Manic.Monday: NYC Raindrop - dupe for Dior Trianon Porcelaine

If you've read my blog the past month, you'll know that I have had a bit of a thing for Dior's fabulous Trianon spring collection 2014. The collection has such a beautiful, soft and feminine range of shades and the packaging is absolutely adorable with patterns of little bows. Despite all this finery the very first thing in the collection to catch my eye was a humble nail polish (surprise, surprise), Dior's Trianon Nail Polish (£18) in the gorgeous Porcelaine - a truly stunning cool, pale Alice blue. But there was something vaguely familiar about this shade, and for once I actually listened to the alarm bells going off at the back of my mind, before I happily threw it in my shopping basket. I decided to have a good look in my nail polish collection, and sure enough there it was; the perfect dupe in an unassuming little bottle - the NYC Minute Nail Polish (£1.49) in the shade Raindrop.  

NYC (New York Colour) is a budget brand which we in the UK can find in our local Superdrug, and they have a pretty good range of nail polishes in about 50 different colors and effects, priced between £1.49 and £2.99. The formula is surprisingly good with just the right consistency that makes it easy to pick up enough product on the brush for an effortless application. The brush is of average width and it would probably take three strokes to cover the whole nail side to side, but it is of good enough quality that the bristles are all even and well formed, not causing any streaking or pesky unevenness in the finish. The pigmentation is also good, although with a pastel shade like Raindrop you definitely need two coats for a nice opaque finish. This particular formula is marketed as a quick drying nail polish, and that is definitely the case - I would even say that it dries in about 45 secs, brilliant for busy girls on the go. Another thing that I'm very impressed by is the beautiful glossy high shine finish, and you really don't need a topcoat if you're in a rush, and the photo shows the nail polish without topcoat.

So far so good, but the one thing that isn't so great is the wear, and on me the polish starts to chip after about 1.5 - 2 days, and that's having applied two coats on a basecoat but no topcoat. It might be that the finish is longer lasting if you apply a good topcoat, but let's face it - it's a cheap and cheerful nail polish and for a fraction of the price of Dior's Porcelaine, it's a really REALLY good dupe. I absolutely love Raindrop with its graceful and gentle color, and since the color difference between it and Porcelaine is almost non existent, the choice for me is easy - I'm sticking with NYC. If you love blue and green colors, NYC has a very good selection in different shades and I've already picked up quite a few and I would recommend that you do the same! Which is your favorite high end dupe?