Essie Silk Watercolor 2015 Collection: Review and Swatches

Disclaimer: The products featured were provided for review.

New from Essie for Summer 2015 comes a line of rainbow sheers designed to be layered and mixed to create a watercolor effect on your nails. With eight mouth-watering jelly shades and a creme white base, the Essie Silk Watercolor Collection encourages you to let your creativity loose and create a polish masterpiece. To see swatches of the collection my attempt at a watercolor nail art, click.......
This collection, much like the OPI Color Paints, features eight colors with a translucent finish. Despite all being sheer, there is some variation on how intense the colors are. The drying time of these shades is longer than that of cream colors. So if you are opting to wear them on their own (as opposed to using them for nail art designs), wait a good half hour before going about your day.

Highest Bidder: 
A deep wine red, Highest Bidder is nice and pigmented. I used two coats for the swatches below.

Highest Bidder, two coats with no top coat.

Blush Stroke:
This is a very pretty pink-red. The color is very rich, two coats for the swatches below.

Blush Stroke, two coats with no top coat.

Art New-Beau:
This is a soft orange sheer. The pigmentation is less intense than Highest Bidder and Blush Stroke. I used two coats for the swatches below.

Art New-Beau, two coats with no top coat.

Muse Myself:
After my experience with the yellow OPI Sheer Tint shade from last year, I have been really afraid of sheer yellows as they tend to make my nails look sickly. Fortunately though, Muse Myself has a good amount of orange to it that the shade actually looks pretty good. I used two coats for the swatches below.

Muse Myself, two coats with no top coat.

Point of Blue:
A deep purple-blue, Point of Blue is surprisingly sheer, especially compared to the lighter shades. I had to use three coats for some of the swatches below. I'm guessing Essie diluted the color because it would otherwise appear to opaque.

Point of Blue, two or three coats with no top coat.

No Shrinking Violet:
Another very sheer color, No Shrinking Violet is soft eggplant purple. I used two coats on some nails and three on the others.

No Shrinking Violet, two or three coats with no top coat.

Love Sheen:
This is an electric pink with a really pigmented formulation. The polish is quite thick so this one was actually a bit hard to work with. I used two coats for the swatches below.

Love Sheen, two coats with no top coat.

Pen & Inky:
Last but not least is a stunning teal called Pen & Inky. The formulation for this one is great, not too sheer like the dark blue and dark purple. I used two coats in the swatches below.

Pen & Inky, two coats with no top coat.

Finally, here is my Silk Watercolor creation. I tried an abstract look by simply swiping the sheers on top of "White Page", which is a really nice white cream base. The end result actually looked pretty cool, but I definitely want to try some other techniques with these polishes as well.

Two coats of White Page as a base. Topped with Muse Myself (yellow), Blush Stroke (pink red),
Pen & Inky (teal), and Point of Blue (purple blue).

Overall:

I think this is a great collection for those that love nail art. I personally don't see myself wearing the colors on their own, not because they don't look great but because the drying time just takes too long. Compared to the OPI Color Paints, these are generally sheerer so they are better at creating that soft watercolor effect.

Availability:

The Essie Silk Watercolor 2015 Collection will be available starting July 2015.