Mini Messy Floral Mani | Nail Art

Hi friends! I've been busier than usual lately but happily, I now have some new nail art for you. Hooray! I feel I should warn you upfront, though, that my photos are somewhat inconsistent - I decided to take them next to my window but it was one of those days where the light changes from one second to the next, so I ended up with a real variety of colours and brightnesses haha.

Aaand here's a close-up of the H&M dress I based them on (which I have had for years):

I'm so so pleased with how these turned out - they're really cute but the loose-ish interpretation of the flowers keeps them from feeling cutesy. I didn't reproduce the fabric pattern precisely, but I hope you'll agree that these capture the sense of the dress nicely. 

I used Barry M 'Passion Fruit' (from the Gelly line) as my base colour. I picked this up just last week and I'm so glad I did. My pictures don't do it justice but it is a fantastic shade - a really bright, coral-y red (not the orange my camera seemed to think it was!). The white detailing was added with a cut-down brush; I used a kind of dabbing/blobbing technique for some of the smaller flower petals. 

These nails were relatively simple to do, perhaps deceptively so: since the pattern is quite messy and haphazard, your flowers shouldn't be too perfect, so you can be quite freehanded about it and no one will know if you make a 'mistake'. I did a couple of matching accent nails on my other hand and they broadly match, even if they're a touch more 'abstract'. ;)

What do you think about these? Do you enjoy this kind of floral? Also, if you've been following for a wee while, you might have noticed that I've had (another) file-a-thon, haha, so feel free to let me know how you feel about this nail shape, too (I really like it, for now)!

Tropical Flowers feat. Color Club Fiesta Collection

Hello lovelies!  Just a quick post from me since I had intended to be in bed hours ago (though such is the case more or less every night, haha).  I was actually in two minds about whether or not to post these at all - although I really like them in person, I'm not entirely happy with how the photos turned out.  You're getting them anyway!

I was rather so excited to come across the Color Club Fiesta Collection in TK Maxx last week - other people always seem to find bargains there but this was my first, which made it kind of irresistible...though the colours are nice too, haha.  This design made use of Endless Summer - blue, Sunrise Canyon - chartreuse (or at least, that's what I would call it) and Wild Cactus - green.  These pictures aren't perfectly colour-accurate, to my eye: I'd say Endless Summer is a touch darker and bolder (I found it to dry noticeably darker than the bottle colour, which was disappointing, though it's still nice) and Wild Cactus a bit deeper/greener and less teal-y.  

The idea for the leafy nails popped into my head whilst watching this MrCandiipants tutorial - although I'm not sure if it will be obvious why...  Of course, I couldn't do without an accent nail or two and flowers seemed the natural accompaniment.  Originally, I had used the pink polish in the same collection (Flamingo) for the flowers on a base of Endless Summer, but I took those off and much prefer them this way!

I enjoy the fun, summery vibe I get from these, despite the fact that our weather remains rather...Scottish.  What do you think?  Do you feel my viiibe?!  Haha.  This post was definitely longer than I intended...  Good night!

P.S. Yep, changed my nail shape again.  I am fickle.

piCture pOlish Blog Fest 2013

Celebrating the Year of the Blogger!

HIYA POLISHED PALS!  Can you tell I'm excited?!  I'M EXCITED.  I was utterly over the moon when I received the email inviting me to take part in piCture pOlish Blog Fest 2013, not least because I had never had the opportunity to try their polishes before.  For those unfamiliar with Blog Fest, it is an annual event run by PP and involving bloggers from all around the world and this year, Blog Fest is celebrating amazing nail art.  Three lucky participants will also be chosen to create a PP collaboration shade each, for release in 2014.  The voting will take place on PP's special Blog Fest 2013 Pinterest board - if you'd like to see the other entries and take part in the voting, you can find that here: http://pinterest.com/picturepolish/

I was sent these three shades to play with:

Ocean - 'An octopus garden in the shade...'

Ruby Blou - 'Dazzling red, sparkling blue'

Atomic - ' WARNING...totally explosive!'

As you can see, Ocean and Atomic were created by Kelly's Kolors and Samarium's Swatches respectively - I hope I've done their beautiful creations justice!  So without further ado, here is my contribution to Blog Fest 2013!

Ta daaah!  Being so used to working with cremes, I was initially unsure how best to show off these three shades, but I am pleased with how they turned out.   If you'd like to recreate the look, you're in luck, because here is my FIRST EVER TUTORIAL!

1: After applying base coat, paint your base colour - this is three thin coats of Atomic.

2: Using a nail art brush - or the bottle brush, if you're so inclined - paint the shapes of your flowers.*

3: Outline your flowers in black, using a nail art brush or pen, then frame the rest of your nail (which I forgot to take a picture of, oops).  Don't frame the parts where the flowers are!

4: Glitter placement - plop some Ruby Blou on a bit of paper/tin foil and use a toothpick/dotting tool/weapon of choice to pick up individual pieces of glitter and arrange them roughly to form the centres of your flowers.

5: Add top coat & clean up if necessary, and you're done!

*When I used Ruby Blou as a base, I painted the flowers in black and added Atomic over the top afterwards.

The polishes themselves are really beautiful.  Ocean is super sparkly with holo-ish flakes in a turquoise jelly base.  It is quite sheer but the formula is lovely, so it truly isn't a hassle to layer it up.  Ruby Blou is a delightful mix of large and small hex (I think) glitters in red, blue and silver, suspended in a clear base.  Atomic isn't something I would necessarily have thought of as a 'me' colour, but it really is incredibly gorgeous and so complex.  The base is a silvery white shimmery affair, but there are loads of little flakes in there too - I see pink and green and gold reflections and sparkles.  I've included some bottle photos especially to try to capture some of the more complex elements of Ocean and Atomic.

Pretty special, right?  

What do you think?  Are you a piCture pOlish fan?  I'm certainly impressed!  You can find PP's polishes on their website or at one of their worldwide distributors.  If you're in the UK (& perhaps Europe?) you can find piCture pOlish at the wonderful Sally Magpies.  

HAPPY BLOG FEST 2013 EVERYONE!  I can't wait to check out all the other bloggers!

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EDIT: Now you can check out some of the other BlogFesters' posts below and add your own, if you haven't already!

Zig Zags/Floral Tribal Mish Mash

Hello!  I'm back!  We had a very busy (in a good way!) Easter weekend last weekend but I have now had a chance to paint my nails & take photos etc. soooo yay!  Nails!  

I think this looks kind of like an Easter manicure (cute colours + zig zags = Easter?) but that really wasn't my intention!  Guess I still have Easter on my subconscious brain.  I started out with base colours of China Glaze 'Re-Fresh Mint' & Color Club 'Sweet Pea'.  I hadn't really decided in advance what I would do next, but zig zags just seemed an appropriate choice!  For the other nails, I was going for a tribal-esque vibe, but with little flowers instead of dots (am I still making sense?!).

I picked out Essie 'Blanc', Barry M 'Blackberry' Gelly (the purple one) & Barry M 'Gold Foil' (which I use a LOT for nail art) and added the details with some striper brushes and my second smallest dotting tool.  It was starting to get dark when I painted these so I rushed them a little, but thankfully I don't mind the 'hand painted' look, haha.

I was pretty disappointed with these at first - I absolutely love Re-Fresh Mint & Sweet Pea together and I think I felt that the busyness of the design kind of detracted from that.  They have definitely grown on me, though.  What do you think?

Got some bonus Easter photos for you, too!

Heilan' Coo

The top photo is of some nails I did for the delightful Maddy while she and my sister, Alison, were up staying with us over Easter.  I think nail art looks super cute on wee nails.

The bottom photo is of a heilan' coo (highland cow) at Pollock Country Park because HIGHLAND COWS ARE AWESOME.  Seriously, so cute, I love them.  This one is a 'baby' - look at its little teeny tiny horns just starting to poke out!

Hope you enjoyed these little extras & that you all had as splendid an Easter as I did!  As always, I'd love to hear your thoughts.