China Glaze Metro Collection Fall 2011 Swatches and Review

China Glaze's 2011 fall collection is in the same vein as the other fall collections we've seen so far- murky, smoky, green- and brown-heavy with just a bit of purple. And I must say... much better in person than in the promo pictures. Take a look!


Brownstone. Right away this struck me as being similar to Color Club Charity Ball, which I sorta... hated. The main difference is that Brownstone is, well, more brown! Less red. Very much a rust or a burnt sienna. Warm, earthy, a little orangey. And now I have to say, I like this less red version! Very, very fall.


CG In The City. This one morphs a bit depending on the angle and lighting because there's so many kinds of glitter in here. From what I can tell, there's dusty purple, gold, silver and bronze. There might be more colors, hard to tell. The glitter is really fine and tiny, but it's not sheer. I did three coats. The end result is smoky and sparkly!



City Siren. A dirty, blue-based red creme. This one isn't a clean, bright red- this one is smoky looking. Sort of a cooler-toned version of Urban Decay F-Bomb. Makes me think of those old cosmetic ads where they always matched the nail and lip colors, and the nails were oval shaped.



Concrete Catwalk. A dark grey creme with a bit of blue to it. Pretty straightforward... Can't really think of much to say besides that! It's pretty but not terribly unique.




Lofty Ambitions. Makes me think of a darker, dirtier version of Cherry Crystal or one of those old China Glaze red shimmers. This one is more of a wine color- dark burgundy, a little silver shimmer running through it but not a whole lot of it. Not frosty, just subtle silver veining.




Midtown Magic. This is a very dark purple base- so dark it's nearly black. Touch of brown to it. Lots of very shiny flaky gold shimmer that looks bronzy through the layers of purple. Reminds me of OPI Designer Series Mystery with smaller shimmer flecks. Maybe even a lighter, less shimmery China Glaze Side Saddle.



Skyscraper. I know... I took an inappropriately large number of pictures of this one, but I couldn't help it! It's so photogenic! It's a deep, dusty blue jelly with a lot of little silver glitter. It's not as bright and vibrant as it looks here- it's more faded looking. It's a denim blue. I've only seen pictures of it, but it makes me think of the old China Glaze Denim and Diamonds blue... Maybe a cross between that and Dorothy Who?


Street Chic. A nice taupe creme. Little bit of purple to it, but just a hint, keeps it from looking too warm and muddy. At first I thought it was like Ingrid without the shimmer, but it's even warmer than that. As much as I love these colors, I can't help but get tired of seeing one in every collection. I'm all taupe/griege/gruple'd out!



Traffic Jam. In the bottle this looked like an awesome neon purple... But when I put it on, I realized that it was BERRY. My nemesis, berry! It was a trap! It looks more pink in the picture, but it has a more berry look in real life. I guess it's not that bad for a berry, but really not my thing.



Trendsetter. Yes! Now this is what I wanted to see! It's this year's Classic Camel- one of those crazy ugly-pretty colors. Trendsetter is a dingy dijon mustard base with a bunch of avocado mixed in... That actually sounds really good, maybe I shouldn't try to describe nail polish while I'm hungry. Anyway... The murky dirty yellow-green is accented with shiny yellow gold shimmer pearls to keep it from looking chalky. Love this. Absolutely love it.


Urban-Night. A vampy dark purple creme. The sunlight brings out the base color best, but the indoor picture is more accurate in terms of darkness and intensity. It's a red grape or plum color. It's lighter than that one that was in OPI Touring America.



Westside Warrior. Drab olive! I was hoping there would be more olives this fall. This one is smoky and greyed-out like all the others, but not as yellow toned. This one has a bit more blue to it. It's also a little darker (and it dries darker than it looks in the bottle) than the others, too.

The formula on these was good but extremely thick. I mean... really thick. But! Once you get a feel for the thickness of it, it's not hard to apply. It's smooth. All the shades are really opaque and you only need one or two coats. I did two coats of all but the glitters which are three (and they needed the third). Drying time was surprisingly good for such a thick formula. I preferred the thicker, more opaque formula on this collection to OPI's thinner, looser fall collection formula.

This collection has some of the same issues that OPI Touring America had- good colors, but easily duplicated. The purple creme, the grey creme, the taupe creme, the red creme... Not unique.

Despite that, this one does have a more unique shade selection (Skyscraper, CG In The City, Trendsetter, Brownstone, and even Lofty Ambitions) so it feels newer and not so recycled. I love the color selection- more camo green! Dijon! GLITTER!


For the most part, I like this. My favorites are the greens and glitters and I liked the nice opaque formula. I don't like the berry and the red isn't a type of red I usually choose (not bright enough!), but other than that, they're winners. Good smoky, murky, dirty fall colors.

(This was sent to me for review.)