When I first saw Deborah Lippmann’s ‘Boom Boom Pow’ (released along with ‘Today Was A Fairytale’ in the Fall of 2010 and which was reviewed here), I fell head over heels for its sophisticated glittery beauty. Having made glitter polishes, and in particular large hexagonal glitter pieces, über-chic, Deborah continues the party with ‘Boom Boom Pow’, a glamorous golden lacquer containing 24 karat gold dust. Swatches are with Deborah Lippmann’s Rehydrating Base Coat as well as her Addicted To Speed Ultra Quick-Dry Top Coat.
While ‘Boom Boom Pow’ looks much more opaque in the bottle, most likely due to the incredible amounts of glitter, both large & small, it’s actually a rather sheer yellow tinged base. There’s a variety of different sized golden glitter pieces and I’m guessing the 24 karat gold dust acts as a thickening agent to the overall colour, as well as adding a subtle gleam. The formula was wonderfully easy to work with and because of its sheerness, it’s rather forgiving of any mistakes. As well, having all those different sized glitter pieces means that while you won’t have uniformity on every nail, which is not the purpose anyway, you will have plenty of bling to go around on each finger. With two coats (pictured above), you achieve a pretty look, without it being overdone.
Once three coats are applied, I can’t say that the base shade deepens all that much more; instead, there are more glitter pieces on each nail which gives a more lustrous look and fills in a few more gaps, thus looking richer and a lot more golden overall.
I wanted to show you how this lacquer, while never mistaken for anything but supremely golden, can look either cool (top photo, taken with flash) or warm (bottom photo, in sunlight) which thus makes it so versatile to wear regardless of your skin tone.
Wanting to see how ‘Boom Boom Pow’ would look over a darker base, I chose CHANEL’s ‘Black Satin’, a super pigmented and glossy ebony shade, to layer it on.
In this first photo, I layered 2 coats of ‘Boom Boom Pow’ over 2 coats of ‘Black Satin’ and it was interesting to note how the dark base so completely sets off the beautiful golden glitter. I found that the gold dust embedded in ‘Boom Boom Pow’ did in fact slightly alter the inky blackness of ‘Black Satin’, but not significantly enough that it takes away that depth.
With 3 coats of ‘Boom Boom Pow’ over the same 2 coats of ‘Black Satin’, you achieve a stunning celestial extravagance. Whether seen in full sun (top photo) or in natural shaded light (bottom photo), you cannot help but be totally captivated by everything that seems to be going on, with the pattern ever changing depending on your hand’s movement. I absolutely LOVE this combo!
Final thoughts: If you haven’t gotten on the large-glitter-polish bandwagon already, then I believe this is definitely one lacquer that can change your mind. The beauty of ‘Boom Boom Pow’ is that YOU control how glittery the overall look ends up, either by wearing one coat for a hint of shine, all the way up to three (or more!) for radiantly golden digits. The fact that it can be layered over basically any other polish makes it a chic multi-tasker, giving you yet more combinations to work with, which I love. Of course, removal can be a slight hassle, but I found that by soaking a cotton pad in plenty of remover and letting it sit on the polish a minute or so, greatly speeds things up. Deborah Lippmann lacquers can be found at higher end department stores, or purchased online through her website.
*Disclaimer: product sample was provided by the company/PR for my unbiased consideration
