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Essie Spring 2022 Collection Nail Polish [836 - Keep Branching Out] Review

By Maychiri's Thoughts - October 26, 2023

Aww only one item for today! But it’s a luxe item! This is the Essie Spring 2022 Collection Nail Polish, shade 836/Keep Branching Out!
 
 
I have always wanted to have an Essie or two! OPI is class, of course, but Essie is in that range too, so I wanted to see if it is as good as OPI. It’s just a tad too expensive for me without any discounts... luckily, Müller had a few Essie nail polishes at 50% off! They were all from the Spring 2022 Limited Edition, but I don’t mind! So what if it’s a bit older? You don’t get to find Essie for only 5€ every day, so I jumped at the opportunity and bought it. It was the only bottle left and the colour seemed really pretty (I am a sucker for these grayish brown nail polishes)! No way was I going to let it go – no, no, I had to have it! Finally, now I have not one, but two Essies! One white and one this gorgeous light grayish brown! This makes me super happy! Now, the only thing left to do is to see if it actually is worth all the praise among both common folk and celebrities! And if the price is worth it, too! So, let’s see; I, for one, cannot wait anymore!
 
 
Packaging: classic for the regular Essie nail polishes, which is very elegant and looks expensive. I love how heavy the bottle feels! It’s a clear glass bottle in a short rectangular format, giving it a squat shape, like it’s vertically squashed. I like that, even if it does take more space. The cap is white and closes extremely tightly – believe me, no air is getting through this! This is also the only place where you’ll find the name of the shade, specifically, on the top of the cap where there’s a little sticker. The text is white, a good match for the cap, and it just looks great against the light brown background. There’s the classic giant Essie logo, in both text and embossed format! It’s the embossed logo that truly makes it expensive-looking! Really gorgeous bottle! I love it!
 
 

Ingredients: nothing nourishing and also no harmful ingredients (DBP, formaldehyde, toluene). The scent is unbelievably intense! Like, Essie isn’t fooling around! It’s extremely chemical, like most nail polishes, but dialed up to not 11, but like 33! It actually started to burn my nose on the inside a bit! This is definitely not a nail polish you’d want to sniff! The expiration date is 24 months after opening.
 

 
 
The brush is a flat brush that is thin and long. It picks up a generous amount of polish, much more than you need for one nail. This is a superb brush! It applies polish perfectly evenly and is very precise, ensuring that the entirety of the nail gets the right amount of polish. And because it is so precise, it’s easy to paint the sides of nails without making too big of a mess. I usually prefer wider brushes, but this one is almost perfect despite being much thinner than I’m used to. A truly professional brush!
 
 
 

Oh my god! The colour! I was afraid it would be too much like caramel, like that warm, orange toned brown because that’s what it looked like on pictures online. I wouldn’t mind it that much, but I definitely prefer cool toned browns much more. And would you look at that – this is a very cool brown with a lot of gray undertones that makes it look so elegant and so pretty and just perfect! It’s not at all like in the official Essie pictures! And I couldn’t be happier about that – for once! This colour is exactly the kind I love, so imagine just how ecstatic I was when I painted the first nail and saw it! It is truly love at first swipe! So, in more details, this is a cool brown that is almost taupe, but slightly more pink. It honestly reminds me of hot cocoa when you don’t put enough cocoa in and it’s all pale. 
 
In any case, a gorgeous nude everyday colour! Perfect for really any occasion, be it casual or formal. And it doesn’t even wash my pale skin out – it actually gives it more warmth visually. Astonishing!
 

And the formula! Oh it is so amazing! I cannot explain why exactly, but it feels expensive – like, it feels like it’s on another level of quality compared to 90% of my other nail polishes. It’s quite similar actually to the formula the OPI Bonfire Serenade has, which is, curiously, another expensive, quality nail polish. It’s relatively thin, but it’s not at all watery. It’s actually beautifully silky, which makes it extremely easy to use. It’s not at all gelly, which is what I am used to, but this thin, silky formula feels much better to use. It never looks streaky or uneven, or even messy, for that matter! And, I don’t know why, but this formula makes my cuticles look much better than they are; I usually have problematic cuticles but with this nail polish they actually look healthy! 
 

 
 
One coat is already opaque and perfectly even, so you could stop there. I went and added another coat just to see what it would look like and it’s even better now! The colour is exactly as it is supposed to be and it looks perfect; not at all thick yet still rich and completely opaque. It really looks expensive and high quality! The texture is highly glossy.
 
 
 
 
 

Longevity sadly isn’t quite as good as I hoped it would be. It is definitely better than most other polishes, but it is just not as exceptional as it should be, I think. So, it does get a little scratched up, but it’s barely noticeable, even if you aren’t careful, so that’s great. Although I would for sure suggest applying a top coat, just in case. Besides that it has pretty good longevity, although it is not immune to chipping. It started to chip on day 3, which isn’t really what I expected from an Essie, even if they were tiny chips, barely visible. Most of the chips happened while I was lacing my shoes, which, I admit, I wasn’t doing carefully, so it is a miracle there wasn’t more damage. The next day there was a bit more damage across a few more nails. A hair wash, which is the most critical point, did damage it further, but not by a whole lot. 
 
There was chipping along the free edges of most nails, which is super disappointing. So, in the end, it looked rather bad. I expected more from Essie... this is just sad. And it makes me sad, too. Also, I noticed some air bubbles. I’m not sure what caused it, as my nails weren’t that damaged; maybe I didn’t wait long enough between the two coats or maybe it reacted with the drying drops somehow. I don’t know. In any case, they aren’t too visible anyways, so it doesn’t really matter all that much.
 
 
Oh my, it’s perhaps the easiest nail polish to remove, and I am not exaggerating! It only takes a few seconds to fully remove it; barely any rubbing, too! Fantastic! And of course, no stains. I was so surprised by this, like, just a few turns in the Ebelin Express Remover and that’s it?? Wow!
 
 
All in all, while this is certainly a good nail polish, it’s not excellent like I expected it to be. I mean, it’s an Essie, for crying out loud, and that comes with a certain reputation, that it is much better than standard nail polishes. Sadly, the longevity isn’t that better. I wish it were. I honestly do. But it’s just slightly better than other nail polish when it comes to chipping, only starting to chip on day 3. This isn’t good. Especially not for the regular price of an Essie. I expected it to last 7 days no problem, as it should if it’s a favourite of celebrities (hell, the favourite nail polish of the late Queen Elizabeth II was an Essie) and such a darling among professionals. But nope, after that initial chipping it only got much worse over the next two days; in the end, after 5 days, it looked bad, with edge chipping on almost all of my nails. And it wasn’t that minor, either. This is by far the biggest problem this nail polish has. In fact, it’s pretty much the only problem, but it is a big one, one I cannot ignore or pretend like it doesn’t matter. Well, that’s the bad. Now, about the good, because there is such good to talk about! Aside from the problems with chipping, in terms of everything else this nail polish justifies its price and reputation. The brush is fantastic, applying nail polish perfectly evenly and thickly, giving you professional looking nails each time! And the formula is just divine! It’s perfectly thin, not at all watery and it just feels expensive! And it looks expensive, too! I don’t know why, but it definitely looks high-end, much more than most other nail polishes that I have! And the colour, oh my god! It’s legit perfect! It’s a nude grayish light brown, perfect for my pale skin, although it would look great on a wide variety of skintones. However, the pictures on Essie’s site don’t do it justice; it looks almost caramel brown there, when, in reality, there are 0 orange undertones here! And that’s exactly why it is so perfect! I am literally in love with this colour, it is so much better than what it looked like it would be! I can already tell I am going to be wearing it often for any occasion I can think of! However, all the perfection aside, the bad longevity really left a sour taste in my mouth. I was left feeling disappointed and slightly sad that it’s not everything it was made out to be. OPI seems to still be a bit better, at least for now. And that’s such a shame, that such a professional nail polish has such mundane problems still... it makes me sad. Of course, a good base + top coat would probably fix all the problems with the longevity, but on its own, it is just not what it should have been. Not what I expected. But it’s a great polish otherwise! Just remember to use protective base/top coats and it’ll be 100% perfect then. So, yeah, I would recommend this nail polish (or any other Essie, for that matter) if you are looking for professional-looking nails. Just try to get it on some sort of discount because I don’t feel like it’s actually worth 10+ euro. Oh well... I am still so glad I decided to branch out and finally try an Essie, no matter what the results may be!
 
 
 
Rating: 8/10
 
 
Would buy again? YES (but only with a discount, the performance isn’t quite as amazing as I thought it would be to justify RRP)




 

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