Is it a Dupe? Guest post from Julie of Wishes of a Blue-Eyed Girl!

Hello hello, Lit from Within readers!!  The lovely Nidia and I have decided to swap blogs for the night.  My name is Julie, but I'm also known as the Blue-Eyed Girl, from Wishes of a Blue-Eyed Girl!  When Nidia and I were discussing the swap, I just knew what I wanted to do - I wanted to post my normal Comparison Thursday series on her blog for the week!  She, in turn, injected some much needed nail art on my blog.  Go check out her delicate and pretty design here.


Ok, so on to the subject at hand!  Comparisons!  I abhor purchasing duplicates.  It drives me crazy!  Typically, if I find a duplicate or a near duplicate, I have to purge the one with the worst attributes, i.e. takes too long to dry, not pigmented enough, formula is a pain in the tukus to work with, etc.  I'm also trying to cut down on my hoardish tendencies, so I've also been purging near duplicates.  Lastly, I like doing these comparisons to help people find near duplicates of hard to find polishes to help sate their lemmings.  Often times, though, something I think may work well in my head for a comparison doesn't really pan out after all.  Tonight, I'm going to show you what I thought may be close dupes where one is hard to find and the other is not, Rescue Beauty Lounge Scrangie and Elevation Polish Pic de Subenuix.  Unfortunately, these two aren't even really near duplicates.  The color scheme is in the same family, but, as you will soon see, one is much darker than the other.

The basic color scheme for these polishes is a purple base with teal shimmer.

Elevation Pic de Subenuix

Pic de Subenuix is more of a blurple than a true purple.  The teal flash is uber present here giving the polish a vivid teal glow.  

Application was fantastic, like with most Elevations.  I didn't have to add any thinner, and it didn't pool or drag.  It's not a one coater like Pic de Sotllo, but took around 3 coats for full opacity.  The first coat is a little streaky, but it builds nicely with a few coats.  The dry time was great and didn't require too much time to be dry enough that I could go to sleep.

Scrangie

Scrangie's purple base leans red versus Pic de Subenuix's blurple base.  The teal shimmer is much more pronounced in the bottle than it is on the nail, which was disappointing.  

Also disappointing was the formula.  I mean, seriously?  You pay that much for a polish with a barely workable formula?  

Scrangie is one of those polishes that is so thick that it wants to stick to itself and not spread out on the nail.  Then, it was clumpy when you went to add another layer.  I was just really disappointed all around.  In my opinion, it's just not worth the astronomical prices people are asking in blog sales or other sales forums.  If RBL re-releases it, sure, grab one.  However, don't pay a bunch of money for it.  It's not really worth it.

Pantone Parachute Purple

In the true spirit of teamwork, Nidia has take photos of an alleged Scrangie dupe, Pantone Parachute Purple.  Keep in mind that our lighting set ups are different and we don't have the polishes side by side, but it appears that Parachute Purple is closer to being a dupe of Scrangie than Pic de Subenuix.

It does, however, lean more blue than red, so they don't appear to be exact duplicates.  If I get my hands on one after my no-buy, I'll definitely update this comparison post.


And here are the obligatory refrigerator photos.  I find that I can coax even the most shy duochromes by photographing in the refrigerator.

So, there you have it!  Of the two I own, I vastly prefer Pic de Subenuix.  However, if you're a collector, I could see the allure of Scrangie.


You can purchase Rescue Beauty Lounge polishes at their online store.  Follow Ji's blog and Facebook for updates and news.  Elevation Polishes may be purchased at Lulu's Bigcartel store and Llarowe.  You can follow Lulu at her blog, I Dig Brown Nail Polish, for news and updates.  Lastly, you can purchase Pantone polishes at Sephora.


Thanks so much for reading!  Come check out Nidia's post on my blog today, too!  It's gorgeous, so well worth the extra click.


Which of the three is your favorite?

Thanks so much, Julie!  I loved the comparisons.  One of these days I'll get up the courage to start getting rid of my dupes!

*I was not financially compensated for this
post.  All items in this review were
purchased by me for my own use.  The
opinions are completely my own based on my experience.  For more information, please see my
Disclosure Policy in the tab above.*