31 Day Challenge, day 25: Inspired by Fashion

Hi everyone! :-) Today's nails were kind of an experiment. When I saw this super cute Modcloth dress, I couldn't wait to capture the edgy neckline with the starry mesh fabric on a semibare accent nail. I used an image plate (that I bought here) to stamp the star pattern, and later I added the rest with the help of tape for nice and crisp lines. It didn't turn out as awesome as I hoped it would though, the stars made the sharp edges of the 'neckline' fade a bit. So next time I try this, I'll probably leave out the stars. What do you guys think about my fashion-inspired nails?

My inspiration: 'Written in the Stars Dress' from Modcloth

Double V

Hi guys! I haven't been able to do much nails lately, so I have something from the vault to show you. This mani was made with my new favorite to-go polish: H&M Deep Deep Water. It's been sitting in my drawers for ages, just waiting to be discovered, and now it has been. Pictured is only one coat. One coat of perfectly pigmented, blurple metallic polish. And it dries fast too. ♥ But as pretty as it is, I like my manis with a little extra. ;-) So later I added the triangles with tape. I started with a gold triangle, and when it was dry I made a black one inside, and repeated these steps at the cuticle area. Slowly building everything up with layers. You can imagine this took a while, with so many triangles to dry. But if you're watching your favorite TV show at the same time, there really isn't much patience needed. ;-) Thanks for reading!

Gold Ornament

This mani is from a few weeks ago. I was just getting in the mood for the December holidays and added this simple tribal-ish pattern with a striper to go with the rest of my dark nails. I sure have a soft spot for black and gold. ♥

Below are a couple of older manis in black and gold. I thought it would be fun to show these lined up together to compare, isn't it a versatile color duo? ^_^

Fancy triangles, one of my first posts!

 Shining like a star on Christmas '11.

 Nude clouds for New Year's Eve.

Fierce French!

And my recent Art Deco linework. :-)

And for those who are interested: the black creme I use is Color Club's Where's The Soiree?. It dries with a satin-matte finish, but I don't mind since it dries very quickly because of that, and I can always add some glossy topcoat. Another thing is it's a one-coater, so it covers perfectly but therefore can also leave stains on the skin. So I have to be extra careful with the application. Despite of this, it's still my favorite black so far.

Thanks for reading!

Dark Zigzag

Hi everybody! Last post I showed you the amazing suede version of Suzi Skis In The Pyrenees from OPI. Because it dries so fast, it's a perfect basecolor for tape manis, such as today's. I covered half of my nails with triangle shaped pieces of tape and used my trusty black polish (Where's The Soiree? from Color Club) on top. Then I removed the tape strips and felt like a rock star... Rock on!

31 Day Challenge, day 7: Black & White

Hi everyone! Welcome to day 7 of the 31 Day Challenge; black and white. I love black and white manis so I was very excited about this one. I expected myself to do a full nail black and white pattern but eventually these skittled zigzag tips were the result. Basically I made randomly zigzagging black tips and added the white and colored triangles later. It reminds me of the fierce French I did a while back, only funkier. :-) Thanks for stopping by!

31 Day Challenge, day 5: Blue

Blue nails! For this challenge I decided to bring out my stamping tools. The basecolor is Essence Via Airmail! from the Ready For Boarding collection. On top I did a leopard print in black with Konad imageplate M57. Stamping isn't a technique I often reach for because I always think too much about the mess afterwards that I'd have to clean up, especially when I'm using my opaque and therefore hard-to-remove black polish Color Club Where's The Soiree, like in this case. But clean-up actually wasn't that bad this time because I rubbed a bit of greasy handcream on the skin around the nails, making it harder for the polish to stain. :-) Even the pattern transferred okay on the nails! It's definitely not perfect, but that's the nice thing about leopard print: imperfections are hardly noticeable from a distance. ;-) So all in all I was quite pleased with how this mani turned out. I really should do stamped manis more often...

Funky Easter

Happy Easter everyone! When I think of Easter nail art, I think of pastel shades and detailed designs. But after wearing soft colors so often lately, I wanted to have something brighter on my nails now! :) I started with H&M Wildflower as my basecolor, then I painted half of the nail turquoise with Essence Bella, using tape for crisp lines. Finally I added a few dots with Color Club Almost Famous and my funky Easter mani was done. :) Have a great day!

A Broken Heart

Hi everybody! For this post I have a broken heart for you. Nothing to worry about though, I just thought it would be a cool design as I'm still experimenting with sheer polishes. :) I used my vertical lightning bolt design, then I painted the heart on top with a stencil I made from tape (like I used in this mani). I'm not sure if I like the colors I used, but I'm glad the idea I had in mind came out pretty much the way I wanted, yay! Thanks for reading! :)

Polishes I used:

H&M - Bella's Choice

Essence - Stamp Me! White

Color Club - Warhol

A Fresh Version

Hi everybody! First of all: thank you so much for all the amazing comments you guys left on my last post, my abstract '80s mani. I seriously didn't expect so much feedback, thank you! Also I received many requests for a tutorial and I wanted to let you know I'll happily work on it soon. :-)

I liked the '80s mani myself a lot too, plus it's fun to do, so I made another version. Same idea but in fresher colors. :-) The basecolor is the classic China Glaze For Audrey, I love this polish! (It combines so well with different colors.) I used Color Club Almost Famous for the yellow and the sheer blue is Color Club Chelsea Girl. I really like the bright color of Chelsea Girl, but was so disappointed when I found out how sheer it was (4-5 coats for opacity, if you don't use a white base). However, that sheerness has a purpose from now on. :D What do you think of this blue and yellow mani?

Abstract '80s

Hi guys, another tape mani for you today! Oh, how I love stationery tape. It's so perfect for making geometric shapes which I happen to love too. ;-)

After (re)discovering the layering possibilities of sheer polishes with my recent springy stripes, I used the same technique in this mani. My base color (H&M Polish Me Happy) was applied the day before, so I could immediately place tape strips on top to form the mint green shapes with Orly Ancient Jade. When that had dried I once again used tape to make the pink triangles with Color Club Warhol and I just love how new shapes are formed where Ancient Jade and Warhol overlap. Speaking of Warhol, it's such a great polish for this layering technique. It's sheer, but covers very evenly and the color is so unbelievably bold! (Also take a look at layered Warhol together with its neon friends in this crackle mani.) And that's it for this post, I hope you enjoyed it. :-)

Windows

Hi everybody! I hope you all had a great weekend. My nails are still quite short, but I'm actually very comfortable with this length. I think they look edgy and also my polish lasts so much longer on these shorter nails! I've been wearing Color Club Where's The Soiree (the black) for three whole days now and there's not a single sign of tipwear. A year ago I wouldn't really have cared about the wearing time, since I changed my nail polish daily back then, but now that life's busy again I certainly don't have the time or energy to do that anymore. Anyway, after three days of black I really needed a change, so I went for a trusty tape mani. :) Nothing too difficult though, basically the design consists of one big and one smaller rectangle. First I used China Glaze Adore, a wonderful light blue metallic, then I made the smaller rectangles with Where's The Soiree again. So a quite simple design that reminds me of little windows when I look at my nails. ^^ Thanks for reading!

Nude with hearts

Hi guys! How are you all doing? :) I've finally finished all my exams for the first semester, so more time for blogging again! :)

For this post I wanted to share this semi-nude mani with you that I made last year. I wanted to make hearts on my nails by making a template with tape and this heartshaped paper punch that I have, but the punch had a hard time getting through the tape, so all I was left with was a little wrinkled, misshapen hole... So I cut out the shape myself from a fold up piece of tape and that's how I got to this design with V-shaped French tip. I still have to get used to nude nails, but I kind of like it like this. ^^ For the rest of my nails I was looking for a smokey purple, the polish that came nearest to what I wanted was Bourjois Bleu Asphalte. But I if I had Frederiksberg from WIC Herôme at the time, I certainly would've gone for that instead, I love that color so much! :)
So what are your thoughts on these nude nails? Would you wear them yourself?

Yesterday's mani, updated

Hello dear readers :) The mani from yesterday looked a lot cooler in the pictures than it did in real life, certainly when there's not a sign of the sun to reveal at least some of my effort haha. So for today's post I have the updated version which I made by filling in a few stripes with Essence Bella. Doesn't it make a cute couple with Almost Famous? :) Thanks for stopping by guys!

Yellow & black stripes

Hi everyone, for this post I have another striped mani to show you and it's bright! Not that my last mani wasn't bright enough, but tonight I felt the sudden urge to wear yellow. And that's rare, but fine with me, because I can really use some brightness in these dark, cold days that we're lately having in the Netherlands! The yellow I used is Color Club Almost Famous. I had to apply three coats for an even coverage and smooth surface. Normally I kind of avoid three-coaters, but for a yellow it's actually not that bad. Once again I used China Glaze Ink to make the stripes. In my head this mani looked better than it does in real life. Because I used a bright lamp in the pictures, the yellow is well visible. But in lower light, you can pretty much only see the stripes because the yellow kind of blends in with the tone of my skin, which looks weird haha. Maybe I'll add another color or something later, we'll see. Thanks for reading guys and nighty-night!

The Mad Dollies nails

Hello guys! Today's post is another custom mani, I abosolutely love doing these! I got this request from a player from the Greensboro NC roller derby team The Mad Dollies. She asked if I could come up with some fierce nail art designs, in her team colors teal and yellow, that she could use for an upcoming game. She also loved the use of tape for nail art, so the first thing that came in mind was a fierce lightning bolt tape mani! ;-) (Which all went great until my topcoat decided to smudge my hard work!) On my thumb and pinky I have the symbols that two certain players carry on their helmet. I made the star using tape and I really like the design, but it took a lot of precision to get all the tape strips right. So I'm still thinking of a more efficient way to make the design in the future. And the index and middle finger resemble the distinctive tights I saw players on pictures wearing, mostly striped or fishnet. And luckily I had Konadplate M57 to make the last :)
So Kristin, I really hope you like these designs! You can use all five of them or just pick the ones you like best ;-) And good luck with the rest of this season!

I really enjoy working on these custom nails requests I'm getting lately, so if you would like me to make some designs for a special event or just for fun, feel free to leave your idea in the comments or send me an email at: nailside@gmail.com.

Polishes I used in this post:
Essence Stamp Me! White
Essence - Let's Get Lost
Color Club - Almost Famous
Color Club - Where's The Soiree?
China Glaze - Ink

Skittle and dots

Hello nail polish friends! Today I decided to practice some dotting. I envy those who can make perfect, even-sized dots, like the talented girls from Emerald Sparkled, Another Bottle Of Polish and Rebecca Likes Nails. Click on the links to see some amazing dotting manis they made, too gorgeous! My own attempt was very modest though, but definitely something I would wear again. I love the big impact of dots and how they can be achieved with little effort. The polishes I used:

China Glaze - For Audrey

China Glaze - Concrete Catwalk

China Glaze - Adore

Color Club - Uptown Girl

In case you're wondering, I used the same colors for my thumbs as the one on my pinkies ;) Thanks for reading!

OPI You Don't Know Jacques + Color Club Covered In Diamonds

Hi readers! The other day I showed you OPI You Don't Know Jacques. It's a very calm and subtle color, very beautiful, but I was curious to see it with just a little bit more sparkle. So here it is with a coat of Color Club Diamonds. I like the combination and love iridiscent glitter/flakies. They're sparkly enough to add a lot of magic to a dull mani but yet they're subtle. Sounds quite contrary, doesn't it? :P So a party for the eyes but too bad Covered In Diamonds has such a thick formula. It made my nails look thick and plumpy. And I guess another layer of matt topcoat over them won't help either, but I just had to see what it would look like mattified :) What do you think about this combo? Thanks for stopping by!

Color Club - Have A Bash

Hello everybody :) Though I'm not a huge crackle fan, I do like it. Especially since nowadays there are plenty more colors to choose from, other than black. I really like the blue crackles that OPI has released, but because I still find them kind of pricey, I chose for a cheaper alternative; Color Club Have A Bash. I don't have many other crackles to compare it with, in fact I only have one next to Have A Bash (Barry M Nail Effects in black), but so far I'm extremely satisfied with it. The crackle finish and drying time is similar to the Barry M's, only Have A Bash has a smoother formula.
In this mani I used Have A Bash on top of 3 coats OPI Don't Know... Beets Me! and me likey, because I heart blue and pink together ;)
Thanks for stopping by!

Modern mummy

Hi guys, today is another gloomy day here in the Netherlands so I've got pictures for you from the vault. This is a mummy mani I did a little while ago, I used China Glaze Sea Spray for the base color and LA girl Matte Blue Twilight on top. Matte Blue Twilight was a delight to work with, the formula was quite smooth for a matt polish, so the lines came out surprisingly crisp. And as you can see I didn't use topcoat, because I wanted to keep the matt/shiny contrast :) Thanks for visiting!

Color Club - Raspberry Rush

Hi everyone! Today's post is about Color Club's Raspberry Rush, from this year's Wicked Sweet summer-collection, it's the only one from the collection I bought. Raspberry Rush is a scented, intense, blue-based pink neon. The pink is much more intense in real life, but my camera just wouldn't capture it, which is often the case with neons. As the name implies, Raspberry Rush is raspberry-scented, but I'm not sure if you'd recognize it if you didn't know the name. All I know is it smells sweet! Even after a layer of topcoat. The scent is pleasantly intense if you smell your nails from up close, but not noticeable from further away, which is a good thing since the smell of scented products can be disturbing sometimes.

A few cons: Raspberry Rush is pretty sheer and the drying time a bit longer then I'd like it to be. Although there's still VNL after three coats of polish, I can live with that because it's just very subtle and the formula is great. So despite its downsides, Raspberry Rush is still a winner in my opinion, because of the beautiful color and the nice formula. Did you buy anything from the Wicked Sweet collection?