Monday 31 March 2014

Speckled Eggs Manicure & Models Own Review

I have the Models Own Speckled Egg nail polishes on my nails today. The three nail polishes that I have used are Duck Blue, Dove Pink and Goose Yellow. These also happen to be the colours for my Tri-Polish Challenge for April.
Models Own Speckled Eggs Review
It was really hard to decide which colours to get - they are all such gorgeous colours - perfect for Easter, spring and summer. The matte black glitter for the speckled effect just adds to the gorgeousness. They do look a bit like bird's eggs and definitely like the Cadbury's Mini Eggs!
Models Own Speckled Eggs Manicure

Thursday 27 March 2014

Peach Manicure with Copper Stamping - GOT Polish

There may still be a slight chill in the air but the flowers are in full bloom in my garden and the days are longer and brighter. Spring is definitely here at last! And I continue my Spring theme here on the blog with a lovely pastel peach manicure!
I painted my nails with Barry M Gelly in Papaya. For the accent nail, I painted half the nail with the peach and the other half with Sally Hansen Insta Dri in Jade Jump. I added pastel studs to the accent nail and sealed them with top coat. For the other nails, I stamped them with images from the MoYou London XL Image Plate 01 from the Pro Collection. The stamping polish is Essie Penny Talk. I finished with top coat.

Tuesday 25 March 2014

Colourful Flowers to Celebrate Spring!

I have a special Spring Manicure today! Its a stamped manicure but I have used a glazing or lead light technique to fill in colour into the stamped images. With this technique, you stamp an image with a dark stamping polish onto a light base, for example a black stamping on a white base, which is what I have used here. Then you can use a dotting tool to fill colour into the image with translucent polishes. Julia from Messy Mansion has done a good tutorial video on this technique.
Colourful floral stamping nail art
For this manicure, I painted my nails with Model's Own HyperGel White Light. I stamped an image from the XL image plate 10 from the MoYou London Pro Collection with Konad Black. I really like Konad Black for stamping because it is such a dark, vivid black to stamp with but it is tricky to clean up and stains my cuticles.

Sunday 23 March 2014

Celtic Knots Green Manicure

I did not get a chance to do a St. Patrick's Day manicure last week so a green manicure has been on my mind for a few days! Also, I had this lovely green nail polish that I have wanted to wear for some time. Unfortunately, it turned out to be a bit of a nail fail as you will see!

Thursday 20 March 2014

Ruffle French Tip Manicure - GOT Polish

The prompt for the GOT Polish Challenge is the Ruffle Manicure. For this manicure, you just need to use a large dotting tool to create a line of dots on your nails. Then follow it up with successive lines of slightly overlapping dotted lines in a different colour. The end result looks like fabric ruffles. There's a good tutorial on Chalkboard Nails.
I thought it would be nice to use the ruffle nail art as an accent and french tips rather than the whole nail so this is what I did.
Its a pretty simple technique and the end result is very cute and colourful. This is my first attempt at this kind of nail art. I painted my nails with China Glaze For Audrey. And I did the ruffles with Sally Hansen Insta Dri Flashy Fuschia and Revlon Gold Coin.

Monday 17 March 2014

Holi Manicure

Holi, (Pronounced the same as "Holy"), also known as the Festival of Colours is a Spring Festival. To quote Wikipedia, " It is an ancient Hindu religious festival which has become popular with non-Hindus in many parts of South Asia, as well as people of other communities. Holi celebrations start with a Holika bonfire on the night before Holi where people gather, sing and dance. The next morning is free for all carnival of colours, where everyone plays, chases and colours each other with dry powder and coloured water, with some carrying water guns and coloured water-filled balloons for their water fight. Anyone and everyone is fair game, friend or stranger, rich or poor, man or woman, children and elders. The frolic and fight with colours occurs in the open streets, open parks, outside temples and buildings." I found this Youtube video for Holi, that you may like to see.

I decided on this colourful manicure to celebrate Holi. This manicure also uses my Tri Polish Challenge colours.

Friday 14 March 2014

Purple - Quilted and Flakies - GOT Polish

Purple is one of my favourite nail polish colours so I really enjoyed doing this prompt for the GOT Polish Challenge. Also, even though I love the manicures I have seen with the Layla Butterfly Effect Nail Polish, it has been in my heap of "un-trieds" for a while - so I thought this would be an excellent opportunity to break out the gorgeous flakies for this manicure!
On three of my nails, I am wearing a base of Barry M Gelly in Plum topped with two coats of Layla Ceramic Effect CE52, The Butterfly Effect nail polish. For the other two nails, I first painted the nails with Catrice 07 Genius in the Bottle. This is a gold-green duochrome. I marked out the criss-cross quilted pattern with striping tape and painted with Sally Hansen Insta Dri Grape Escape on top. I removed the tape while the Grape Escape was still wet and finished with top coat.

Tuesday 11 March 2014

Blue, Green, Purple Stamped Gradient - Tri Polish Tuesday

The colours for Tri Polish Tuesday for March are Blue, Green and Purple. I thought this combination would be good for a gradient. I also stamped a pretty pattern on top to add to it.
I painted the nails with Klean Color Metallic Aqua. I then sponged on the gradient with Klean Color Metallic Aqua, Green and Purple. I stamped an image from the MoYou London plate 05 from the Sailor Collection with Color Club Harp On It. The stamping is subtle so it keeps the focus on the vibrant colours of the gradient.

Thursday 6 March 2014

Skittle Nails with glitter French Tips - GOT Polish Challenge

The prompt for the GOT Polish Challenge is a Skittle Manicure - where each nail is painted a different colour, inspired by the sweets with the same name. The colours I used for my Skittle nails are Rimmel Riviera Red, Sally Hansen Insta Dri Brisk Blue, OPI Kiss Me On My Tulips, Revlon Emerald and Barry M Gelly in Plum.
Skittle Nails with glitter French Tips
I used striping tape to mark two sections on the nail tips and painted this with Barry M (Textured Nail Effect) nail polish Lady. Now this in not really one of my old polishes but since its only for the nail art, I think I can get away with it - what do you think?!

Tuesday 4 March 2014

GOT Polish Challenge Orange Nails

I am really late with my Orange Nails for the GOT Polish Challenge. But it was a much busier week than usual and I completely missed posting anything last week. I had even done my manicure in time but just didn't get a chance to post it! So here are my nails for the challenge, at last!
For this manicure, I used one of my favourite orange nail polishes, Barry M Gelly in Mango. The gradient and stamping is with Essie Penny Talk. And the beautiful stamping image is from Pueen 33.