I’ve always avoided medium brown nail polish because I always thought I didn’t like it. Then suddenly, about a month ago, when everyone was posting colorful nails, I just knew I needed a medium brown nail polish in my life. I turned my whole nail polish storage unit upside down, but I couldn’t find a simple medium brown. I spend quite a while finding my perfect medium brown, I created a Pinterest board dedicated to brown nail polish, and read every blog post about brown polish. My first pick would have been Essie Hot Coco (even the name is cute!), but that polish is not that easy to find. Then I came across Essie Expressie Cold brew crew, but I wasn’t convinced by the swatches. That’s when Clothing optional came into play. Whenever I checked the webshop I often use to buy my Essie polish, Clothing optional always seemed to be listed as the most popular shade. When Amazon had a sale on Essie polish, I decided to pull the trigger and pick up Clothing optional.
Clothing optional is described by Essie as a lighter Sienna brown. Before I had seen this shade, I had no idea what this actually meant. Now I understand it better. While most medium brown shades lean often orange or grey, Clothing optional leans redder. At first, I wasn’t sure whether I liked that. But let me tell you, after trying it, it is just amazing. No wonder they have decided to let this shade stay in the core collection! The formula of Clothing optional is also great, almost opaque in one coat and definitely opaque in two. The way it applied was also perfection. I couldn’t wish for anything more.
Compared to other shades I have in my collection, Clothing Optional is probably closest to Essie Teacup half full. Teacup half full is filled with golden shimmers, but the brown undertone of the base is quite similar to the color of Clothing optional. I was quite surprised that Angora cardi was also sort of close to clothing optional. The main difference is, of course, that Angora cardi is much darker and a little bit redder. I expected Eternal optimist to be close to Clothing optional, but honestly, they couldn’t be more different.
Clothing optional was originally released in the 2017 Wild Nude collection, which was an awesome collection. I have no clue why I didn’t pick up Clothing optional immediately when this collection was released, but I am happy I picked up this shade eventually. The story goes that Clothing optional is also quite similar to the elusive Essie Sorrento yourself. So that’s one more reason to love this shade. At least in some stores here in Europe, Clothing optional is added to the core collection. You can always find it of course on Amazon over here (affiliate link).
