Polish days - Get back to nature

It's Polish day time again - the monthly blogger event set up but the lovely Polly Polish. I, unfortunately, missed last months' in the haze of post Christmas back to reality, so even though I'm currently overseas with work I made sure I did a design ready to post. The theme is 'back to nature' so pretty broad and I had a vision of a daisy chain but it didn't quite work out like that in the limited time I had before my trip, but it certainly still fits the brief...

So just a quick run down of the polishes used... the base blue is one coat of H&M Nail colour in Blue my Mind. Then using a striping brush I added the grass using Bad Apple in Green Apple. Then added the flower detail using Models Own nail art pens in white and yellow.

All finished off with a generous coat of Save the Nail 45 second top coat.

And as we're talking about nature I thought I'd share the beautiful sunset here in the Caribbean...

Happy painting... the nailist xxx

Acid angles

So as the snow scuppered my plans this weekend I decided to get ahead of the seasons and rock out some truly summer colours to bring some sunshine into my life!

I absolutely love acid colours so didn't feel I should have to wait til summer to wear them!

The base orange is two coats of Angelica Nail Colour in Hip Hop from Primark. I then free hand painted a inverted triangle using Barry M Nail Paint in Matt White, followed by a smaller triangle in Bourjois Ultra Shine So Laque in Lime Catwalk. Then using a black nail art pen, I used Models Own, I defined the triangles.

The result would have been a lot better if I'd used tape for cleaner lines but oh well! I'm trying not to sweat the small stuff as much in 2013!

I used W7 top coat to finish off.

Happy painting... the nailist xxx

Polish days - MAN-icure

It's Polish Day time!.. the monthly blogger event put together by Hannah @ PollyPolish.com. This month's theme is MAN-icure in honour of it being Movember. The brief was either a the iconic moustache design or a tribute to any special men in your life.

I decided to go literal and simple....

I had a bit of trouble with the moustaches due to a gloopy black nail polish but no time to redo unfortunately! Still loving it though - makes me laugh every time I look at my nails.

And what makes me giggle even more is that if I look at them the other way the moustaches, unintentionally, look like eyebrows and I have angry/surprised faces looking back at me!

I opted for muted 'manly' base colours:-

Thumb - Nail Polish by H&M in Nerd

Index - W7 in 29 Grey

Middle - Models Own in Concrete Mixer

Ring - Bourjois 1 Second Gel Silicone Texture in 04 Taupe Classy

Little - Bourjois 10 days No Chips in shade 23

Happy painting.. the nailist xxx

Eat cake, make money for charity!

Today is Macmillan Cancer Support's 'World's Biggest Coffee Morning'. Donate to a very worthy cause by eating cake... what's not to like?!

That's exactly what I'll be doing while sporting my Macmillan-esque nails!

Base coat: Save the Nail Eau so hydrating
White: Barry M Matt White
Green: W7 Neon Green
Detail: Models Own white & black nail art pens
Top coat: inm Out the Door quick dry


Happy painting (cake eating and coffee drinking!)... the nailist xxx

Wrapping paper

So today's design has ended up looking like wrapping paper... which wasn't what I originally had in mind! It definitely looks better in the flesh as the matt vs glossy effect doesn't come across that well on screen.

I wanted to test run a new polish which is the base colour - W7 Nail Polish in Matt Green. It's got more of a satin finish than completely matt which I really like. After two coats of the green, I added an angled tip to each nail in Bourjois 10 days Nail Enamel shade 15. The polishes in this range are great for applying coloured tips as they have really small brushes with angle end.

Over the top I then added two silver stripes using a No7 nail art pen I have from a limited edition Christmas set. The pen is really good as it gives a dense colour in just one stroke.

I finished off by adding a high shine top coat just over the pink and silver so there's a real contrast between the matt green and the tips. I think it's this, and the colour combo, that makes it look like fancy wrapping paper!

Happy painting... the nailist xxx