Anatolia is a high-sparkle plum red with gold. I thought this would be my favorite but felt the others were more unique. Still this is a stunning shade. The red is slightly transparent and it’s packed with plum and gold shimmer making it look multi-dimensional on the nails. Since the base seems to be slightly jelly-ish, it requires two thicker coats to achieve full coverage. To date, this is the closest shade I’ve seen to Chanel Tulipe Noire,  not a dupe but close. Comparing the two, Le Metier Anatolia has a bit more kick, attitude and dimension since it has a more sparkly finish. I see this as a shade that can be worn year round but will be particularly fun for the holidays. The formula of this shade is slightly thicker than Silk Road (copper) but not as thick as Urban Dweller (chocolate). Apply this one slowly and let the first coat dry before applying a second.

Silk Road is a metallic orangey copper. I never thought I’d wear a darker warm coppery shimmer on the finger nails. Orange pumpkin colors do not typically flatter my olive skintone. It’s a color I avoid in clothing at all costs. I adore Chanel’s Golden Sand, & Dior’s City of Gold, but those are more golden rather than copper. It was surprise to me how much I love Silk Road on the fingers. The texture of this shade is thinner but the pigment is just amazing. It’s swatched below with just one coat. This shade is proof that I need to go outside of my neutral makeup comfort zone and try different things.

Here they are all lined up and swatched next to each other plus comparisons:

Although $10 is steep for these tiny bottles, I agree with assessment from The Non-Blonde & Cafe Makeup that with this size, one does indeed have hope of using these up. I’ve spotted the Silk Road collection already in stores at Neiman Marcus on the West Coast. I highly recommend you check your local counters if you haven’t already.