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!
I was so excited to be asked to review the June Nailbox! I've seen so many of these subscription boxes around for everything from dog toys to makeup to sweets, and only fairly recently heard about Nailbox. I'd heard good things, so I jumped at the chance.
Nailbox is a subscription service where for £13.50 a month, you get a box with
three or four different nail polishes, and one or two nail care or nail art items. These include lots of big brands like OPI, China Glaze, MoYou London, Nails Inc and many others. I was skeptical at first - I have so much nail varnish already, surely I would get a duplicate or colours that are similar to what I already have?
The June 2016 box is themed around Festival Fever, and contains 4 polishes and some nail art tape.
OPI Is Mai Tai Crooked - usually costs at least £9
Bourjois Turquoise Block - usually costs around £5.99
Rimmel Cheeky Chap - usually costs around £2.99
Essie Jazzy Jubilant - usually costs around £7.99
Elegant Touch Metalllic Nail Art Tape - usually costs around £4
So I calculate the value of the box at around £30, which is obviously lots more than the £13.50 the box costs! In fact in some shops, you couldn't buy one bottle of OPI for that amount.
It was also a big plus in that there were no duplicates in my collection, and the OPI and the Essie weren't even similar to any polishes I own. The nail art tape is gorgeous! There are five long strips each of 6 different colours. I use striping tape from time to time, and not as often as I'd like, because I generally find the rolls really fiddly to use. I love the idea of having nice short strips all ready for you to peel off the card! Plus, look at that third one down! It's copper, but it's full of rainbows in the light!
So, what did I do with the contents? I decided to try two different looks. First up is a floral design. I started with a base of the Rimmel, which is a one coater that applies nicely and dries to a matte finish. Then I freehanded some leaves with the Bourjois, and flowers with the OPI. I found that the green didn't really contrast with the blue enough to show clearly in the photos, but it was more obvious in real life. I sponged a bit of the glitter from the Essie into the flower centres and topcoated everything. I wore these nails for two days.
My thoughts about the polishes after making this first design was that the Rimmel was really nice, and I really really like the peachy orange of the OPI. I didn't feel I used enough of the Essie or the Bourjois to really comment.
Next up I wanted to swatch all the colours individually. I made a skittle across all my nails, and then used the tape to make a rays design on two of my nails.
The green swatched beautifully - it applies really well and is another one coater. The OPI is a gorgeous colour, but is a bit thinner and streakier than the other two, and needed two coats. I preferred to topcoat the Rimmel one, as I wasn't crazy about the matte finish.
I did the ray design freehand and then added the tape to cover any wobbles on the joins. I topcoated over everything just in case the tape wasn't sticky enough (I think it was though) and because I want to wear these for a couple of days.
Overall, I'm massively impressed! I'm trying really hard to spend less at the moment, but I am so tempted to sign up. The August box is called "Into the Sunset", which sounds gorgeous. It's my birthday in early September, so maybe I need to treat myself!
You can check out Nailbox on their website here.
This box was provided by Nailbox for my honest review. See my Disclaimer for more details.
I haven't posted for a couple of weeks - sorry! I don't even have any reasons. I've been doing my nails, just not posting.
Anyway, here is what I have on right now, some mermaid fish-scale nails using more of my stencils from Whats Up Nails.
I started with a base of Barry M Pacific, which is a greeny blue metallic polish. This was two coats.
I then used the vinyls and splodged on a random pattern using 3 textured glitters: 2true Christy (silver) and Barry M VIP (blues) and Fashion Icon (purples). The final design was very very textured, so I added one coat of Seche for a little bit of smoothness and shine.
I really like how these came out, and they are really sparkly in the sunlight.
I think next time I would use a more contrasting base colour though, so the fish scale pattern shows a bit more clearly. Having said that, the vinyl stencils themselves are really good. I bought loads of designs, so I have lots more coming up!
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.
I've been stamping a lot recently, and I felt the urge to do some freehanding for a change. The weather has been grey and damp, and I wanted something bright and cheerful, so I went for my favourite flowers, sunflowers.
I started with a base of China Glaze For Audrey (my bottle has gone a bit thick and gloopy - it's now a PERFECT one coater!) and freehanded the flowers using some MoYou stamping polishes and a fine brush. The yellow is Bahamas Punch and I used two greens for the leaves, Key Lime and Spring Green. I really like how pigmented and rich the MoYou London stamping polishes are - they're not too gloopy to do nail art with, but they're still opaque over strong colours.
The brown flower centres are Barry M Cocoa.
And just to show you that I do always do both hands (apparently some people don't! Who knew?) here's my other hand as well. The cleanup's not quite as good, but I'm pretty pleased with these.
Weirdly, I posted a pic of these on Twitter, and my friend Wendy from MASPOOASE pointed me at the sunflower nails she did almost 3 years ago today, and they're almost identical!
After my first reverse stamped decals the other day, I was itching to make more!
These ones use MoYou London Tropical 14 plate. I started with a base of Barry M Meadow, and stamped using MoYou London Spring Green. I filled in the flowers using several different China Glaze neons.
I was a bit disappointed with the blue flowers, because some of them overflowed a bit. I don't think it's massively obvious, but I wish they were neater.
I really like the design on the middle and ring fingers best - I think I wish I'd done that on all the nails now. Still, I do like the result!
These are the nails I've been wearing for the last few days. They've got so long recently that it seems a real waste not to paint the backs of my nails as well as the fronts, and I love the combination of pink and green!
The front of my nails is two coats of Barry M Sugar Plum. I then sponged a gradient of Barry M Socialite over the base of the nails.
On the back, I have Barry M Greenberry.
It's really hard to take a clear photo of a louboutin mani!
Oops! I haven't posted since before Christmas, sorry! I wasn't in the mood for nails particularly for a couple of weeks, and then last week I had a really nasty nail break so my left hand looked quite unpleasant. I'm still missing a big chunk of nail on my middle finger, but at least it's not too awful now.
Anyway, I was contacted recently to ask if I'd like to review a new polish brand, and I was particularly excited to see that they're Scottish! I'm not Scottish my self, and I don't live there now, but I was at uni in Dundee and spent 4 very happy years living there.
Tami Beauty is a new brand, and they sent me all three of their colours to try out.
Don't they look pretty? Left to right, here are Gleneagles Glamour, Lady of Lomond and Skibo Sunset.
Check out their website here. Tami polishes are 3-free, and are not tested on animals in any way.
I tried Lady of Lomond over new year, before I had my broken nail.
This is a pale green polish with lots of holo particles and tiny glitter.
This is two coats, with topcoat. The formula is nice - a little runny, and dragged a couple of bare patches on the first coat, but the second coat was perfect. This dries slightly matte, so I added topcoat to smooth it and add shine. The brush is nice - fairly short and slim, and easy to control.
Isn't this pretty? I wore this for three days, and the wear was excellent. There was no chipping, peeling, shrinkage or anything else. Removal was a little tricky as the glitter was pretty solidly fixed, but it was nothing that the foil method couldn't solve.
Next up was Gleneagles Glamour, which is a pale nude-pink with the same holo and glitter as Lady of Lomond. The formula seemed slightly better, as I didn't get the dragged patches.
This again is two coats, with topcoat.
I really like how this one looks. It's sparkly and pretty, without being OTT, and I think would be work-appropriate as well as very pretty.
It's such a pretty, delicate polish, don't you think? You can see the rose-gold glitter particles there, which make it a really flattering shade.
The last of the three is Skibo Sunset. This one is a bright cerise pink holo. It doesn't have the glitter particles of the other two, and dries with a shinier finish.
This is two coats, with topcoat. Again, the application was really good, and the polish dried quickly. This is the least unique of the three shades, but it's really pretty, especially in bright light, where the holo is more visible.
Isn't it lovely?
I really liked all three of these polishes. The formula is good, application is nice, the brush is the sort I like best. They are available on the Tami website for £9 each, or £21 for the set. I think the £9 price is perhaps a little steep for a new brand, when you compare it to brands like Nails Inc or China Glaze, but then again it's a small company and I can understand why production costs more. And the polishes are really really nice, so it's a big thumbs up from me! I'm looking forward to seeing what their next colours are going to be.
These polishes were provided for my honest review. See my Disclaimer section for more information.
Today's nails are some freehand floral nails. I haven't done flowers in far too long!
I started with a base of Barry M Sugar Apple, a pretty blue-green creme. I then used a fine brush to freehand the flowers. I used a combination of Konad White, then Barry M Pink Punch and Rose Hip for the petals, with Yellow for the centre, and Key Lime and MoYou London Spring Green for the leaves.
I'm really pleased with how these turned out!
And just to show that I do always do my right hand, even if it's not quite as neat, here's my other hand! Sorry, I can't pose it properly or hold the camera level!
I kind of wish I'd added lots more flowers now!
The new Barry M autumn-winter Gellys seem to be a big hit amongst bloggers currently. You can see my swatches here.
They work really well for stamping! I used 8 different Barry M Gelly colours for this skittle - a corresponding paler one for each of the 4 almost-black colours. I stamped using MoYou London Steampunk XL plate 7.
The red is the only one which doesn't work as well over the bright colour. The contrast isn't quite as strong as the other ones I chose.
These are Blood Orange, stamped with Black Cherry, Key Lime stamped with Black Pistachio, Fondant stamped with Black Currant and Guava stamped with Black Grape.
These work really well for stamping, and I can see them getting a lot of use from me this winter.
Today I was in the mood for a water marble. I wanted to make a neon rainbow one, but I just could not get the polishes to spread on the water, so I gave up that plan and made a pastel one instead using China Glaze polishes.
I started with a white base, and then used Tart-y For the Party, Pink-ie Promise and Keep Calm Paint On for the marble.
I've added topcoat for shine. This looks a bit scruffy round the cuticles, especially on the thumb, as I found it quite hard to clean up for some reason. My cuticles are really dry at the moment too. I need to do a deep-moisturising treatment!
Following on from yesterday's big post about the OPI Color Paints (click here if you missed it!) here are two more quick looks I did this morning while I was experimenting with them.
This is my first attempt at leadlighting. It's not the tidiest, but I do love the effect! I started with a base of Silver Canvas, then stamped using Laqa & Co Black Gloss and MoYou London Holy Shapes XL 04. Then I used a fine paintbrush to add the Color Paints in the spaces.
This gradient look was done with a white base. I then added a stripe of Color Paints down each side of the nail (yellow and pink, and yellow and turquoise) which I then dragged sideways using the polish brush. Where the yellow and turquoise meet, they make green. Where the yellow and pink meet, they make orange. I love this effect!
