Fierce French

The black part in this picture reminds me of the M of Maroon 5, love them! ^^

Hello everyone! In my last post I used Orly Solid Gold in a fifty-fifty tape mani. I liked Solid Gold so much that I prepared two more looks with it and today's semi-nude look is one of them. I first started with a zigzag in black (tutorial here) and when that was dry I added the gold chevrons with Solid Gold. It dries with a matte finish as you could see in my last post, but this time I went for glossy by adding topcoat. I'm not sure which finish I like most - the edgy matte one or the sparkly glossy one. They're both so cool! :-) What do you think? Thanks for reading!

Viva La Lightning Bolt

Hello dear readers! I'm still very busy with school, only two more weeks to go! I've still got a lot of things to do, but right now I just want to show you these nails. :-) Yesterday I wore a brandless plain white creme. It took three coats to get opaque and it took forever to dry, but it was totally worth it. Who knew I could like white nails this much! But sadly the polish already chipped after one short day, so today I added these lightning bolt tips with Essence Viva La Green. I hadn't done lightning bolt tips for a long time, I almost forgot how fun they are to make. ^^ Finally I added a bit of glam with OPI Spark The Triomphe. It's so sparkly! ♥

Nude Zigzag

Hi everyone! How are you? I'm liking semi-nude manis more and more and they can be very simple too! Just like today's mani with zigzag French tips. Because there's no base color needed, you can immediately place tape strips on the nails. Apply a coat of Essence Chuck on top, remove the tape right away and you're done. Finally a layer of topcoat and edgy nails are born! :-) What's your thought on this funky French mani?

Fancy clouds

Hello dear readers :) This post I'd like to share this cloud mani with you. The red I've used is China Glaze Phat Santa, I bought it last Christmas in a set with Jolly Holly and Party Hearty, which I now happily own! (For some really strange reason I thought I didn't need Party Hearty when it came out in 2010, so weird, because it's so pretty!) I'd worn Phat Santa on its own for a day, but the next day I already had subtle tipwear on some nails, so that's when I applied the layered cloud look to cover up things. Another reason why I love this design ;-) The silver and black are China Glaze Millenium and Color Club Where's The Soiree? respectively, two of my most often used polishes.

I've received many requests for a tutorial for this cloud design, so you can expect it soon :) In the mean time you can read how I make the pattern in this post. Thank you for reading!

Nude clouds for New Year's Eve

Hello everyone! Here's a quick little post on my New Year's Eve mani. Initially I wanted to do the festive star pattern again that I wore for Christmas, but in the end I decided to go for something quick and simple instead. I don't like my nails naked, but this semi nude cloud look I like ^^ I used H&M Golden Treasure and Color Club Where's The Soiree? for the clouds and finished with a topcoat.

Have a great New Year's Eve and I'll see you in 2012! :)

Pyramid tips with Essie Fair Game

Hi everyone! These pyramid chevron tips were made with Catrice Raspberry Fields Forever and Essie Fair Game. Both polishes are amazing to work with. Raspberry Fields Forever is a bright folly red, which has a pink hue that's much better visible in real life. It has the great formula and easy application that I'm used to from most of Catrice's creme polishes, I only used two coats and a layer of Seche Vite, shiny! Because Fair Game has that hint of blue that makes the polish so special, I thought it would look nice next to the pinkish Catrice. I just love the combination of pinks and blues, no matter how subtle ;-) I've never worn Fair Game as a full mani and question if I ever will, because as much as I like it, I just think it works better as an accent next to other colors. At least, on my skintone that is, I bet it would look gorgeous on people with a nice tan!

Leopard chevrons

Wow! This look so isn't me, hahah. But once I had the idea I just had to make it reality. I used tape to make the chevrons, then I added H&M Golden Treasure for my gold background and finally I used konad plate M57 for the leopard print. Normally I suggest people to remove the tape right after applying the polish, to prevent the polish from sticking to the tape, but this time I ignored my own advise. But it turned out alright, as you can see :D I applied very thin coats and then after I stamped, carefully removed the tape strips, one by one. The pretty blue metallic/shimmer is Sephora's Summer In Bangkok, my favorite Sephora polish after It's Time To Rock. It's actually more turquoise in real life, very pigmented and unfortunately also stains so bad! That's why I'm wearing two layers of base coat underneath... Anyway, would you wear this wild design? Or does it scare ya? ;)

Aztec tips and a comparison

Left Orly Lucky Duck, right OPI Jade Is The New Black
(Completely on the left is Konad Solid Pop Green)

Hello everyone :) Last week I attempted my first aztec nails, or should I say pixel nails? The nice green you see is Orly Lucky Duck, it had an amazing formula, a bit in between a jelly and a creme, which made it very easy to apply. So you'll end up with a glossy and opaque finish after two coats. On the swatches of it online, it looked more turquoise, that's why I loved it so, but in real life it leans a lot more towards green. Still very pretty, though I don't think I needed it, since I now find it very similar to a polish I already had: OPI's Jade Is The New Black. They're not dupes, JITNB is a bit dustier than Lucky Duck as you can see, but still I think they're so similar, that you probably won't need both. They both have a great formula and cover in two coats, also the drying time of the two polishes is pretty good, so the big difference must be in the brush/cap (or price). I like both the rubberized cap of Orly and OPI's Pro Wide Brush, but you might not agree with me ;)

About the nail art, I used tape strips to make the aztec pattern, what else, right? ;) The white is Essence Stamp Me! White and the red is OPI's Big Apple Red. Yes, it took me forever to make, haha, but I'm quite patient when it comes to nail art, so I'd do it all again in a heartbeat. Though using it as an accent nail would be a nice compromise, like the polished perfectionist AmyGrace did here. Accent nail FTW, right! She's awesome. And that's it for this post, good night!

Turquoise pyramids

Hello everyone! How are you? I hope fine :) I'm alright, but something terrible did happen today! Somehow one nail of my left hand got teared a bit this week. I've been really good and didn't touch it for days but I guess the stress had taken over today, because I kept picking on it and now I've got a little nub there. Boohoo! So I made the rest of my nails shorter too to make it less noticeable. And so I won't be taken any pictures for a little while, because I don't like my nails this short :( But lucklily I still have a few manis from the vault for you. And today's post is one of them.

My basecolor is P2's Groovy. What a wonderful polish! I don't own many P2 polishes but my mom bought me some bottles a few weeks ago. I really loved the elegant shape of the bottles and I love them even more now when I found out how perfect Groovy was. It's a muted shade of teal, with a perfect creme formula and you can get away with one coat of it. Lovely! The next day I decided to add the 'pyramid' design, like I used in the 'military chic' mani. I used Wet 'n Wild Carribean Frost for it, which gave a subtle ton-sure-ton effect, I really like that shimmery teal polish :) And as my finishing touch I mattified the look with the sadly discontinued Essence Matt topcoat. Maybe I'll give China Glaze's Matte Magic a try when I'm through my back-ups. Anyway, enough rambling for today! ;) Have a great night!

Military chic

Hello guys! I hope you all had a great weekend. This look was made a couple of days ago. I was wearing China Glaze Westside Warrior from the Metro collection. What a beautiful shade of green! The application was wonderful too. I loved it and couldn't stop looking at my nails, it's unlike any other green I own. But a few days later I got tipwear on several fingers, I was bummed because I didn't want to take Westside Warrior off... So what do you do when you want to keep a polish on your nails, but it's suffering from tipwear; you go for a funky French ;) I was just playing around with my tape strips when I finally got to this design, and I must say I like it a lot! Though the whole look has a military feel, the tips reminded me of pyramids. Pyramid tips ^^ The gold shimmer I used for them was H&M Golden Treasure. It's an antique shade of gold, very pretty and very nice for tape manis. The formula is smooth and it doesn't dry too quick :) And a little by the way, these pictures were made under my boyfriend's granny's lamp, which belongs to our appartment now. Apparently it's great in mimicing sunlight! And that's awesome, because it means I can keep taking my pictures, even in the winter! Regardless of the weather and whenever I have time to, hooray! Have a great night everyone and I'll see you soon :)

Tutorial: Cartoon heart

Hi everyone, welcome to my cartoon heart tutorial! After several tape method tutorials, I thought it would be fun to make one with a freehand design. It's a girly and simple design that only takes little time to make. And using it on a few accent nails is a nice way to add something cute to your mani. So go get your brushes and let's do some nail art ;) Continue reading »

Explosions with China Glaze Jitterbug

Hi everyone! I hope you're all doing great. I am :) As I mentioned before, I'm busy with school at the moment. My first days have been hectic and already pretty tough, but I'm enjoying it and it's good to finally feel like I belong somewhere, after years of not knowing what I was supposed to do with my life. Yay, me, haha. So this week's been busy, but one day I got home a little earlier and it was even still light enough outside so I could take these pictures you're looking at. I was wearing OPI's Big Apple Red, a stunning, superglossy red jelly. But the next day it chipped on one of my nails, so I covered it by using the explosion design and China Glaze Jitterbug. I adore that polish, it's supergreat for tape manis and the shimmer spices up any mani in a cool, elegant way. Have a great night and see you soon :)

Explosions with OPI Absolutely Alice

Hi everyone! For today I have another explosion mani to show you. It's such a fun design, so I'm still experimenting with it, using different colors and finishes.

Here I used OPI's Absolutely Alice for the design, on top of Wet 'n Wild Blue Moon and with a matt topcoat afterwards. Normally I wouldn't pick a glitter as a layering color for tape manis, because they often need several coats to cover. But those of you who own a few OPI glitters, know how dense they can be, which is also the case with Absolutely Alice. I only used one coat of it and I'm still surprised by how crisp the design came out. Another benefit of this polish, being a glitter, is it doesn't 'bleed' when I go over it with my topcoat, like with some cremes. Nice! All the OPI glitters are stunning in my opinion, whether used alone or combined with other polishes. And apparently they're also perfect for tape manis ^^ So I'll definitely use them again for future tape adventures to add some magic to my nails... See you later!

In case you'd like to create this look yourself, check out the tutorial for tips and tricks.

Gold explosions

Hi everyone! For today I want to show you an explosion mani. I had already worn China Glaze For Audrey a whole day and the next morning I decided to add someting special, using tape. I wanted to pick a gold to go with For Audrey and usually I'll just grab my favorite gold 2030 from China Glaze, but then I stumbled upon H&M's Golden Treasure, which I actually thought was better for this mani because it's darker, so it creates a bigger contrast with the soft blue then 2030 would have. I'm happy with the end result, but when I see blues and gold together, it's hard for me not to haha. Love those colors together :) Thanks for watching and have a nice day!

Cute funky French

Hi everyone! And a big welcome to my new followers, it's great to have you here! The other day I made a cute version of the lightning bolt, I'd used two pinks from Essie for it: Lion Around and Your Hut Or Mine. I liked the two colors so much together, so I decided to make another tape mani with them. The simple stripe design I used is the same as the one from the nautical funky French I did a couple of weeks ago. This time it's a lot girlier than most of my nail art and sure brings out all my inner girliness haha, but I like it :) Thanks for stopping by!

Navy tips

(This is a scheduled post, I'm on vacation!)

Good afternoon fellow nail polish lovers! For this post I have a nautical funky French to share with you. The day I made this I was wearing OPI Big Apple Red. To spice it up I added blue tips with OPI Russian Navy. I really like this simple funky French, the tape design instantly adds that nautical vibe, reminding of the rims of sailor outfits. I used Russian Navy for the blue tips instead of a regular navy, because besides that it covers so well, its shimmer with subtle red just gives it something special. Okay, not that anyone from my environment would notice, because nobody looks at nails from such an insanely short distance but me. (Even the BF makes fun of it somtimes: "Look at my naaails! See that subtle shimmer?! Look, you see?!", while holding his hand in an awkward claw pose in my face.) I guess having that super subtle shimmer on my nails is like wearing sexy underwear, nobody who'll notice but it makes you feel prettier and more self-confident. You know what I mean? ;-)
Enjoy your day!

Flower design for inspiration contest

Hi everyone, lately I've been busy, busy, busy... 'Cause the franken contest at More Nail Polish isn't the only contest I've entered, Swaafie also hosted one for which you had to let your design be inspired by something.

So this is my entry. I was inspired by a little tin can with flowers I have. The can is empty but I just had to buy it because it was so cute and I loved the colors so much. It looks very cheerful and summery so it was a suiting inspiration for this time of the year. The colors and the flower pattern are what makes the can so nice to look at, so I wanted to capture that on my nails but without being too literal. Later I added purple rhinestones, I think they compliment the design and are just within the limits of cute instead of tacky, haha. What do you think?
About the contest: only a few entries will be presented to the judges who will pick the winner. But before that can happen everyone can vote who should be part of those few. So check out all the entries and vote for your favorite three designs. You don't have to be a GFC follower in order to vote. Thanks for reading!

UPDATE: I'm proud to let you know my entry won first prize in the contest! Thanks so much if you voted for it, it wouldn't have won without you! The prize is awesome and of course I'll share the pretties here with you all :)

Before the rhinestones

Superhero nails

Hi guys! On my previous lightning bolt manis I got many comments saying how they have a superhero quality, I really liked the comparison and I do have a thing for stereotypical superhero outfits ;) You know, with the bold colors and graphical patterns. So for today I made actual, intentional superhero nails. And yes, I used my last lightning bolt mani to achieve this look ;) The colors I picked are Diamond Cosmetics Blue Bell, China Glaze Millenium and a red shimmer from Etos, a Dutch drugstore. I really like how it turned out, I think it definitely says superhero! Hahah. This mani would probably work well too with the MAC Wonderwoman polishes, but with a gold lightning bolt in the middle instead of silver. Unfortunately I don't own those cute polishes, but I'll live :) Anyway, hope you guys like it and have a great weekend!

Blue and silver lightning bolt

Hi everyone! Today I have another lightning bolt mani to show, because frankly I'm still hooked :) And I hope you guys aren't bored with this design yet, because I've got more of 'em coming up this week... Mwuahahaha... This time I used China Glaze Millenium for the tips and the blue is Diamond Cosmetics' Blue Bell, which is quite similar to Essence's Chuck, so I'll have to do a comparison of those two soon.

Thanks for visiting!

My Favorite Jeans goes lightning bolt

Hi everyone! Hope you're having a great day. The mani for today's post is an update of the second lightning bolt French I did, it was turquoise with black tips. The day I was wearing that mani I found a polish that I wanted for so long but since it's discontinued I didn't think I would find it again. I'm talking about H&M's My Favorite Jeans. Lately I've been obsessed with foils, especially if they're blue, and that's exactly what My Favorite Jeans is. The first time I had it in my hands, I wasn't that much into nailpolish yet, I thought both color and finish were weird, so I put it back. I can slap myself now for doing that! So fortunately I found one last lonely bottle of it on the bottom shelf of an H&M! My favorite Jeans is a foil with a grey-ish blue base, kind of like jeans, with bolder blue flecks. The flecks are subtle but make the polish less dull. I love it :) And it was also the perfect polish to add some shimmer to the lightnig bolt design I was wearing. I just applied tape again the way I always do for the lightning bolt, only this time I placed the tape a bit more towards the tip, covering up a little part of the black. So that after adding My Favorite Jeans and removing the tape, there's still a line of black visible. Finally I added a layer of matt topcoat, the one I use is from Essence.

I like how the mani came out and that it only takes little effort to achieve the look. If you want to recreate it and could use some help, just check out the tutorial by clicking here or in the tab at the top.
Thanks for reading guys!

Before Mr. Matt

Before My Favoroite Jeans