33DC Black Matte Contrast Nails

The challenge for today is to choose a manicure from your pinterest board and recreate it. I choose this one from Copy That Copy Cat nails. But because my nails are shorter my shiny details are less complex.

I used my Barry M matte polish in Espresso for the base coat and then used NYC Grand Central Station to create the patterns. I much prefer this way of using the contrast between matte and shiny than just doing a french manicure, it gives it a subtle elegance. I'm not sure how long this will last because there's no top coat involved and matte nail polishes are notorious for chipping quickly. Here is Espresso alone at 2 coats:

My computer has done something really weird to the next photo but it made me giggle quite a lot so I thought I'd share it with you.

Remember to check out everyone else's pinterest inspired manis through the inkslinks below :)

Tweet

33DC Art with your most used colour

The challenge today is to use the colour you have the most of to create some nail art. I have so many blue polishes- I know I have too many but I just cannot stop myself from buying them, I'm addicted! I used three different blue polishes for this; Barry M Blue Grape, My Ten Friends Space Sauce and NYC Aqua Mystic.

There are so many layers to this art but they're not really visible, I started with a base of Blue Grape topped with Space Sauce then stamped over the top with Aqua Mystic and Moyou Suki Collection Plate 09. I just chose some bits off the plate to do each nail but I like the basket weave image on this plate. I'm also super excited to use the koi image.

I then used a medium length striping brush to add in the stripes with Blue Grape. This looked so good in person, Space Sauce gave it a really nice holographic effect and it looked really complex (my boyfriend couldn't immediately work out how I had done it).

I love the complexity and simplicity of this mani :). Tomorrow I have a skittle mani to show you.

Tweet

33DC Geometric

For my geometric nail art I decided to use these parallelogram loose glitters I have to create cubes on my nails. I love how it turned out and can only apologise for the light I had to take this in.

The base for this is NYC A suitcase and a donut, a gorgeous greyish, blackish navy, I am showing you two coats which were just perfect for this polish.

These little glitters are incredibly holographic and I just love this easy cube effect. However, on reflection I wish I'd considered the camera and put my cubes the other way up... here's what they looked like for me :):

There we go, I loved this but I have to admit it only lasted for a couple of hours because I pick glitter off my nails...

Tweet

33DC Pixellated Gradient

Pixellated nail art is something I first did back in July. I have been seeing it around a lot more recently and thought it would be a great way to incorporate the prompts of three colour gradient with a pattern. I love the colour scheme of blue, grey and yellow that I used for this, they just go together so well. I used a single polish for each and then used white polish to change the saturation but keep it the same hue.

The polishes I used were A England Dorian Gray, Barry M Blue Grape and NYC Lexington Yellow. The yellow was the hardest to get different shade of at the right thickness, hence why there is so much less of it.

I did these nails by using the base I already had on (Nails Inc Covent Garden Ballet), putting OPI Matte Top Coat on and drawing a simple grid using my white Barry M nail art pen (these pens work so much better over a matte base. I then used a small brush to fill in the small squares, mixing a colour and putting it in across all my nails, then mixing the next colour. It took a surprisingly short amount of time to do- in the range of half an hour but I didn't have to paint my base colour on as well.

I love how this looks, it's so simple but really effective. If you're going to use the same effect as me with the lighter squares it's easier to pick a dark colour and lighten it in stages with white polish than it is to try and darken a colour without greying it. Tomorrow will be a small update about some new polishes available in the (UK) shops with a few swatches.

Tweet

33DC Inspired by a Tutorial

This wasn't really a tutorial but it is someone else's design. Dressed up Nails did these awesome dotty hearts and when I saw them I knew they were what I wanted to copy for this challenge. I did mine in neon pink and pastel lime green- a fabulous combination which is under appreciated.

The colours used here are Jessica Lime Cooler and Lilypad Lacquer In Pink We Trust- an exclusive made for the UK store Sally Magpies. I did the dots with a dotting tool and freehanded the stripes with a medium length striping brush.

I really like this manicure. I like how in your face it is but also isn't because the pastel green tones it down, just awesome :).

Tomorrow I will have a post summing up my top ten polishes for the winter season now that the clocks have gone back and some of them are a little wild cardy so come and see if you agree with me :).

Tweet

33DC Manicure with 2 Patterns

The challenge for today was to do a manicure with two patterns, I could have cheated a little and done a different pattern different nails to produce a skittle mani. I decided instead to test my stamping skills and stamp two patterns onto each nail, one half each.

I used two patterns from my Moyou Sailor plate 4 but they're a little unbalanced as the image on the left is so much busier than the one on the right.

I'm not sure that this is something I would wear again- it definitely doesn't show that I had to stamp twice.

Oops almost forgot to tell you what amazing base colour this is- it's Whimsy by piCture pOlish- the perfect blue.

Tweet

33DC Artwork with your favourite brand

I couldn't really pick a favourite brand- for a start I have a load of indie brands I couldn't choose between for my glittery and holographic polishes. So I decided to change this prompt a little bit and I am showing you artwork with my favourite cheap polish brand NYC. NYC is only available at Superdrug, all their polishes are named after New York City and they do a good range of amazing cremes, glitters and foils.

I got Lincoln Center fairly recently from Fragrance Direct and it is an amazing burgundy colour in two coats (on the first coat it does look like blood). The foil effects range has four amazing stamping polishes in it (avoid the orange) and their gold is actually my go to stamping colour and as they're so cheap at £1.50 you don't mind the wastage you get with stamping so much.

I decided to do a tone on tone stamp with these two colours and I hope you like this more subtle look. I got the stamping centre on my nail by rolling the stamper vertically up my nail- looking from the tip towards the cuticle end to make sure it was lined up.

Tweet

33DC South America Aztec Temple

Today's post is late because I took off my first manicure for this prompt without taking any photos. I didn't want to do the same things again so I give you the aztec temple in silhouette:

The base here is a Nelly Polish sample which she was selling off and I did the step detail in Barry M Espresso.

It's another one that looks great when your hand is in exactly the right position and weird the rest of the time...

Tomorrow I'll be sharing some exciting news so be sure to check in :).

Tweet

33DC Woodland Animals

The prompt for today is animals and I had to use this mani from Eeeek! Nail Polish as my idea because it was so gorgeous (much better than mine ;)). We have here a badger, a fox and erm... a dog? My boyfriend thinks it's a squirrel... Plus the tail of the brown creature which was my little addition to this :).

I love this so much- I still need more practice with acrylic paint to make it do what I want it to (my fox was a little lumpy).

For the base I used A England St. George then stamped with Moyou Pro Plate 8 (I think) and NYC Magic Earth to produce a leafy background. The stamping alone looked incredible- I wish I'd taken a picture before I attacked it with acrylic paint. I know it's quite a common thing to do tone on tone stamping but I personally haven't done it before. With my new squishy stamper I am able to do art over stamped backgrounds because I don't have to wait ages for polish to dry before stamping.

I love these little woodland critters :)

Tweet

33DC: Abstract Lines

Abstract is such a hard prompt because it is so wide- I typed it into Google and came up with a picture of some lines and thought it would be a perfect chance to try some fan brush nail art. This is not exactly what I was picturing in my head but for a first try it's not terrible.

I like the blue side of this more than I like the red side. I'm getting a bit worried that I won't have an easy new technique to try for that prompt in this challenge; if there are any techniques you'd like to see me attempt please feel free to comment and let me know.

I'm not going to tell you any of the colours I used here because I put them away before noting them down and also because you can't really tell what colours are in it anyway. I'm going to try to use a fan brush to get a vertical gradient on my nails at some point because I seem to fail doing it any other way.

It's not terrible but I don't really like this either. It lasted on my nails for about an hour before I swapped it out. Friday's challenge is animals and I already know exactly what I want to do...

Tweet

33 DC: Based on Pattern in home

Again this is going to be a quickie because I'm quite busy at the moment. I got some Deborah Lippmann polishes really cheaply from TK Maxx and I wanted to show you them so here is Cleopatra in New York and Nefertiti with a bundle monster splatter stamp (which I love!)

You might be asking what's the pattern- it is mess, I love having a lot of stuff out on my desk which is perfectly organised to me but messy to others. Sadly this is the last design for a while in which I will have long nails because I had to cut them down to look a bit more professional for an interview :(. I'll be back tomorrow with a pre prepared post and some awesome nail art :)

Tweet

Black Cat Lacquer Midnight City Swatch

Today I am showing you Midnight City by Black Cat Lacquer, a phenomenal black jelly glitter with holographic circles, hexagons and crescent moons in it. I layered it over a coat of Barry M Black but as I then added three coats of the polish to get the glitter distribution I wanted I could probably have just used the polish, however, with this kind of polish I would advocate using a base so that you can control the glitter density without having to worry about if the base is even.

I love that this polish is like a galaxy manicure in a bottle complete with little planets and crescent moons.

I love how rock and roll this looks on my new nail shape. If you haven't already guessed I am a total convert to the almond shaped nail- they elongate my fingers in a way that square nails never did and they look really classy. However I will be worried every time I file them that I'm going to file off the wrong bit and lose the shape!

What do you think? Black nail polish that still looks great on slightly longer nails, it's definitely a win for me. By the way you may have noticed ads popping up on my site- I'm hoping to raise a little bit of money to spend on polishes to be able to buy polishes which I love and want to share with you. 

Tweet

33DC Flowers: Moyou Tulip Stamping

As soon as I saw this Moyou stamping plate image I knew what I wanted to do with it and that was to make stamper decals:

These are quite simple to make- pick up your image on your stamper as per usual and while it's on the stamper use nail polish to colour in the parts of the design you want to (here I coloured in the tulips and the grass below them)  then add a generous coat of clear nail polish to the image and wait for it to dry (I usually leave mine about 15-20 minutes) then use tweezers to peel the whole thing off the stamper, place it on your (dry!) base coloured nails, use nail scissors to cut away any excess around your nails and then put another coat of the same clear top coat over the top, wrapping the tips.

I used a few different polshes here, the background is Jessica Lime Cooler, the flowers are H&M Orange and Yellow, OPI Flashbulb Fuchsia and A England Rose Bower, and the leaves are NYC High Line Green.
I love the effect you can get with stamped decals, they can produce some exceptional nail art images. Remember to check out all the other 33 day challenge flower designs, there will be some amazing nail art!

Tweet

33DC Indian Design

I decided to go with an intricate design inspired by the sort of patterns often associated with Indian art and henna. Also today is the exciting debut of my new rounded nail shape! I broke off the corner of my middle finger doing some heavy lifting earlier this week and decided to try a new nail shape rather than losing all my length.I was really worried about it but now I really like it :).

I started this design with a base coat of Collection Scorched, then added the details with Deborah Lippmann Through the Fire, NYC Water Street Blue, Full Metal Jacket and my Barry M black nail art pen.

This design came out really well and I love the autumn feel this has with a pop of blue.

Remember to check out everyone else's Indian themed nail art and pop back tomorrow to see a new UK indie polish with some cute nail art (I'll give you a hint, it's about balloons)

Tweet

33DC Chevron with Emily de Molly Blueprint

Today's 33 day challenge prompt is chevron. I wanted to use this polish which arrived last Saturday to do my chevrons. The base is Emily de Molly Blueprint and I hand painted on the chevrons in OPI A Woman's Prague-Ative.

Isn't it funny how sometimes you get a polish and it sits on your desk looking at you for months before you use it and sometimes you get a polish out and have to put it straight onto your nails. It was definitely a case of the latter with this one. This is two medium thickness coats, it looked very streaky on the first coat but the second evened everything up and made it totally opaque. This polish has a navy base with mixed sizes of royal blue glitter, some small purple glitter and purple shimmer. The matte photo on the bottom left best captures the purple shimmer of the polish. I used OPI matte top coat and it looks amazing matte.

For my chevron design the base was already matte so I carefully painted on the chevrons with a small nail art brush and the OPI polish and then didn't top coat the design as I wanted to keep the contrast between the matte base and the shiny, glittery chevrons.

I love these two colours together, they look and feel really autumnal. I have a nail wheel of the colours I've chosen to make up my autumn colour palette and A Woman's Prague-Ative is one of them. My aim is then to use these colours through my designs this autumn to pull my designs together.

I loved wearing this manicure, Blueprint is an amazing polish and if you like blues and purples I would strongly suggest that you check it out. I didn't know if I'd be able to freehand chevrons but it was easier than I anticipated :).

Tweet

33DC Your Oldest Untried Polish

Over the weekend I have reached over 90 followers on bloglovin with some more on gfc, twitter and facebook. I really hope you enjoy my posts and thank you for following :). Today is the 33 day challenge nail art with your oldest untried polish. Although I'm not entirely certain that this is my oldest untried (I seem to have accumulated masses of untried polishes) it came in a Llarowe mystery grab bag and is simply gorgeous. This is Nail'd It Water layered over NYC Water Street Blue as it is too sheer otherwise. It has various different shapes of glitter in blue, purple and green.

For my nail art look I added an accent nail of Pocket Money Polish Summertime (another untried) placing the heart glitters in a diagonal line across the nail. This glitter topper is beautiful but I don't think Charlie is selling it anymore-sorry! I then stamped birds from my new Bundle Monster plate set onto the rest of my nails with NYC Full Metal Jacket.
I love this bird design, it would be awesome for making nail decals. 

I'll be back tomorrow with another stamped design from the Bundle Monster plates but right now check out the other 33dc designs and the second inkslinks for UK Indie month.

Tweet

33DC Textured Gradient

I showed you Barry M Countess alone yesterday and for today I sponged another textured polish, OPI Alcatraz Rocks, over the tips of my nails then added studs from the Born Pretty Store which came in a wheel with a few different types of stud.

To apply the studs without changing the texture of the polish I used dotting tools to add a dot of clear polish where I wanted the stud then used the dotting tool while slightly tacky to pick up and place the studs. The studs are thin and lie close to the surface of my nails which I really like.

I've gone for some more arty shots that I normally do, I love the one below and the one above shows you just how thin these studs are.

I hope you like this :), tomorrow I'm going to be showing you a design I made with the awesome new bundle monster collection.

Tweet

33 DC Mexican Sugar Skulls

The only thing I ever really see on people's nails about Mexico are the Cinco de Mayo sugar skulls. So I used this tutorial by Pretty Squared to draw skulls onto my nails.

The polishes I used in this were Barry M Guava and Passion Fruit, Jessica Radioactive, Lilypad Lacquer In Pink we Trust, NYC Lexington Yellow, OPI My Boyfriend Scales Walls, Orly Hottie and Holla. I used NYC Matte Me Crazy to give it a satiny matte finish. The details were all drawn on with Barry M Nail Art pen.

I've added a link to my giveaway below, enter to win a bottle of my Pocket Money Polish custom Sparks and OPI Tiffany Case. UK ONLY sorry international readers :(

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Tweet