Thursday 22 December 2011

Nails of the Week- Noel Nails

Getting ready for the holidays this year and I was really inspired those NOEL kind of ornament things and I thought that they would make nice decorative nail which was christmassy. There's not too much to say about these, but I did them whilst watching the TOWIE Xmas Special so every time I look at them I am reminded of that which makes my laugh because that was quite funny. this could be done in a variety of colours too because the christmassy part is the word not necessarily the shades although I now wish I had included a dark green here but I don't know where I would have put it? this was quite tricky I had to work really had to get the letters how I wanted them and some of the lines are still a little wobbly but the joy of Christmas for me is that nothing every goes perfectly so I guess these sum up the season for me perfectly. This will probs be the last post before Sunday so MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!!
I was so excited to upload these that I didn't even clean up the white polish around my nails! If you were wondering the gold was the Barry M Instant Nail Effects in 143.
Difficulty:7/10

Saturday 17 December 2011

Unicorns and Glitter!!!!

Just a peek at my piggies this time, I' have painted them glittery for the festive season! Now I love glitter EVERYWHERE, when I go out I am always covered in glitter, on my eyes, on my body, my hair everything, but I hate glitter nail polish because it is a nightmare to remove and you end up making a big mess. However, on my toes I don't mind because I don't change that polish as often as I do my fingers, only after it is a complete wreck, especially in the winter. I created this look with inspiration from the glittery wrapping paper in the background of the pic (I got this from John Lewis and I am going to put it up in my kitchen at uni) and I used  Models Own in Champagne nail polish as the main colour, and then whilst wet I pressed into it a silver cosmetic glitter, I didn't use a glitter top coat because I find that with my toes if they are really thick with nail polish they chip more easily. Finished with two coats of top coat and you're done.
 ADDED TOUCH: I added the Unicorn as an afterthought because I luuuurrrrrve unicorns, this was painted on with a very fine artist brush and black nail polish. But you can add to this whatever you like, the silhouette works really well against the glitter. You should do this after the topcoat, although add another topcoat to finish as well.
 
Difficulty:2/10 (no Unicorn) 6/10 (With Unicorn)

Thursday 15 December 2011

Barry M Instant Nail Effects

Today I went into town braving the crazy Xmas shoppers in busy Brighton to get some of the new Barry M Instant Nail Effects. I got 143 (gold) and 146 (lilac). They look really good, metallic polishes look really good especially when paired with matt finishes, plus they are perfect for the hols! Sorry though they don't have the purple one on the website.
Barry M Instant Nail Effects - Foil Gold Foil

Nails of the week-No two are alike...

Hi guysies, back with my personal favourite xmas look this year, snowflakes!!! Yes, this look was done by hand (mine, obvs) because my brother thought it was a stencil, I told him that all snowflakes are unique and therefore a stencil is useless!!! Yes, this took ages, but I am home from uni for the hols and I had the time to spare so I didn't really mind. (NB if you didn't have the time you could do this on the ring and thumb nails only.)


 Here is how I did it...
1. Paint nails with basecoat and two coats of colour. Leave to dry FULLY or the red will bleed into the white and it won't be crisp.
2. Using a cocktail stick (I have done this before with a very fine artists brush but the results are not as good) dipped in white nail polish start creating your snowflakes. There is no fool proof way of doing this you need to be very patient and a bit creative but it is helpful to have images of snowflakes (which are everywhere this time of year) for inspiration.
TIP:  By applying pressure to the cocktail stick, you can scrape away the white while it is still a bit wet, leaving the red underneath, which allows you to either tidy up lines or create very fine gaps of red between areas of white. Leave to dry FULLY.
3. Finish with a topcoat.
VARIATIONS: I have used red (which looks much darker in real life than in the photo) but pale and dark blues, purples, gold would look really nice too and also I have done this in the past with a glitter topcoat placed only on the actual snowflakes, which also have an added Xmassy effect.
DIFFICULTY: 7/10

Sunday 11 December 2011

Nails of the Week- Glitter Attack

This week I have been getting into the festive season with glittery sliver and black nails. Okay they don't exactly look Christmassy but there is glitter and I just really love the way it looks like glitter is dripping from my nails as if I just tore into a Unicorn with my bare hands. I cannot take credit for this design though, I saw it on the Illamasqua website as part of their Christmas Gifts section. The Illamasqua colours were Harsh and Boosh Festive Nail Duo but I knew that I had similar colours and I re-created the look with Barry M NP47(Black), although any black will do, Models Own in Champagne as the silvery colour (this colour looks gold in the bottle but comes out more silver) and then I just pressed a silver glitter top coat into it (there are tonnes of these around especially this season) and then two coats of top coat.
This is the Illamasqua Version, it looks great with really round almost pointed nails.

This is my version of the look, as you can see my nails are really short at the moment so the roundness is kinda lost on my nails but the two layers actually make nails look longer. 
VARIATION:I have tried this with various colours, my fave was when I did red glitter with black and my 60+ Spanish lecturer, Luis was proper impressed with them! But that looked a bit gory though, go wild use any combinations you like, go subtle with the same shades in matte and glitter, or wild with clashing colours!
DIFFICULTY: 3/10

Friday 9 December 2011

NAILSALICIOUS!!!

Hellooooo! thank you for reading this Blog which will be full of fun and easy to create nail designs as well as step by step guides on how to recreate them yourself, product reviews and tips etc. I am very excited about this and I will definitely do one new nail design per week but there will be more posts than that about nail care, new polishes and other things.
Just a bit about me, you should know that I am just a normal nineteen year old girl, not a professional or anything but really enjoy being creative and I think that that it is really fun and easy to create small works of art on your nails. I live in Brighton, I go to the University of Sussex and I study Spanish and Italian, but I grew up in Southend, Essex.
You've not got the world AT your fingertips you've got the world ON your fingertips.
Love ya,
Megs