Ciaté Mini Kit: Beam Me Up Lottie, Social Elite and Mineral Positivity Review, Swatches and Photos

Ciaté is a UK-based nail polish company that has nail art and fashion in mind. You may have seen their nail kits at Sephora, most famously the Caviar Manicure, where your nails are covered in tiny beads and resemble the culinary delicacy.

I've always thought that such nail art was pretty high maintenance. I don't want furry, feathery nails and I certainly don't want tiny beads glued to my nails. I can only imagine all the hair snagging that causes!

But on a recent trip to Sephora I noticed that you can now buy mini bottles of some of their polishes. Three mini bottles (0.17 fl. oz./5 mL) for $22.50 packaged in a cute little box, which makes it perfect for gifting. You can make your own "kit" by choosing a regular nail polish and two topcoats, or two regular polishes and a topcoat. I took the opportunity to buy three shades that stood out to me, not for their ability to work together. In fact, the three I bought wouldn't work together very well at all.

The three polishes I bought are:

•  Mineral Positivity (Mineral Effect Onyx), a textured matte black with multicoloured glitter.
• Social Elite (Tweed), a multi-dimensional topcoat with gold micro glitter and blue and black shard glitter.
• Beam Me Up Lottie (Matte Glitter), a matte multi-dimensional topcoat with pink and gold chunky glitter.

L-R: Mineral Positivity, Social Elite and Beam Me Up Lottie

To give you a sense of the size of these bottles, I photographed them next to a regular sized Essie polish and OPI polish. The Ciaté bottles are tiny, but if I think about how often I actually finish a bottle of nail polish, I have no issues with their size.

Let's look at each shade one by one, starting with Beam Me Up Lottie. Beam Me Up Lottie has quickly become my favourite of three. It's a matte glitter shade comprised of chunky, jagged glitter in soft pink and gold/silver in a cloudy mattifying polish. 

The mattifying polish simply cuts any shine to the polish or your bare nail beneath, as below. The glitter has more shine when applied than it does in the bottle. The consistency is on the thick side and it can take some extra effort to apply depending on how much glitter you want on your nails. I found that it worked better to dab the brush on my nails rather than drag it across as I normally would with an ordinary nail polish. 

It was tough to capture the effect with the flash on my camera since it's so reflective. This is a very cool polish that you could wear if you just wanted a glitter polish or if you want to create nail art with it. I've been wearing it on top of dark purple and dark wine-coloured polishes but just on my pinky finger. It looks really cool, especially when my nails are longer than usual.

Two applications of Beam Me Up, Lottie on bare nail.

Two applications of Beam Me Up, Lottie on bare nail.

I love the chunky, jagged glitter flecks. The matte aspect of it helps to temper the GLITTER aspect, which makes me feel comfortable wearing it. Below, I applied it over two coats of Marc Jacobs Petra, which is fairly metallic and reflective itself. With Beam Me Up, Lottie on top the metallic sheen of Petra is masked but the colour comes through. This was two coats of Beam Me Up Lottie.

Beam Me Up Lottie on top of Marc Jacobs Petra

Beam Me Up Lottie on top of Marc Jacobs Petra

Beam Me Up Lottie on top of Marc Jacobs Petra

As I mentioned earlier, I've been wearing Beam Me Up Lottie on just my pinky nail over top of deep purple and wine-coloured polishes. If the rest of my manicure is super-shiny, like when I'm wearing my CDN Vinylux shade in Dark Dahlia, the matte of Beam Me Up Lottie is off, so I just apply a top coat over it to boost the sheen. Over time I find that the glitter gets dry and can start to lift up off the nail, which can be a bit annoying. Reapplying a top coat may be necessary.

Grade: A

Another of the three polishes I picked up that I believe is meant as a top coat primarily, is Social Elite, one of Ciaté's "tweed" polishes, meant to mimic the look of the loose-knit, woolen fabric. It's a combination of a tiny gold glitter in a clear polish with long, narrow bright blue and black glitter pieces. Like Beam Me Up Lottie, it's best applied with dabs of the brush, and not drags across the nail like with normal nail polish. This one is a bit more "solid" a polish though, with the fine gold glitter making it seem more opaque than Beam Me Up Lottie. 

Here is Social Elite applied on my bare nail, two coats worth. You can see how the fine gold glitter makes it look almost like a solid colour where the light hits it. 

Two applications of Social Elite on my bare nail.

In the photo below, I angled my finger so it showed the texture of the blue and black flecks.

Two applications of Social Elite on my bare nail.

And here is Social Elite on top of Sally Hansen's Jungle Gem, a rich and lovely dark teal. This was a particularly challenging polish to photograph. The glitter reflects and doesn't quite capture the texture of this polish, which mimics the weave of tweed fabric. The teal peeks through and adds some depth. This was 2-3 coats of Social Elite on top of two coats of Jungle Gem. 

2-3 coats of Social Elite on top of two coats of Jungle Gem

2-3 coats of Social Elite on top of two coats of Jungle Gem

Below I've angled my nail so you can see some of the blue/black texture. It really does have a tweedy effect.

2-3 coats of Social Elite on top of two coats of Jungle Gem

And here I've photographed it without flash to try to capture the texture. It's really quite multi-faceted and textured. Overall I find it a bit flashy with the gold glitter though I do like the texture and the tweed-effect.

2-3 coats of Social Elite on top of two coats of Jungle Gem

Grade: B

Last but not least is Mineral Postivity, the only one of the three that is not meant to be worn on top of another shade. Ciaté describes it as a Mineral Effect Onyx. Mineral Positivity is a thick, textured black and antique gold polish that reminds me of Butter LONDON's Gobsmacked. 

It's texture is thick and heavy and dryish. It goes on easily and needs probably only two coats to be opaque. It's not as coarse as Gobsmacked but it is just as rough at the edges which make it more prone to chipping and snagging on fabrics (one of my pet peeves). 

Two coats of Mineral Positivity

Two coats of Mineral Positivity

I was absent-minded and went ahead and started applying top coat to my manicure before realising that Mineral Positivity isn't meant to be shiny. I luckily figured this out after applying top coat to just my thumbnail. See below. I mean, it works fine, so if I wanted this to be a textured and shiny black-gold manicure, I could add a top coat. I personally think it looks better without. Also, it sucks up the top coat like crazy!

In the photo below you can see the rough edge along the nail tip.

Two coats of Mineral Positivity under one coat of Seche Vite Dry Fast Top Coat.

And to compare, here's the un-topcoated polish. It has some shine, but it's muted. 

Two coats of Mineral Positivity

Two coats of Mineral Positivity

Two coats of Mineral Positivity

I like Mineral Positivity but, like Gobsmacked, it can be high maintenance. My nails were scratchy and snagged on things and I found I picked at the polish a bit in absent-minded moments. But it is a very cool, interesting, unique look. 

I can't see this being very effective in doing nail art though. It's a demanding polish and would be challenging to control applying on top of another polish, and sucking up any polish layered on top. But maybe I'm wrong - has anyone done nail art using one of these super-textured polishes?

Grade: B

Of the three, my favourite is Beam Me Up Lottie and I've worn it a few times since I bought them. I think this gift set idea where you pick your own shades is a great idea and wonderful for someone like me who hasn't tried Ciaté shades before. It's a great way to sample some of the types of polish they carry.

Are you a Ciaté fan? Tell us what your favourite polishes are!

C.