The perfect nude! This is going to sound like nothing special (indeed it looks like nothing special in the bottle), but it totally. It just makes my nails look so done and classy. I have super pale skin, with kind of pinkish fingertips. My nails are far from perfect, so most polishes really just call attention to my short, ridged nails, raggedy cuticles and pudgy fingers. Not this! My nails actually look done and improved. So how to describe? It's an opaque beige with subtle rose hue, the finish is quite shiny, no matte, no glitters, definitely not metallic, a hint of iridescence. One coat of polish is totally transparent, two gives a magical My Nails But Better look. I use a base and top coat. Unlike most Essie polishes, this applies like a dream. Super hard to mess up, which is really saying something considering I am pretty bad at doing my own nails. I use the SH Insta Dri Top Coat (red bottle) for a perfect, goof proof finish. This is probably most flattering on super pales struggling with ruddy fingertips (yeah, I never thought ruddy finger tips were a thing until I started taking my nail game seriously, but the struggle is real). It will add a nice pop and finished look to darker skin tones. I do believe this is universally flattering. Definitely you can't go wrong in a professional or job interview setting wearing this. I will never go around with naked fingers or toes again. Will certainly repurchase.

I hated this at first. It's horribly unflattering on my nails I'm tan/olive complected. However, I just used this on a pedicure on top of Chinchilly and it's gorgeous. It made the grey slightly lighter and iridescent. Will layer on other colors going forward. I imagine this would look great on other cool-toned polishes.

This is a very slightly rose-tinted beige sheer with a soft, pearly iridescent finish. I'm not the biggest fan of nudes or of sheers, to be honest, but I quite like this and it looks very nice on my pale, cool-toned complexion. It's neither too yellow nor too pink, nor is it too "milky", and the pearly iridescent finish gives it an attractive lift to keep it from looking like corpse hands (or mannequin hands). One coat is barely perceptible, just glossy and slightly iridescent. Two coats is still fairly sheer, but more obvious as actual nail polish rather than just the gloss/iridescence. This makes very nice undies for glitters or other sheer or sheerish polishes, and, I think, it looks pretty nice just on its own (which surprises me; as I said, I'm not the biggest fan of nudes or sheers). Grabbed this kind of on a whim and I'm really glad I did.

I never thought there was such a thing as a universal "Your Nails But Better" polish but I have been proven wrong by Au Natural (I'm an NW45-46 and an Almond 7 in Bobbi Brown for reference). You really have to have this on your nails to really see its beauty come through. In the bottle, it looks like a beige polish with that faint frost shimmer that Essie is known for, the type you find in Demure Vixen. Sounds pretty ordinary but it is anything but. Au Natural is extremely flattering and really unique and works great for pedicures too! Application was a breeze (which is a rarity for Essies) and oh my is this colour gorgeous! It is an amazing one coater for a high end manicure look and also looks great with more coats depending on what look you want for the week. This is a shade that everyone should have. If you can only get one polish (and you like the manicured look), get this!

great nude/ mannequin hands shade for my fair, cool/neutral tone. this color is a slightly rosy beige and more opaque than I would have imagined given its name and the reviews. Easy application, tough to screw up given the color. My bottle is slightly goopy, but I think this is an old or discontinued color (picked it up at ULTA recently, but it's in the old Essie bottle). I love essie Allure for a conservative manicure, but it's a bit too white to be MNBB. This offers something different.