Essie Bikini So Teeny Review and Swatch!

Hi everyone! Today I have for you a pretty polish done by a great brand that I enjoy, but has often been a little bit too far on the pricey side for me, a broke teenager, to afford. But, the lovely Michelle from Manic Talons gave this to me. Which I appreciate a lot. 
So here it is, Essie Bikini So Teeny. This color is almost one of those lavender blurples. But it's just enough on the blue side that it's not. It's a creme with subtle silver micro shimmer in it (which I couldn't really see much of on the nail).

Application

I had some trouble with it. It went on kind of streaky and sometimes looked lumpy on the edges of my nail. I had to re-do my middle finger three times. Three. So the formula could be better.

Look

Although I'm not sure that it totally agrees with my skin tone, it's a cute color. I think it probably would look good on people with less red and pink undertones in their skin then I do. It also ended up with what looks like a tiny bit of bubbling. In it's defense though, I'm not 100% sure if the bubbles are from the polish or the top coat. I've had some difficulties with the top coat I had bubbling. I might re-do the swatches in the future with a different top coat to see if that was the problem. It also could've been a combination of both the polish and the top coat.

You can really see what i'm talking about in this picture.

Price

Retail $8.99, but I received this one as a gift, as I stated above.

Overall

I think for the higher price Essie could've done better on the formula. It's a cute color but I'm not really sure if I like it enough to go through the application process again. But although it wasn't overly great, it definitely wasn't the worst formula i've seen in a polish. The price of the brand makes me a little more critical of it though. Especially with the bubbling.

So, what do you think? Do you thing the bubbles are the polish or the top coat? Or both? Hmm..