Stamping over Barry M Indigo

Greetings All!

This is another one of my 'stamp over an untried' manicures. This time the base is Barry M Indigo, a polish I had been lusting over for a while. It's so perfectly indigo, I love it! Of course it shows up more blue in these photos (thank you camera!).

It was perfect in 2 coats. I then stamped over it with Barry M Gold Foil and PUEEN44. I didn't manage to get a single one perfectly aligned! I'm getting better though - they are all nearly aligned, none of them are wildly off to one side lol. I thought this would look all gorgeous and regal, but the gold is just a touch too pale for the indigo. Barry M, could you please add a more yellow gold to your Foil Effects range? I need it!

Llama Nails Nerd Challenge - Inspired by Hunger Games

Greetings All!

I'm sneaking in a quick second post, as it is Double Challenge Friday. The last one for a while, I'm afraid. I've decided to bow out of this challenge, as I really don't have any inspiration for the remaining themes, and I don't think it's fair to make some lame attempt, when the other ladies are creating such beautiful nail art each week.

This week the theme is yet again something I have no knowledge of. I haven't seen the films, or read the books.

Fortunately there is a lot of HG nail art out there! A quick Google Image search gave me plenty of inspiration! There were a lot of flame nails, which I like anyway, and I very much liked the look of these nails over at Misch's Beauty Blog. In the past I've always started with black, then painted the flames on, but this is kind of the opposite.

I started with Barry M Yellow, then sponged on some Sally Hansen All Fired Up and Right Said Red. Then I used W7 Black to paint the flame shapes, and fill it all in. I left a bit too much yellow at the bottom, so I added a little Barry M Gold Glitter to hide it!

I really like these - my flame shapes aren't perfect, but I love the sponge effect of the fire. I think it gives a much better effect than when I draw them onto the black. I think in future, I'll do them this way!

Relaxed 31DC Week 27 - Inspired By Artwork

Greetings All!

I'm posting a bit late today - there was a bit of a crisis last night when my lamp died! It's the one I use while painting and photographing my nails! My room is North facing, so I don't get much sunlight, and I tend to polish in the evenings. Energy saving bulbs are just awful for actually being able to see anything, so I've come to rely on my trusty daylight lamp, so that I can see what I'm doing! I also use it to take my photos, as my camera can't cope with anything less than direct sunlight (or luckily, a daylight bulb!) without flashing. So imagine my horror last night as I was painting my nails, only for the light to flicker and die mid-manicure!

Today was spent searching online and in shops for a replacement bulb. I did find them online quite easily, but faced with the prospect of waiting up to two weeks, I ventured out into the real world to try and find one. In the end, I bought a new lamp for about £5 more than the replacement bulb. It's smaller and lighter, and fingers crossed it should work exactly as the old one did. So, crisis averted!

The end is now in sight for this challenge! Only 4 more weeks to go after today! Unfortunately I haven't been feeling very inspired by art. I'm a little ashamed to admit this, but I don't really have any interest in art. I did try a sort of pop art manicure, but it failed so hard I took it off before it was even finished! So I did what I always do when I have no inspiration - I stamped!

I was gong to do plain white with black stamping, but I thought, primary colours surely fit the art theme quite well!  So I added a couple of coats of Gitzology Crunch Berries to my white base. I then stamped with Konad Black and PUEEN47. Scribbles are about the best I can manage myself, so they seemed fitting!


My Nerdy Nails will be coming very soon!

Tri Polish Challenge August 2013 - Manicure 4

Greetings All!

This is the last of this month's TPC. There will be another one next month! If you would like to join in, you can do so here.

Here is a final reminder of the polishes I've been using this month to represent red, yellow and green.

OPI The Thrill of Brazil, The 'It' Color and Jade is The New Black.

This manicure is a bit of a strange one. It looked amazing in my head, terrible on my nails, and kind of not too bad in the photos. I guess it all evened out!

I started by painting my nails using the three colours. Then I put on some random stripes of tape, and used the splatter technique with a straw, using the two contrasting colours for each nail. I removed the tape and voila.

These polishes are a little on the thicker side, so they didn't splatter too well, they didn't leave me with crisp lines, and they made my nails so lumpy lol. I was ready to scrap this as a fail, but I thought I'd take pictures just in case, because they did end up taking quite a bit of time and effort to do!

Miraculously they don't look too bad! Not great, but not as awful as in real life. I do like the marbling effect, and I think if I had gotten neat, crisp lines they would have been pretty good. It is something I would try again, but with thinner, less lumpy polishes!

Stamping With 2true Metallica - Athena

Greetings All!

This is the third (and final!) Metallica polish I wanted to show you. They aren't really the sort of polishes I would wear as a base, but they work so well for stamping!

The base is Color Club Take Me To Your Chateau, stamped with Athena and PUEEN13. This is a fairly thin, delicate stamp, and  as you can see it stamped very nearly perfectly!

You can buy 2true polish from Superdrug. The Metallica range are £4 each.

UK Indies - Pocket Money Polishes - The September Sparkle Collection

Greetings All!

Pocket Money Polishes is a brand that has featured on numerous occasions on the blog. Charlie, the creator, is a super sweet girl, and is always willing to help out with that indie polish fix! This time I have four polishes from her latest collection, which will be available here on September 1st. As with all her collections, each polish is named after a song. There are a lot of pictures in this post, so let's get on with it!

Stamping With 2true Metallica - Artemis

Greetings All!

Yesterday I showed you the stamping capabilities of Aphrodite, and today is the turn of Artemis, a steely metallic purple.

The base is Revlon Lilac Pastelle (which is odd, because it's a much more pinky colour!) and the stamp is BM306. Like Aphrodite, it stamped really well, and I'd really like to try it over black or dark purple! I even have a perfect manicure in mind, so watch out for that one lol.

Tri Polish Challenge August 2013 - Manicure 3

Greetings All!

This is the third instalment. Here's a quick reminder of the polishes I used.

OPI The Thrill of Brazil, The 'It' Color and Jade is The New Black

This time I did some dots. I don't really like this one very much - it kind of reminds me of pizza.

New UK Indies - Dragonglass Nails - The Game of Thrones Collection

Greetings All!

Today I have a new UK indie brand to share with you! Dragonglass Nails opened just last month with some very pretty and sparkly polishes, and I decided to go for the Game of Thrones Collection. Confession - I have never watched the show. But that doesn't mean I can't enjoy the polishes!

Stamping With 2true Metallica - Aphrodite

Greetings All!

Whenever I see a foil polish, I think stamping polish. It was for this reason that I bought some of the new Pro Metallica range from 2true (also for the name - Metallica lol). I haven't been disappointed! They all stamp wonderfully well! This rosy pink foil is Aphrodite.

I would usually avoid stamping over a dark polish with a lighter polish (apart from Konad White) but Aphrodite did really well over Revlon Vintage! The stamp is from PUEEN26.

Glitter Bunny Polish Birthday Girl Collection

Greetings All!

These polishes are the last two from my recent Glitter Bunny haul. I've already shown you Strawbermelon and You Can Do It, Brucey!, and today I have two glitters from the Birthday Girl Collection.

Rainbow Sprinkles is just that, a sprinkle of rainbow! This is 2 coats over black.

I love matte glitter, especially when it has matte microglitter! There's something so brilliant about non-sparkly sparkles. It's a good mix of glitter but yeah, the microglitter is definitely my favourite part! It's very festive and looks great over the black.

I Got A Goody Bag is a mix of neon squares, with holo sparkle. Again, 2 coats, over black. I tried to be more imaginative, but what's the point when black is clearly the best?! Usually, anyway!

This is so cute. It's very much like confetti, and I love how even 2 coats gives it great depth. Thankfully this is opaque neon glitter - I don't really like the thought of having to wear it over a light colour, I like the option! (I also just worked out, these swatches were taken 12 days apart - my nails sure can grow fast when they want to!)

I had no problems with application - the glitters came out very easily, and I didn't need much topcoat to smooth them out. I bought them here, where shipping is only $4.50 per package!

What Is It With Owls?

Greetings All!

Today I have a question - why is it that owls are so popular? I must have at least half a dozen owl stamps - is is because they're cute? Wise? They look kind of vintagey? If anyone could shed some light, I'd be grateful! Nothing against owls, they're fine, but I've never really had the urge to put them on my nails.

Having said that, here are some owls on my nails!

My base is L'Oreal Owls Lust, and I stamped with Barry M Gold Foil and DRK-B, which has three owl stamps in different sizes, so they'll fit on all your fingers! I also made it matte.

I still don't get it!

Nails Inc Leather Effect Swatch Spam

Greetings All!

So this textured trend shows no sign of dying down in the near future. I do like textured nails, but not so much the sparkly offerings from brands like OPI and Zoya. I've decided I like my texture a little bit duller lol. My favourite textured polishes by far are the Nails Inc Leather effects. I got the black and tan all the way back in January, and recently I welcomed three more into my collection!

Pembroke Square is a really dark, deep purple, almost black but with a lovely tinge. This is 2 coats.

I love it. It's so dark and moody, which fits the leather effect really well I think. The texture is smoother than a full on textured polish - it's sort of soft, and feels really nice to touch! You may recognise this particular bottle, as it came from The Crumpet's most recent destash! I'm quite glad it isn't her cup of tea, because I think it's fabulous!

Old Compton Street is a pretty, soft grey. 2 coats.

I'm not sure if this one is meant to be softer, or if it just takes a long time to dry, but the texture of it was very soft and smooth, actually quite a bit like fine leather, which is very nice, but a bit weird! It's a really nice warm grey shade too.

Shoreditch Lane is burgundy red, and I've had my eye on this one for quite a while! 2 coats.

All three of these polishes were on my wishlist, but I probably wished a little harder for this one. I love the colour, and the overall effect is just wonderful! Leather nails always make me feel a bit badass lol.

I got all three of these polishes from Facebook groups who buy sell and swap polish. It's an extremely efficient way to remove all the money from my bank account! Seriously though, they have everything. It's done a great amount of damage to my wishlist - yay!