Black and White Optical Illusion Nails!

I'm kinda late to the party cos I've only recently discovered tumblr.  When I did though, oh the hours that were wasted.  Especially when I see a post like this and think that would totally be a good idea to start doing at midnight.  Oh, not so subtle promo: I am on tumblr and post most of my manicures, if you're into that. 

To start, I applied two coats of OPI My Boyfriend Scales Walls - still my all time favourite white - and topped it off with a coat of Seche Vite.  After I waited for that to dry, and waited another five minutes. I  taped off the tips of my nails with painter's masking tape and did the initial stripes using striping tape and Essence Back in Black.  Any black will do, this one was just at hand.  Once all my tape was on, I pressed everything down, to make sure I had no leaks.  This is why you gotta wait for everything to be super dry - you don't want to squish it.  Once I'd done all my fingers and the next coat of Seche Vite was dry, I tried lining the tape back up and applying the reverse stripes.  I did my thumb before giving up because it wasn't really working that well - it's super hard to see through opaque blue tape.  I resorted to free-handing the remaining stripes but I'm not happy with that either - not crisp enough.  And they look like umpire nails.  But at least they're different!

The Verdict:  Meh.  They took forever and aren't even a bit sparkly, so eh.  I think I'll try this again with brighter colours and clear tape, see if I can't get the second lot of stripes perfect.

Sparkly Glitter Dots!

Whenever I do a glitter mosaic mani, I get a lot of people focusing on how long it takes to do.  That's fine, it's easy to see it's time consuming.  I wanted to challenge myself the other night, see how long it would take me to do a slightly more sparsely glitter mani.  

To start, I applied two coats of Essence Black is Back.  You can go three coats, doesn't really matter, you just want a base that has enough polish to let you sink the glitter into, ever so slightly.  Then, with a toothpick and my usual technique, I went to work, but this time with a timer.  It took me about 3-4 minutes per finger, to get the glitter on.  That's pretty reasonable!  If you want to "cheat" with your non-dominant hand, just do what I do, make one hand super fancy, do the other with the same base coat and find a glitter polish that looks the same.  American Apparel Meteor is the same size and shape as my silver holo polish so the only difference is how neat the glitter is!  Total time taken, from base coat to top: 42 minutes. 

The Verdict: I love holo glitter so much, especially in the elevator at work.  So many rainbows that two separate people I've never met commented on me doing this in the light:

Review: Essence Nail Art Decoration Kits

Shoppers Drug Mart is a dangerous place for me and it's worse because it exerts a kind of magnetic pull I just can't resist.  I have to go in nearly all I pass because WHAT IF THEY HAVE NEW SPARKLIES MMMM SPARKLIES I COULD GO THAT, I'LL JUST GO IN REAL QUICK.  Didn't help me that I found Essence now sells Nail Art Decoration kits and they have holo glitter in them.  I clearly wasn't going to not buy them.  The trick is how to use them...

The kits come in gold and silver and I had really high hopes for the gold and silver holo diamond glitter.  The hardest part about working with this particular shape is that it often isn't cut even.  When you're trying to do a precise design, having a piece be off in shape or size really gets old fast.  Anyway, I got started with two coats of Essence Back in Black as my base colour then went to work with my usual technique.  I started by laying a line of a single colour down the middle of my nail, then alternated colours, building out each side.  On my non-feature nails, I just laid a line near the tips of my nails.  When I had the glitter spread out on my little plastic tray, I could find enough consistent pieces but there's a lot in there that has cut-off bits, weird shapes or just generally not even.  It is very sparkly though, so I guess it's ok.  

The Verdict:  For ~$3, these kits are worth it, wonky pieces aside.  If you're too impatient or generally not into ebay, it's a good start for holo glitter.  And seriously, look how sparkly it came out.  

Purple and Gold Hand-placed Glitter Gradient!

The Essence Nail Art Decoration Kits still have plenty of glitter in them, so I'm clearly going to do more glitter manis.  I try to not do these every day because I don't want you to get sick of them but this is so totally permission because I have to review these kits properly!  I really wanted to do a full coverage mani with the medium sized gold holo glitter from the gold kits but I've done this one recently, can't be predictable.  Glitter gradient it is!

I don't know what it is, but I'm totally obsessed with Urban Outfitters nail polish right now because their creme colours are really good at going with my glitter.  And the bottles are so square, they tesselate nicely in my drawers.  And they're $4 each.  So I started this mani off with three coats of UA Bandeau, a strong purple creme.  Next, I tipped a little of the gold hex glitter onto a plastic container lid (or anywhere where you can retrieve said glitter without dying) and went to work with my orange stick and cheap top coat.  I found it easiest to start at the cuticle - keep them nice and close together - then just work up until you think it's good.  Nice and easy, this one.  Then all the top coat.  Cos we want our glitter to stay cos yay sparklies. The end.  For this bit, there's more down there vv :)

The Verdict:  Ignore the bubbles in the top coat, that's just cos I tipped two Seche Vite bottles together and it was chucking a tanty.  You can't really go wrong with purple and gold, especially when it's sparkly and the purple is such an awesome colour.  Sparkly!

Review: Crows Toes Heartless

I've talked about this before but I have a bit of a problem with indie polishes.  I love them, I order way too many off the internet but when it comes time to use them I get a bit stuck.  There's only so many times you can find a complementary base colour, whack the glitter on and then talk about the composition and the consistency.  Odds are, someone's already done it, and probably done it better.  So I feel the need to get creative with it which is hard which is then why I don't post them that much.  ANYWAY, I did actually do something interesting with a very sparkly pink polish from Crows Toes, so let's take a look. 

To start with, I applied three coats of my current black, Essence Back in Black and topped it off with a coat of Seche Vite because I wanted it to dry faster.  Once it was dry and I had waited five more minutes after I thought it was dry, I cut out my zig-zag piece of painter's masking tape and applied the glitter.  Heartless (the polish) is pretty thick so I just needed the one coat to get this level of opacity.  The glitter itself is amazing, super sparkly with different sizes and shades of pink holographic glitter.   Once done, another coat of Seche Vite applied, and I'm done.

The Verdict:  Love the polish.  Heartless is just so sparkly and pink, how could I not love it? It applies well over black too, not patchy, which is always a bonus.  I'm not super sold on the design, but it'll do.  SPARKLYYYY :D

I've Got Neon, Holo, Zig-zags, Half Moons and Studs in the One Mani, Yay!

I was contacted a little while ago from Iona from StickyNails Nail Stencils about trying a new product she was working on.  I like to try new things so I gave her custom nail decals/stencils a shot and look!  Her package included a few different patterns of nail stickers but I'm always partial to a good chevron or zig zag so after pulling out the brightest colour combination I could find - Claire's Neon Orange and Pretty & Polished Boombox - I went to work. 

Iona's stencil stickers come on a white sheet of pseudo-plastic, with the designs pre-cut out, ready to lift off.  After applying three coats of Claire's Neon Orange polish with a coat of Seche Vite and waiting for it to dry completely, I peeled off one of the larger chevron stencils and laid it on my thumb.  She warns that these are strong stickers and she's not wrong because the first time you use one, you probably haven't waited long enough, and the base colour is going to come with you when you take it off.  I found that if you press the sticker against your palm first, it's much less ferocious.  The good thing about it being sticky is that you can press it down fully, and get right to the edges.  And your zig zags come out perfectly spaced!  I even used the in-between pieces on another manicure so win there.  Anyway, on my other three fingers I did a small freehand triangle half-moon and surround it with teeny studs from the Essence Nail Art kits I found at Shoppers.  Neon zig-zag stud win!

The Verdict:  I really like the stencils Iona has come up with.  I was able to re-use the same sticker 3-4 times, no issue, and you still get nice, even spacing and clean lines.  Also super digging Boombox as a holo blue, it's absolutely gorgeous and applies really well.

You can find StickyNails Nail Stencils on Etsy, $8-10 a set.  Worth it!

These products were sent to me for my honest review.

Black and Gold Glitter Placement Art Deco Nails that I'm Angry At.

I've had this little bag of gold holographic square glitter sitting on my desk for a little while now, taunting me.  "I'm not that small!", it says. "You can totally start a mani with me now, at 11.45pm, and you'll totally be done by 1am!".  IT'S A LIAR AND I SHOULDN'T LISTEN TO GLITTER.   I was talking to my new friend Antonia and she had the great idea of doing an art deco mani with glitter instead of tape.  See how these two things came together?  Yeah, well, I love the idea and hate the glitter.  And my execution. 

My usual tactic with glitter is to start with three coats of base colour to give myself a nice deep starting point, then lay down stripes of top coat and stick my glitter on.  This bloody glitter is so small that this doesn't work.  You get too thick a base and it just disappears and is generally uneven.  So as well as being so small it sent me cross-eyed, it can't even stay straight.  I had to baby my top coat with the thinnest coats.  This just isn't as crisp as I'd like it to be.  It is sparkly but as soon as I took these photos I wanged my thumb so it's all warped and then broke the corner off my middle nail this morning.  I swear this whole thing is cursed :C

The Verdict:  I like the idea here but my execution sucks and the glitter is just way too small.  I'll try this again with bigger glitter, see if I can't get patterns like this going for a better art deco mani.  Sorry Antonia.

The Most Glitter Feasible to Fit On My Nails

I don't even know how to introduce these any more.  It's a lot of glitter.  Like, a lot.  I was showing off my glitter stash to instagram yesterday and realised I had more holo glitter than I thought, in the smaller size that fits with my matte and metallic rainbow glitter.  So of course I'm going to do something excessive with it.  Cue the pictures!

I know there aren't too many people out there that would spend so long gluing 150 pieces of glitter to each nail.  That's ok.  It's sparkly and that's enough for me.  To do this, if you're curious, uses my usual process.  Three coats of black polish, thin strip of cheap top coat down the centre of your nail, line of glitter - this is the place you want to focus on getting everything evenly spaced and straight - then build out each side.  Top with a top coat and you're done.  Sure, there's a lot of time in there but rainbow sparklies!

The Verdict:  I know a lot of you don't spend this long on your nails in a month.  That's ok too.  I like to be the one that puts the time in, is a bit crazy with the glitter.  Makes me happy.  And sparkly.  My preferred state of being.  Yay glitter!

Last Week Wasn't Sparkly Enough So MORE HOLO!

Ok so I did this mani last weekend.  It was good, but it could be sparklier.  I know that was a lot of glitter last time but JUST NOT SPARKLY ENOUGH.  So realising I now have the full rainbow of holo colours in my small hexes, of course I'm going to do proper.  Sparkly.  

I tried to do this at a reasonable time last night but that meant applying glitter while watching the last episode of Breaking Bad and that clearly wasn't a good idea.  So late night glitter it is!  I think you know how to do this by now (see here if you want a tutorial) so let's assess composition and placement.  What bugs me, looking at this closely, is that the spacing isn't consistent between my fingers.  My thumb and ring finger - being done first - are loosely spaced but the other three fingers are closer together.  I don't like the difference.  This is what you get from doing glitter while tired and not taking out a colour or two for shorter nails.  I also which I hadn't added the silver.  Cover it up, and the rainbow is much smoother.  I know you'll think I'm nitpicking but I've done so many of these by this stage there isn't any harm in critically evaluating my work.  Fortunately, it is rainbowy and sparkly, so there's that.

The Verdict:  I like this, save for the reasons outlined above.  It's sparkly!  No macro photo today because apparently that's too hard for me to do, four times.  Sparkly!  Rainbows!

HAHAHAH I'M NOT CRAY DON'T KNOW WHAT YOU MEAN THESE ARE NORMAL NAILS

Ok so for a while there I wasn't working.  Love that, it's the best, cos sleeping is awesome.  While I should have been using the time to pump out the nails, I used it to go through all 283 pages of the nail art supplies section of aliexpress.com. This site is really amazing, cos it's so cheap.  You can get 10,000 rhinestones for $3.  So I bought a bunch of 3D nail charms.  I then decided it would be a good idea to put them all on at one.  TACKYTIME YAY ADHERE ALL THE THINGS! 

Ok so my boyfriend HATES these.  Like, HATES them.  He's pretty tolerant of my nails but this apparently the line.  Like, he yelped when he saw them.  DON'T CARE, THESE ARE NOT FOR YOU.  So I did a rainbow ombre thing with Urban Outfitters Ringo, Claire's Neon Green, and others - I can't remember and I don't really want to get up to check so there.  I then just stuck all these on with nail glue. The charms will come off but I have no idea how I'm going to get the glue off.  I just love these though because it's the most tacky and loud and so very much me.  And I'm ok with that.  

 

The Verdict: Typing is hard right now cos the hearts on my thumbs stick out a lot but DON'T CARE.  These are the craziest nails I've ever done and I'm quite proud of myself.  Worth it!