Butter London

Tags

Butter London, manicure, nails, Shopping

I have a new nail polish love! Sorry Essie, I have forsaken you for Butter London! I picked up these gems on OzSale last month and they just arrived! EEEEEEEEEEEE!

I cannot tell you how difficult it was to only pick 5. My shopping cart started with 16 polishes and I had to narrow it down. It was a Herculean task for an addict like me.

So finally I managed to cull my shopping cart down to: Trout Pout, Primrose Hill, The Old Bill, Knees Up and Wallis.

Some super speedy swatches (3 coats):

Pinky: Trout Pout, Ring: Primrose Hill, Middle: The Old Bill, Index: Knees Up

No top coat, base coat or tidying up here. I just swatched them quickly so you guys could see the colours. Trout Pout is a bright coral cream. Primrose Hill is a hot pink jelly. The Old Bill is a coffee-bronze foil. Knees Up is a glowing metallic scarlet.

And this is Wallis. I am crazy in love with this colour – everything about it appeals to me. I love the name (named after Wallis Simpson, Duchess of Windsor and wife of the abdicated King Edward VIII) and I love the colour. Its a gorgeous olive green with gold microglitter. I can see myself going crazy with this one in the coming months.

Some general notes – these polishes dried in less than 2 minutes and have very good wear time even without a top coat. They dry to a satiny finish. I did find that 3 coats were required to get a non-streaky finish, which is annoying. Have you tried Butter London yet? It’s available in the Eastern States but sadly not widely in WA yet. Hopefully they don’t come for a while, so I can remain financially solvent.

xx

The quickest animal-print manicure ever

Tags

beauty, manicure, Maybelline, nails, style, topcoat

This is just a quick and easy mani that you can do when you want something fun on your nails!

All I did was apply a black crackle topcoat above some orange polish and voila! Tiger nails!

Ok obviously these are pretty basic, but they’ll work in a pinch. I loved the effect of the black on orange. For this look, I used Maybelline Rapid Xpress polish in Sunset Prism and  The Face Shop’s black crackle topcoat.

Happy Monday! x

Tropical Marbled Nails

Tags

essie, manicure, nails

Hi everyone, I know I have been the worst when it comes to continuity! The sudden decrease in spare time and increase in energy expenditure caught me completely off guard BUT I do love blogging and I promise to be more punctual with posts from now on!

Here’s some photographic evidence of my attempt to try nail marbling. I chose tropical colours to help me stay in the summer mood.

If you have tried marbling before, you’ll know how time consuming it is! This process took me a good 80 mins, which is why this is my first and only attempt so far. Clearly, its far from perfect – the white base is still peeking through and there is some smudging from when I applied a top coat.

To do this manicure, I used:

• Essie Blanc (base coat)
• NYC Sunshine
• Essie Vermillionnaire 
• Skin Food Vita Nail Hot Pink

This technique does use up a lot of polish so I wouldn’t use my favourite treasured limited edition colours for this. Also, the thinner the polish, the easier it is to manipulate so keep that in mind when you’re selecting colours. I didn’t bother to film/photograph this attempt, but if you just can’t wait for me to try then check out cutepolish‘s video below:

(If you love quirky and cute manis then subscribe to cutepolish on Youtube!)

It’s good to be back! Stay tuned for much more fun stuff, dear readers!

xx

‘Deck the Halls’ Manicure

Tags

essie, holidays, International brands, manicure, OPI

It’s almost Christmas! Of all the many wonderful things associated with the holiday season, one of my favourites is the festive decoration. Since I won’t be home for Christmas, I decided to put up some decorations anyway…on my nails!

Apparently the sparkliness of the rhinestones made it impossible for my camera to focus properly – I apologise. I do love this manicure, its like having a Christmas tree on my fingers!!!

1. Thumb: Base colour using OPI Glitzerland, Xmas tree using essie Pretty Edgy and rhinestones from Skin Food. Random star…

2. Index: Base colour using essie Lollipop, poinsettia using OPI Glitzerland, outlining using essie Blanc. Rhinestone from Skin Food.

3. Middle: Base colour using OPI Glitzerland. Christmas baubles using OPI Absolutely Alice and essie Super Bossa Nova.

4. Ring: Base colour using essie Lollipop. Snowflakes created using Etude (Korean brand) silver nail pen.

5. Pinky: Base colour using OPI Glitzerland. Holly created using essie Lollipop, Pretty Edgy and Etude silver nail pen.

Hope you enjoyed this one, dear readers! Merry Christmas to you alll!

xx

‘Peaches and Lace’ Manicure

Tags

Bloom Cosmetics, essie, manicure, weddings

This is a very girly, cute manicure that I did to celebrate holidays, summer, and the recent engagement of a close friend! Apologies for the truly poor job with tidying up the sides of the polish (I didn’t realise that I hadn’t cleaned it up before I took these photos and ran out the door).

Here’s what to do to get this manicure:

1. Apply a base coat and 2-3 coats of a pale peach base colour.
2. Thumb: Use an opaque white polish to draw a bird (this was a bit of a fail :P). Use a dotting tool to make the bird’s head. Use a fine tipped brush to draw the rest of the body. Use a silver polish to add details such as feathers and a beak.
3. Index: Decide where you want your bow to be and use a dotting tool to create the bow’s knot. Draw two triangles on either side to create the bow. Use a fine brush to draw the ribbon using the same colour polish. I used a pastel lilac colour.
4. Middle: Use a fine tipped brush to create a diagonal lace design. Draw two parallel lines diagonally across the nail. On the side closer to the edge of your nails, draw a criss-cross design. On the far side draw small ‘c’ shapes for the lace edge.
5. Ring: Carefully apply two flower fimo nail appliques on slightly wet polish. Finish with a clear coat of top coat.
6. Pinky: Use a fine brush to draw and fill in a triangle for the ice cream cone. Use opaque white for the ice cream scoop. Use silver polish to add detail.

For this mani, I used Skin Food’s Milky Colour Polish in Peach Milk for the base colour, along with essie Blanc, Lilacism and Bloom Miranda.

Hope you enjoyed this one!

x