Thursday, May 30, 2013

An OPI San Francisco breakfast event

Hi ladies :D You have no idea what it means for me to able to even type this post up! In fact, I think it is every nail addicts dream to be able to have the opportunity to attend product launch events and in this circumstance, I had the distinct pleasure of going to OPI's breakfast event. To make it even more memorable, George Schaeffer, founder of OPI, was present and gave us all an insight into the brand.

OPI George Schaeffer

I actually arrived at the event pretty early (paranoia hit me and I kind of over-estimated travel time) so I actually walked around the area a bit first and took some photos of the scenery. The breakfast was going to be at The Sailors Club in Rose Bay, aka gorgeous sea views. It was a pity the day was overcast and although the rain held off (obviously it wouldn't rain, because I took the time to lug my umbrella around), it was a rather cloudy day. Still, I was able to catch the sun before heading indoors for the event.

The first person I met was the wonderful Lisa from OPI's Australian PR company. It was fabulous getting to meet her in person and I totally regret not being to snag a photo with her! After getting my name badge I was warmly invited to get my nails done. With shades from the upcoming collections, of course ;)

Oh choices, choices, so many choices! Again, I didn't manage to snap a shot of the table set up - so many nail polishes! - but you get to see what nail polish I decided to go with instead. I was actually torn between OPI Alcatraz...rocks and Peace & love & polish but in the tend, I decided to go with Alcatraz....rocks. In hindsight, I should have just asked for an accent nail like Michelle did, but oh well! You may see one in a future post instead :)

OPI Alcatraz...rocks

Afterwards, lots of mingling happened as more ladies trickled in. It started to occur to me at that point that many of the ladies attending the event represented magazines or salons, making this opportunity even more special for me. I heard that there were a few other blogger ladies present, but I only had the chance to meet Michelle in person, and it was great getting to know her in real life!

In this time, I also took the chance to go around the room and take as many photos as I could of the upcoming product launches. Prepare to drool, ladies! ;)

I'll start with the recently released Bond Girls collection. Seeing the bottles in person are even better than swatches online! They're all utterly amazing and I know I will especially adore Jinx ♥

OPI Bond girls collection

Next up is the cute Couture de Minnie collection, which will be available in June.

OPI Couture de Minnie

OPI Couture de Minnie

Of course, the namesake of the breakfast was also prominently featured and displayed throughout the room. The San Francisco collection is a huge collection consisting of 15 nail polishes.

OPI San Francisco collection

I also discovered OPI's Holiday collection for 2013 displayed and trust me, I almost literally drooled over this one! Having not heard or read any information of it yet, it was an extremely pleasant surprise to see it featured for all to see. It looks like OPI will be collaborating with Mariah Carey once again and will provide an additional 6 Liquid Sand nail polishes in the collection. I have to admit, I didn't even realise the collection was filled with reds until I looked at my photos again. I was too drawn to the glitters, shimmers and darker shades along the left, as well as the liquid sands to even give the reds my attention!

OPI Mariah Carey holiday collection 2013

OPI Mariah Carey holiday collection 2013

OPI Mariah Carey holiday collection 2013

And omg, there is going to be a GOLD AND SILVER leaf top coat! Can the Holiday collection look any better already? :D

OPI Gold and silver leaf top coat

Outdoors on the verandah, I made another small discovery of product launches. Really, this morning just couldn't get any better :P There was also a small display of the Matte top coat, along with some fine gold and silver glitter pots. I loved the display nails which showcased some shiny and matte top coat nail art designs :)

OPI Matte top coat

OPI Matte top coat

OPI Matte top coat

OPI's annual Breast Cancer Awareness Pink of Hearts 2013 collection reveals another glitter bomb. The multicoloured glitters remind me of a pastel version of Rainbow connection.

OPI Pink of hearts 2013

OPI Pink of hearts 2013

And of course, the annual Halloween 2013 collection was also sighted. Rolling bones looks the most interesting of the four.

OPI Halloween collection 2013

OPI Halloween collection 2013

After all this, I finally sat down to gobble down some fruit from the fruit platter before listening to George Schaeffer speak about OPI.

fruit platter

George is a super funny guy and made the atmosphere really light-hearted. He gave us an overview of the upcoming products OPI would be releasing and the influence OPI has on creating trends. It was absolutely amazing to hear the influence all women have on OPI.

OPI George Schaeffer

There was a chance to ask questions afterwards and this question really stood out - "How do you coordinate the colours in a collection to match the seasons for us down under?" And of course, George being his witty and humorous self answered, "Well, women don't really care about seasonally appropriate colours, they care more about being up-to-date with the current trends."

Lightbulb moment! How many times have ladies in Australia been frustrated with the fact that current collections available in the northern hemisphere were not going to be available until 6 months later? *ding ding ding* Yep, I certainly have been! I found George's answer to be so simple and straightforward - simply provide current products worldwide regardless of seasons because in his words - "Seasons don't exist". I presume not in nail polish land, at least.

I really got to mull over this as I dug into my yummy breakfast - sugar cured ocean trout on brioche with dill dressing ♥ I'm actually not a raw fish kinda gal, but even I found this delicious!

Trout breakfast

All in all, this has been the most amazing opportunity for me. For a small blogger in the most minute corner of the interwebs to be attending an event from such a large and well known brand, this event has really humbled me. The morning ended with a fabulous goodie bag from OPI, of which I am itching to dig through and admire ;)

Of course, be on the look out for my swatches of the San Francisco collection, as well as the Bond Girls and Couture de Minnie collections in future posts!

-edit- Swatches and review of the San Francisco collection can be found here! :)

Thank you for reading through this unbelievably long post!
~Sharon

21 comments:

  1. OMG how did you get to be amongst all this fabulousness? It looks like a dream come true! btw I have spotted a few polishes I will be needing from the upcoming collections.
    Thank you for bringing these wonderful previews

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  2. Aw you're so lucky to have been able to attend this event! Looks like you had a blast :)

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  3. so many things to look forward to!!!!!

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  4. So glad you got closeups of everything - I didn't even manage to get to the verandah in all the madness!

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  5. Do you happen to know which one of the Halloween polishes is the glow in the dark one? I've always loved the glow in the dark ones OPI puts out :)

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  6. Soo many sand polishes)) But I can't see clearly: are All Sparkly and Gold and My Favorite Ornament sands too? Or just simple glitters?

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  7. I think my heart and wallet might explode :) What a wonderful opportunity!

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  8. how lucky! this event looks amazing. and i love that pastel glitter for breast cancer. do you know when that is coming out? thanks for the recap.

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  9. Kay @ Slightly 0bsessedMay 31, 2013 at 4:58 AM

    What an amazing experience it must have been! It's fantastic that a large brand like OPI embraces bloggers in this way. Those polishes look AMAZING! I'm especially loving the new Mariah Carey line :)

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  10. Great post, thank you for sharing! I can't wait for the Halloween line and that round Mariah glitter looks great!

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  11. I'm still in shock, I can't believe I had the privilege of attending the event - it's definitely a huge dream come true! I'm glad the previews have got you excited because I know there are several that I'll be needing too :)

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  12. Thanks Ivy! I'm still recovering, but it was a really great experience, especially to hear from George Schaeffer :)

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  13. Thanks Michelle :) It was quite hard to keep my eyes peeled for new collections really, there were too many beautiful displays for me to ogle at! ;)

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  14. They're coming, Vedrana! :)

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  15. Ooh, that didn't even cross my mind, I was that excited to just see the displays XD Sorry I'm no help but I'm sure future press releases will have more information :)

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  16. Agreeing with you there :) I didn't know I would be so into the texture trend but I'm really loving it! I'm fairly sure that the two polishes are just regular glitters, the liquid sands are swatched on the other nail displays :)

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  17. Thanks Erin, it really was a once in a life time event :) I definitely know my wallet will not be liking it when the collections roll out later on in the year ;)

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  18. Thanks fishgirl182 :) There was no official release date the the Pink of Hearts collection but going from past years' releases, I'd say it'll be available from September/October.

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  19. I agree, it's nice that larger brands like OPI are acknowledging the efforts of bloggers :) The Mariah Carey collection really looks wonderful and I can't until the end of the year for its release!

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  20. Thanks Sarah! The glitters in the Mariah Carey collection are definitely calling my name too :)

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