Revlon 370 Smoldering Swatches and Review

Normally I'm not a fan of Revlon's polish formula, so I tend to not pay much attention to their displays when I'm shopping. I think I'm starting to change my mind about them, though, because I've bought six polishes in a row from them that I've absolutely loved, this one included. This color, called Smoldering, made me so happy to see because it made me think of some of the awesome old colors they used to have, like Steel Magic and Khaki Zing. Smoldering is not a dupe for those, obviously, but it is a shimmery, sparkly duochrome with a seriously improved formula.

Revlon Smoldering. The base of this is a very shiny chrome-like frost with a silvery-green tint. It has swirls of really fine, foily shimmer, too fine to be glitter but big enough to notice on their own. The best part about this is the strong teal/green to silver-purple color shift. It doesn't look very strong in my pictures, but it is in real life. At an extreme angle it even has a bit of reddish flash. The shiny, chrome-like base, the twinkly little silver sparkles and the strong purple/green duochrome make this one amazing polish.

To be honest, I didn't have high hopes for this one when I picked it up off the shelf. A lot of drugstore polishes that look duochrome in the bottle end up not being so on the nail, but not with this one. This one is awesome. I really, really like it. And what I like most about it is that it's not discontinued or hard to find!

The formula is great, too. Normally I find Revlon polish to be runny and hard to control, and shades like these are usually sheer. This one is a good, even texture. Thin but not runny, not thick or bubbly like some frosty formulas. The dry time is much better than the old Revlons I'm used to. The brushstrokes fade as the polish dries so it looks more shiny than streaky. I did three coats, but it was opaque at two. Three coats makes the duochrome effect stronger, and four coats might look even better but it's not necessary.

I found this at Walgreens along with one called Sheer Pearl, which has the same purple/teal shimmer particles but in a pearly white base. Both are gorgeous, which makes me even happier about the improved formula on these. Viva la duochrome!