Green and Gold Art Deco Nails

I do enjoy a good bandwagon-jumping-on party!  When I saw the gorgeous art deco nails Whitney at dressedupnails.com posted on Reddit, I knew I had to have a go, warnings about the amount of time it takes be damned!  I'm made of time! Yeah...really should have listen there cos these really do take an extraordinary about of time to do!

To start, I applied three coats of a polish I've been meaning to use for a while, OPI Goldeneye from the Skyfall collection.  It's such a beautiful gold, I have no idea why I haven't used it sooner.  Look at the macro shot below, haven't seen a foil that pretty in ages.  Once it and the extra coat of Seche Vite I added on top cos I'm impatient was dry I set to work with my striping tape.  I've only used it for stripes before so I had no idea what I was in for, trying to get tape ends to line up properly.  I didn't do anything special with the tape, just copied the designs from Whitney, embellishing where I felt like it.  On top of the tape I applied two coats in quick succession of Revlon Posh.  I should have gone with a darker, hunt green like I was originally going to but alas, Posh will have to do.  

The Verdict:  I love art deco everything so this one is a winner for me.  It's funny how the lines look drawn on the green rather than the green over the top but I'm ok with that.  Thanks for the idea Whitney!

Australia Day Nails

Urgh, today is just not a good day for nails.  Not only did I cut myself twice on the cheese shaver (in addition to the two other times I've done it) but both cuts were on my photo hand.  Acetone + fresh cuts = owies.  To top it off, the design I had in my head for Australia day didn't work out that well and I feel like I've cheated if my glitter doesn't line up properly.  I can't even re-do it cos I can't face the acetone again!  So we're all just going to have to deal with less-than-amazing Australia day nails. 

I thought about doing Australian flags but it felt too hard so instead, the call of the wild Australian: Aussie, aussie, aussie! Oy, oy, oy!  Believe it or not I've heard it in bars all over the world.  To start, I applied two coats of the greenest green I have, Revlon Posh.  Then, using my usual technique, I slapped the glitter on.  I couldn't work out which way round the pieces were supposed to go to sit together properly so I cheated and spaced them out a bit.  I used a gold Sharpie on my thumb but it smeared under the top coat, so I left out the super close up today. 

The Verdict:  Urgh, I hate everything about this, including the white balance and exposure on the photos.  And my hand hurts.  Blerg.  Happy Australia Day everyone.  I'll be less complainy tomorrow. 

I Don't Even Have a Title for This, There's Too Much Going On

So I knew I wanted to do something glitter tonight but I wanted to not just be your run of the mill glitter pattern.  When I found my favourite blue holographic glitter it hit me: RIDICULOUSLY BRIGHT GRADIENT WITH SPARKLIES OVER THE TOP CAN'T NOT BE AWESOME.  So that then.

I wanted a gradient using creme polishes, preferably in a blue-green-yellow gradient.  Four American Apparel polishes fit the bill so I set to work using Imperial Purple, Passport Blue, Malibu Green and Crescent Heights, purple through lime green respectively.  I just used the normal sponge method: start with a white base, paint stripes of polish on a makeup sponge in the same height as your nail, apply maybe three light coats, making sure you move the sponge up and down a bit to blend it all in.  I found that I sometimes need to apply a colour or another at the tips or cuticles, to make sure the white doesn't show through.  Then, using a top coat I found at Dollarama because I really didn't want it to ever dry, I went to work with my blue glitter and orange stick.  This loose dot pattern really doesn't take long if your glitter spread out - I can knock out a finger in under five minutes.  Top with lots of proper top coat like Seche Vite and you're done. 

The Other Hand: It's not really practical to both hands like this so I usually loosely match the style of my right hand on my left.  This time I went for an ombre mani, using each of the four colours on each finger and a random purple on my thumb.  I then sprinkled on the same glitter, to get it to match.  You really can't tell that much and no one really pays that much attention.

The Verdict: I really like how bright and colourful this one is.  Can't go wrong with bright AND sparklies.  I especially like how the glitter blends in around the purple but stands out at a contrast against the lime green.  Success!  Despite taking forever to clean up!

Re-review: Nerd Lacquer All of Time and Space, Warrior Ethos and Event Horizon

It's no secret I think indie polishes are awesome.  I love them for all their sparkliness, uniqueness and that they're just made by people.  In their houses.  Sometimes though I just have to go back to the indies that started it all for me, the irreplaceable Nerd Lacquers.  I'm lucky enough to own about a dozen and I thought I might let some of my favourites see the light of day.  Let's take a look at Warrior Ethos, Event Horizon and All of Time and Space.

Back in early 2011 when you could actually buy Nerd Lacquers, there was nothing else like it around.  There were a handful of Etsy sellers but not much beyond that.  It was the sparkliness and all-around differentness that drew me in.  Warrior Ethos was one that especially caught my eye.  It's a beautiful, blood-red jelly polish with black, iridescent and red glitters of all sizes.    With these kinds of polishes, you need three coats to let the glitter build up in layers, getting a real sense of depth.  

I don't even have words to describe how much I love Event Horizon.  Look at the macro shot on my thumb, look at how much glitter is packed in there!  There's too many different kinds to name, suspended in a deep blue-green jelly.  Just like Warrior Ethos, the more coats you add, the deeper the polish looks.  This one has a whole bunch of holographic silver glitter in there so not only is gorgeous, it's sparkly too.

Finally, at least for today, we have the much softer All of Time and Space, an awesome mix of pink and silver glitter in a mint green base.  This one has more of a frosty finish than the first two but it's that pink shimmer that's mixed in there with the glitter that gives it a different kind of dimension.  I feel like this looks almost like Monet's Waterlilies, although that could just be me stretching to find another way to describe how much I love this polish.

The Verdict: It's been well over a year and just no one has been able to come close to making the same complex polishes as Nerd Lacquer.  I don't mean to disparage other brands - they do their own thing - but Nerd Lacquers were just such an amazing mix of glitter and perfect base jellies, flakies, everything.

I'm also posting this because I'm sad the Ninja Polish site crashed when these were going on sale again recently.  Doesn't hurt to take a look at the originals!  Speaking of, I have reviewed all these before but let's just say I'm a bit better at doing this now.

Under an Hour: 3D Glitter Cubes

I'm still brainstorming ways to show you glitter mosaic manicures that don't take a million years to do and one of my favourites are the 3D glitter cubes.  I had the light bulb moment about a year ago that you could fit diamond-shaped glitter to look like baby's blocks and I've been a bit obsessed ever since.  It's super easy to do and is super sparkly, especially if you're using larger, holographic pieces.  Let's take a closer look, shall we?

The hardest part about this particular mani was choosing the base colour.  Nothing really goes with blue, pink and green so I resorted to one of my favourites, Urban Outfitters Blue Velvet.  Using my usual technique, I cracked out my cheap top coat and went to town.  It's about at this point I remember why I usually try to let my base colour dry before adding glitter.  See how there's gunk all over the glitter?  That's because in trying to get the glitter in deep enough not to stick up, the not-quite-dry blue squelched up along with the clear top coat.  I hate this so much I nearly didn't post this.  You deserve only the most crisp, clean glitter!  Anyway, use slightly smaller glitter and it won't stick up, you'll get the same effect and you won't be sad about the messiness.

The Verdict:  As much as the execution could use work, I still love this as an under-an-hour glitter sparkly.  If you have even less time, just do the one cube at the end of each nail and marvel at how well it catches the light and is generally interesting.  It's so fast I even did my other hand!  Again! This is how adults must feel :D

Real Mermaid Glitter Nails

Once in awhile, I get the urge to do what most would consider insane levels of glitter.  I do it because I love it and I love sparklies.  This took a really long time to do - two night in fact - but it's totally worth it because it's just so very, very sparkly.  The glitter from LoveNailz etsy store goes so well together too.  I hope I get reincarnated as a mermaid, and my tail looks like this.  That would be nice...

To start, I applied two coat of Chanel Blue Satin, a dark blue shimmery creme.  Not that the base colour really matters because I completely covered it in glitter but there you go anyway.  Next, using my usual technique, I painted a thin stripe of top coat down the center of my first nail.  When you're planning on doing so much glitter, it's important to do thin stripes otherwise the outer edges will be too thick with top coat.  Then, taking an orange stick and four little piles of my glitter, I went to work, starting with a column of glitter that sets my spacing for the whole nail.  I then worked out to each side.  Don't worry if pieces stick off the edge of your nail, they can be trimmed to get the perfect edge-to-edge effect.  I even cut pieces in half so I wouldn't have gaps around my cuticles.  I don't like that. Top it with two coats of Seche Vite - making sure to wrap your tips - and you're done! 

The Verdict:  Not only is this the most glitter I've ever stuck to my nails, I think it might just be my favourite.  More rainbow is always better but the colour graduation here is so smooth that it just wins.  Not to mention how there aren't any areas I'm unhappy with the application, and it's the most sparkly.  So yay!

Review: A Bunch of Zoya Pixie Dusts

I got paid yesterday so of course I'm going to go buy more polish.  It's the good pay, where I don't have to pay rent, so I kind splurged a bit, picking up the other half of the Zoya Fall Pixie Dust Collection, a Deborah Lippmann, a couple of Nails Inc and a few cheap drug store polishes.  Shh I'm an adult.  I've seen some lovely manis with rainbow stripes and texture polishes so of course I'm going to try out my new Zoyas.  

I'm not very good at freehanding things but it turns out vertical stripes are pretty easy to do.  I started out with the usual base coat (still liking OPI Nail Envy), placed a blob of each of Arabella, Dhara, Solange, Chita, Sunshine and Carter on a piece of paper and went to work with a small brush.  I eyeballed the width of each stripe although I found it easiest to start at each edge and work my way inwards. This is three coats of each polish.  Two would have been fine but I wanted to make the edges as sharp as I could.

I of course then put top coat on.  Which I now regret because it looks better without it.

 The Verdict: I'm not sure why I keep buying texture polishes.  They're still kinda hard to incorporate into regular manis and I'm still not not 100% used to the rough texture.   They're sure pretty in a rainbow though!  What do you think, leave the texture nature or add a top coat?

Christmas Glitter Nails!

Alrighty!  It's December 20th and it's probably about time I did Christmas nails properly.  It wouldn't be me without the sparklies so of course it's going to be all done in glitter. At least I used five different types of glitter!  And pretty base colours!  Let's take a look, shall we?

I wanted to use red and green glitter here and wanted a contrasting base of each of the glitters so to start, I applied three coats of Glitter Gal Red Sparkle and A-England St George, both absolutely gorgeous holo polishes.  I then did my usual trick with the top coat, applying a stripe down the middle of my nail, placing my first column of glitter using an orange stick, then filling out either side.  When you're using bigger glitter like I am here, make sure you press each piece down into the polish and top coat - will help stop it lifting up.  Top with two coats of Seche Vite and you're done. 

The Verdict:  I'm not totally sure of the colours but look, it's sparkly!  Love both of the polishes too, they're always reliable and awesome.  And there's variety in glitter!  Sparkly!  And Christmassy!