Julep Maven Review and Giveaway!

I’m kind of in love with the Julep Maven subscription. For $20/month, I receive a prettily wrapped package of 2 nail polishes plus either a 3rd polish or a beauty product. It’s a super fun treat to receive in the mail!

I posted about Julep Maven in April, and Julep polishes have shown up on several of my manis (most have ended up on my Instagram feed – katealamode – and I’ve been compiling them in a Facebook album too). And now I’m super excited to announce that I’ve teamed up with Julep Maven for this review and giveaway! Read on for the details. :)

Julep gave me a choice of one of their intro boxes to review, so I chose the “It Girl” intro box since it included nail polishes I haven’t received in my normal subscription.

Julep Maven It Girl intro box.

I always love how the box is wrapped up like a present. :)

The It Girl box came with three polishes: Jessica, a light blue crème (in person it has cool tones, like a light periwinkle); Brooke, a sheer purple shimmer; and Mandy, an intense coral crème.

Nail polishes from the Julep Maven It Girl intro box: Jessica, Brooke, and Mandy.

I started out with Mandy. This polish has a really smooth, easy-to-apply texture. It definitely requires 2 coats, because I found with 1 coat it was slightly sheer. But I paint fairly thin coats and always assume I’m going to have to do 2 coats, anyway. As you can see below, it’s a very bold coral – super saturated and on the darker side.

Mani with two coats of Julep Mandy polish, an intense coral crème.

Then I tried out Brooke. Like Mandy, Brooke is very smooth (despite the fact that it’s a shimmer) and easy-to-apply. I applied 2 coats, which gave my nails a purple hue and lots of sparkle.

Mani with two coats of Julep Brooke polish, a sheer purple shimmer.

I ended with Jessica. Jessica has a much thicker texture, so it was more difficult to apply. But I REALLY loved the color. It’s a cool light blue – more of a light periwinkle than the baby blue that Julep describes it as. I ended up doing 2 coats, but it was thick enough that just 1 coat would have been fine.

Mani with two coats of Julep Jessica polish, a light periwinkle blue.

And just for kicks, I added one coat of Brooke. I thought the effect was very pretty – a nice hint of sparkle, and just the slightest purple hue. In the photo below, the 2 nails in the middle have 1 coat of Brooke over 2 coats of Jessica, while the other 2 nails just have 2 coats of Jessica.

Mani with Julep Jessica and Brooke polishes.

If you want to give the Julep Maven subscription a try, use the promo code MAVENINTRO & you’ll get your intro box for a penny! Just head over to the Julep website, take the Julep Maven style quiz, and sign up! Of course, you can choose a different style if you don’t love the one recommended by the quiz. And it is a subscription, so you’ll automatically receive boxes for future months unless you cancel or opt out for the month. (That’s actually one of the great things about Julep Maven: you can choose not to receive a box for a month, or even send it to a friend as a gift!)

UPDATE (7/2/12): CONGRATULATIONS TO CARLEY L. FOR WINNING THE RAFFLE! You can also enter my giveaway raffle for a Julep Maven intro box! It’s super easy: just head over to the Rafflecopter app on my Facebook page and follow the instructions there! You can log into the app using either your Facebook account or an email address, so you don’t need to have a Facebook account to participate. (Note: The giveaway is only valid for Canadian and US residents.)

Let me know in the comments below what your Julep Maven style profile is!

[All photos by me. Julep Maven It Girl box and raffle prize both provided by Julep.]

Spring Mani with Julep Maven

A couple of months ago I signed up for Julep Maven. Once a month, for $20, I receive a box of nail polish/beauty products (either 2 nail polishes and a beauty product or 3 nail polishes). I’ve never done a subscription service like this before, but I’m really enjoying it!

Getting the package in the mail is a nice treat and I’m having fun playing around with the polishes. I used to paint my nails all the time but then I got out of the habit — this has inspired me to start doing my nails again! (Well, I’ve also been inspired by posts from other bloggers and pictures/tutorials I’ve come across on Pinterest.)

Recently, Julep offered a “Spring Mystery Box” – for $20, receive $60-$200 worth of polish & beauty products. I decided to spring for it (I swear that pun wasn’t intended when I started writing this sentence) and this is what I got:

Julep Maven Spring Mystery Box

I totally lucked out! Of course I had to try out my new polish, and I’m really happy with all of it.

Spring Manicure with Julep's Anne, Hayden, and Melissa polishes

I painted most of my nails using 2 coats of “Anne” (lightish/medium violet crème), and painted an accent nail on each hand using “Hayden” (peach crème). Then I added a coat of Melissa (opalescent shimmer), and topped my nails off with Julep’s Fast Dry Topcoat.

Spring Manicure with Julep's Anne, Hayden, and Melissa polishes

Also, I just discovered that if you sign up for Julep Maven and enter the code “PENNY”, you get your first box for $0.01. (At least for the time being!) So you can try it out for almost nothing, if you want. I definitely recommend it! I got my first box using a similar code and I figured I’d cancel afterwards, but I liked it so much that I kept the subscription. And it’s nice that Julep makes it easy to skip a month without completely canceling, if you want. (Or you can just outright cancel it.)

What do you think of subscription services? Is there one you love & would recommend? Or one to avoid?