Lynnderella in Mysterious Ways over Chanel in Sky Line

Indirect natural light

As part of my goal of swatching my Lynnderella stash in order to decide on purge-status, I topped my Chanel in Sky Line mani with Lynnderella in Mysterious Ways. Mysterious Ways was released with the Holiday 2011 "Funny Money and Holiday Houseguests" collection. I don't know if Mysterious Ways is still available. On March 1, 2012, Lynn posted that it was being phased out with that batch, and I haven't paid attention to her eBay store to know whether it has come back. 

Mysterious Ways is described as "the long-lost sister of Gotta Love Brains," with "a grey-violet base with multi-coloured shimmer, white, silver, gunmetal and holographic hexagons, diamonds, squares and dust." That's Lynn's description, but I don't really find Mysterious Ways and Gotta Love Brains very similar (see More Nail Polish's swatches here: MW and GLB). The base is a grey-violet base; it's only slightly tinted and will slightly soften and dampen/dust-ify your base polish. There is a lot of fine hexagonal holographic glitter, as well as large hexagonal white opalescent glitter (like in Lynnderella in Love, Lace and Lilacs). Interspersed is the extra large glitter in various shapes, some holographic and some silver. Most scattered is large hexagonal and square gunmetal glitter in gunmetal. I don't think you could build up Mysterious Ways to opaque on its own.

I used 1 coat of Mysterious Ways plus 1 coat of a very thinned bottle of Gelous and 1 coat of Seche Vite, and everything was smooth except for the extra large glitters, which poked out in some spots. The formula is nice, not too thick, but the glitter does start to sink if it sits for a long time (not super bad, just the top part had started to lose suspension since I bought it in 2011). I just put the bottle upside-down for a couple hours, then shook it, and it was fine to apply. I wore this a while ago, but I don't remember having to fish for glitter or dab my glitter placement, except to keep the extra large glitter on the nail. I really just slapped this on, since I wasn't sure how it would look, so there's no clean-up in these pictures (and there's a blanket fiber on my finger in one pic - ugh!).

Sorry most of my pictures of this are a bit out of focus - my camera had a hard time focusing and staying color-accurate with all the holo sparkle. And no sun at this point during the winter either! I really like Mysterious Ways and I am happy with the layering combo here, so this polish stays in the keep pile for now.

Worn December 8, 2012.

Indirect natural light - blurred to capture the holo

Indirect natural light - indoors

Indirect natural light

Here are more combinations with Mysterious Ways: More Nail Polish (over medium steel blue shimmer), Tobywoo (over light grey blue creme), Nailin' It! (over medium dusty grey lavender creme), Adventures of a Mad Scientist (over warm grey creme), Gems in a Bottle (over dusty light blue with white shimmer), and Steffels (over lilac creme).

Do you like Mysterious Ways? I'm realizing that as gorgeous as I find many glitter polishes, the ones I'm drawn to wear tend to be subtler - or fit a theme for a holiday, etc. Lucky for me and my wallet! Too bad I didn't realize it sooner, though!