Inspired by an Elephant: Rhinestone Skittle Nails

I live near Sheffield, and there is currently a fantastic art installation and charity fundraiser going on across the city, called the Herd of Sheffield. You can read more about it here. To cut a long story short, Sheffield is full of elephants - the big ones have been created by various artists, and the small ones have been made by local primary schools.  There is SO MUCH nail art inspiration amongst them all!

Today's nails were inspired by this theatrical baby elephant, Nelly Noodle, who is inside the Crucible (my very favourite Sheffield place!). I LOVE her toenails. 

I did a simple skittle using Barry M Guava and Key Lime, Illamasqua Prosperity, Essence Flashy Pumpkin and Barry M Blood Orange. I then used topcoat to stick on my smallest rhinestones in a random colour order.

I realised afterwards that I'd got the purple and the orange the wrong way round, but never mind!

I love rhinestones! I haven't worn any for ages, but now I see these, I can't think why! Look how they're reflecting in the sunshine!

So sparkly!
 

People always ask whether rhinestones are really messy and impractical, but if you stick them down with topcoat and then topcoat over them, they pretty much stay in place through a normal day. 

I will not be leaving it so long til I use rhinestones again! And I will definitely be doing more nails based on the Herd of Sheffield elephants!

Crucible Theatre Nails v2

I've posted before about how much I love the Crucible Theatre (see here for my previous nails) and I was there on Thursday night for Artistic Director Daniel Evans' leaving do, so I decided it was the perfect time to redo my Crucible nails. 

I love the Crucible so much! It's my far my favourite theatre ever, and I go often (although not often enough for my liking!)

These are just a straightforward chevron skittle. I used nail vinyls from What's Up Nails to make these. The base colours are Barry M Blue Grape, Essence Flashy Pumpkin, Barry M Blood Orange, Illamasqua Prosperity and Barry M Key Lime. The black top colour is OPI 4 In the Morning.  

I'm happy with how these came out. They're much tidier than my previous effort, and the colours are clearer. 

Bright Gradient

I know, I know! I've hardly posted this year, sorry. I've had very little urge to write any posts, although I have been painting my nails.  But I thought I'd show you these nails!

This gradient uses Illamasqua Prosperity, Illamasqua Superstition, Barry M Satsuma and Barry M Yellow, which I sponged on. 

I'm a touch disappointed in how little the pink shows on these - it seems to disappear into the orange and the purple somehow. Still, that's a fairly minor point, because I do love how these turned out. 

I am considering stamping over these tomorrow, but not sure I can decide what colour or pattern. Do you have any ideas?

 

Illamasqua Superstition

This is the second of my Illamasqua bargains I found in TK Maxx the other day. This is Superstition, a bright neon pink, which set me back a whole £3!

This is two coats, with topcoat.

The formula is really good, and I liked this a lot. There is some visible nail line at two coats, but I don't mind that. I checked before I took this off, and three coats is fully opaque. You could also paint this over a white base if you wanted an even brighter colour and no nail line.

The polish dries semi matte with a similar rubbery finish to Scorn (one of my favourite blacks) but I added topcoat for a glossy finish. Isn't this gorgeous? 

Illamasqua Prosperity

I picked up a bunch of bargains yesterday in TK Maxx - two full size Illamasqua polishes for £3 each, and a set of China Glaze minis for a tenner. Here is one of the Illamasqua colours, Prosperity.

This is two coats of Prosperity, with topcoat.

Prosperity is a vivid purple, very pigmented and vibrant. It's a fairly thin formula, but applied nicely without pooling or making a mess.  

It dries to a mattish rubbery finish, and I added topcoat for longevity and shine. 

I think this looks fantastic! It's a gorgeous colour!

 

Claire's Accessories Nail Pearls

These are Claire's Accessories version of the caviar mani - Nail Pearls. These are normally £5, but I got these on a 2-for-1 a few weeks ago.

These come in a tiny bottle with a teeny weeny cute little funnel for putting the spare beads back in afterwards. I tipped the beads out into the plastic wrapping, and dipped my wet nail in. 

Here are the black beads with Illamasqua Scorn. I love Scorn - this is one coat. I love the rubbery satin finish.  I also really like how the black beads look like those jelly blackberry sweets you can get, the ones with teeny tiny crunchy balls all over them.

I wasn't happy with just the black though, so I painted alternate nails gold (Barry M Gold Foil) and added the gold beads. 

I like how these pearls are very tiny. The beads I've tried previously (MUA) were a bit larger and bulkier.  These are a lot neater and less lumpy.

What do you think?

Flames!

I made flame nails at the weekend, to go with my flame pendant.

I've started using adhesive paper labels for this sort of thing, instead of sellotape. It happened by accident really, but they work so well!  You can write or draw on the paper, so you can see where to cut. They're easier to cut, because they don't stick to your fingers or the scissors while you cut, and because they're less sticky, you don't have to de-sticky them before you start, and they're easier to remove.  

Anyway, I painted my ring fingers with Sinful Colors All About You, which is a gorgeous bronzey gold glitter. I did about three layers. I then cut out a flames shape, which I stuck over the nail, and then painted the rest of my nail in Illamasqua Scorn. I painted all my other nails with Illamasqua Scorn, but used topcoat on my ring fingers only.

Scorn is a fabulous, rich black, with a rubbery satin finish. It's not quite matte, but it's not shiny. I love how different it is from a glossy finish.