31 Day Challenge - Day 16 - Geometric

Hey guys!

The prompt for day sixteen of the 31 Day Challenge is 'geometric', and I wanted to create some overlapping shapes on my nails. I started this mani with a base of Color Club 'Blue Heaven', an intense silver-blue linear holographic polish that I am in love with! I then grabbed a small detail brush and some black acrylic paint to carefully draw the shapes on the nail, making sure to create some overlap in them. Finally, using my detail brush I added colour with Kandy Colors 'Northern Lights' neon jelly collection (my fave jelly polishes to date!), and sealed it all in with Essence 'Better Than Gel Nails' topcoat. Et voila!

As you can see in that macro shot, the base colour is a holo finish and it is just beautiful when under the right light (i.e. not in my lightbox!). I tried to capture the colour shift as best as I could, but I'm not a photographer so these photos do not do it justice! Have a look at the photo below for a better idea of the holo goodness!

I was so pleased when I finished this mani as I can see a definite improvement in my freehand skills. Although the shapes aren't perfect, I am super happy with how this one came out, and it's given me more confidence to try freehand designs more often (even on my short nails) :D

Thanks for reading!

Helen x

Cute Checkered Floral Mani

Hi everyone!

Today I have a checkered design with floral accents to show you. I have been wanting to do something like this for a while, and the finished look reminds me of curtains or towels that you might have in your kitchen! Very summery and cute!

For this manicure I started with a base of Barry M 'Coconut' which is the most perfect milky off-white colour <3. Once dry, I placed striping tape in a checkered pattern on my nails and topped with Barry M 'Sky Blue' on my thumb, index and pinkie fingers, then Collection 'Peach Blossom' on my middle and ring fingers. For the floral design, I blended 'Sky Blue' and 'Damson' (by Barry M) on the nail, and finished with Ciate 'Mojito' for the leaves.

I'm pretty pleased with how these came out and want to try a similar design with more of a yellow theme as I have a very particular set of kitchen curtains in mind which this doesn't quite capture!

Hope you like them :)

Thanks for reading!

Helen

Geometric Gradient Nails

Hi!

Originally I wasn't going to write a full post for this design, but I ended up using so many polishes that I thought it would be best to write them all here! 

This is my geometric gradient design that I created for the Weekly Nail Art Challenge on Instagram.

WNAC - Geometric Gradient Nails

I started off with a base of OPI 'My Boyfriend Scales Walls' and let dry, then I applied striping tape in a criss-cross pattern with a piece of tape running up the centre of my nail. I created a gradient on each nail by sponging two different polishes of each colour (plus 'My Boyfriend Scales Walls') on each nail:

Blue = Barry M 'Damson' / Rimmel 'Mind The Gap, Victoria'
Yellow = Sally Hansen 'Butter-Fly Stroke' / Essence 'Love Is In The Air'
Green = Rimmel 'Sea Green' / Barry M 'Green Berry'
Pink = China Glaze 'Sexy Lady' / Barry M 'Strawberry Ice Cream'
Purple = Models Own 'Pukka Purple' / Barry M 'Prickly Pear'

Thanks for reading!

Helen x

As always, head over to Instagram to see all of the entries into the Weekly Nail Art Challenge - just search #wnac2015 :)