Madam Glam Swatches & Review

After months of seeing swatches of their beautiful polishes online, I was contacted by Madam Glam to swatch and review some of their nail products. According to their website, Madam Glam is a New York based nail company that provides 5-free, vegan, and cruelty-free products including regular and gel polishes, chrome powders, loose glitters, nail art supplies, and other accessories to an international audience of nail enthusiasts.

I was sent five of their non-gel polishes, as well as two different loose glitter powders. All of the products can be purchased directly from the Madam Glam website, where their regular polishes are reasonably priced at $8.90 for 0.5 oz (gels are $19.95), and the glitter powders are $6.50 for 5g.

In all of the polish swatches below, I've used one coat of Zoya's Anchor base coat, and the colors are topped with Zoya's Armor topcoat. Each photo is edited to most accurately depict how I perceive the colors to look in real life.

Starting with the cremes, first up we have Aqualicious:

Aqualicious is a vibrant seafoam green creme. This one was fairly opaque, and I applied two coats for full coverage. While I did apply a topcoat over this, Aqualicious is perfectly glossy on its own.

Madam Glam "Aqualicious," two coats

Overall, I really love this color. Greens and blues are some of my favorite colors to wear year-round, and this polish combines them both into a nice bright shade that reminds me of spring and summer time. Best of all, despite its heavily-pigmented nature, Aqualicious didn't stain my nails at all.

The other creme is Just a Flirt:

Just a Flirt is a pastel purple creme that leans slightly pink. Due to its lightness, this one was a bit more sheer than Aqualicious, and I had to apply three coats for opacity. However, Just a Flirt self-levels well and dries quickly, which easily makes up for the number of coats required.

Madam Glam "Just a Flirt," three coats

I rarely wear light purples on my nails because I find that they're typically patchy and have opacity issues near the tips of my nails, but Just a Flirt had neither of these problems. I was pleasantly surprised to find that my nail line wasn't visible even under differing lighting circumstances.

Moving on from the cremes, we have Mistress:

Mistress is a multichrome shimmer that shifts mainly between vibrant orange and golden hues, although it does also appear a darker red-orange in certain lighting. The formula on this one was pretty thin, so I applied three coats here but soon realized that my nail line was still visible in some lighting conditions.

Madam Glam "Mistress," three coats

Despite its sheerness, Mistress is actually one of my favorites of the five polishes. The color is absolutely stunning, and I can see it being one of my go-to polishes for fall. Since the polish itself dries fairly quickly, I actually don't mind that it takes additional coats to be fully opaque, and since I usually cover up most of my nails with art anyway, the visibility of the nail line isn't a huge issue for me.

The first of the full glitter polishes is Fly Me to the Moon:

Fly Me to the Moon is a collection of gold, green, red, and holographic glitters in a clear base. For these swatches, I directly applied three coats of the polish. The glitters in this one are predominantly golden, but there is definitely a strong presence of the scattered holo glitters as well.

Madam Glam "Fly Me to the Moon," three coats

While I typically shy away from having plain gold nails, I quickly fell in love with this color and have been wearing it on my right hand for several days now. I feel like scattered holo glitter polishes tend to be a bit boring and one-dimensional out of direct sunlight, so I really appreciate that Fly Me to the Moon also has the added red and green glitters to make it more interesting. 

The last polish is Champagne Shower:

Champagne Shower is a clear base filled with a mixture of pinkish-purple, red, silver, and holographic glitters. I applied two coats of the polish until I was satisfied with the opacity. There are far fewer holo glitters scattered throughout this one when compared to Fly Me to the Moon, with the majority of the base being filled by the purple glitters.

Madam Glam "Champagne Shower," two coats

This one really surprised me with how different it looks on when compared to the color in the bottle. On the nails, the contrast between the purple, red, and silver glitters is much more evident and gives the polish more depth. The holographic glitter pieces are a bit hard to spot out of direct sunlight, though.

Lastly, we have the two glitter powders, Holo Skydive and To the Moon & Back:

Holo Skydive, which I'm wearing on my middle and pinky fingers, is a dark blue holo glitter powder, and To the Moon & Back, which is on my pointer and ring finger nails, is the pink glitter powder with purple glitter scattered throughout. I had never applied glitter powder before, so I started with the blue and applied a layer of base coat, waited a few seconds for it to start drying, and dipped my finger into the powder. Holo Skydive was fully opaque in one coat, and once the nail had fully dried, I brushed off the excess powder using a fan brush and applied two layers of topcoat. I moved onto the pink powder, which wasn't as opaque, and applied a layer of base coat, but after dipping my nail once, there were some bare patches, so I waited for the nail to dry and added a layer of topcoat over the powder and dipped it again, adding two layers of topcoat after the nails were dry.

Madam Glam "Holo Skydive" (blue) and "To the Moon & Back" (pink)

Of the two glitter powders, I preferred working with Holo Skydive, as it required fewer applications. Both colors required an extra coat of topcoat to look properly glossy, and while the topcoat really enhanced the look of To the Moon & Back, I noticed that it somewhat diminished the holographic effect of Holo Skydive.

Overall, I was really impressed with all of the polishes, and I love Madam Glam's unique bottle design. My favorite polish is easily Fly Me to the Moon, which ended up inspiring me to paint what turned into one of my favorite nail art designs I've done in awhile (but more on that next week!). All of the polishes dried quickly and self-leveled well, and the colors are stunning enough to wear on their own while also being perfectly suited as bases for designs. The glitter powders are also beautiful, but I definitely need more practice in applying them.

So, which of these products caught your eye? Do you have any requests for nail art that you'd like to see me do with any of them? 

As an extra bonus, you can get 30% off your entire Madam Glam order by following this link and entering the code "Blitz30" at checkout. 

If you love gel polishes, Madam Glam also offers a monthly VIP subscription box where you can select three colors for $29 each month, giving you first access to all the new gel colors they release.

DISCLAIMER: All the Madam Glam products swatched here were provided to me by the company. All views expressed in this review are my honest opinions.