Thursday 28 January 2016

Paint All The Nails Presents Pantone Colour Of The Year 2016

Hey everyone! This is a very late post from me tonight (although when I was a student I would probably have considered this early) as I've been out for drinks and food for my friends birthday and I've only just had a chance to edit and post these. Today is this months 'Paint All The Nails' challenge and we voted to do a Pantone themed design based on this years colours. Each year Pantone normally chose the year's colour, but for some reason this year they chose two, but they are very lovely colours! My manicure did end up looking more blue than blue and pink but I still really liked it. Check the inlinks at the bottom of the page for everyone's designs.


Tuesday 26 January 2016

Nude Dotticure

Hey everyone! I decided to take a bit of a break having posted every day last week (especially because I'd just started a new job), but I have so many nail designs to share with you that I just couldn't resist posting today. This is a very simplistic design that I did after seeing this design by Just1Nail on Instagram. I think I probably made my polka dots a little too small to call it an exact replica of her design, but I like how they look anyway.

Friday 22 January 2016

OPI Hello Kitty Collection Review and Swatches

Hey everyone! I'm so happy to have made it to the end of my week of reviews, whilst I've loved showcasing so many polishes to you this week, it's been quite tiring to stay up every night editing and posting. Especially when I'm only on my second week in my new job so I'm mentally drained (although I love it so it's worth it). I'm also really proud of myself for managing to post every day, it's been a long time since I successfully did that so it's good to know I still have it in me. 

Anyway, the final review for this week is the OPI Hello Kitty Collection*. I know this has been out for a while now but I still wanted to show you my swatches because it's such a gorgeous and cute collection (especially those bottle caps!). OPI really haven't disappointed with recent collections, and this is no exception. I received the pinks half of the collection, although there are 12 in total, as the other half are only being released for salons in the UK so were not released to bloggers (I may have shed a tear when I realised I wasn't getting the vibrant yellow that is My Twin Mimmy). But, this half of the collection are flawless, and are definitely worth purchasing if you haven't already (you can never have enough pinks/polish anyway).

Thursday 21 January 2016

Tami Polish Scottish Showcase Collection Review and Swatches

Hey everyone! I've had such a hectic day today that I've barely had a chance to look at my phone and catch up with emails. I'm really getting stuck into my new job, which I'm loving so far, but there's a lot to do and I want to show I can do it! Somehow I've still managed to post 4 days in a row, I'm not going to pretend that my time management skills have suddenly become miraculously better, as it's actually half 11 and I need to go to sleep! But nonetheless I'm still happy with myself

Today's review is another new brand to me, this time in the form of Tami Polish. Tami are a new Scottish brand, and this, the Scottish Showcase Collection*, is their first release. I must admit it's so far so good for me, as these polishes are pretty much flawless as you'll see below. I can't wait to see more of what they're releasing. You can buy them individually for £9 or you can buy the whole collection for £21 here. I don't think they're too unfairly price for what you're getting and for 10ml bottles.

Wednesday 20 January 2016

Soigne Winter 2015 Collection Swatches and Review

Hey everyone! Day three of review week and I've reviewing the Soigne Winter Collection. These are unfortunately all sold out on their website, showing how popular they have been. Soigne were a brand I hadn't really heard of before this, but they are a French luxury brand who create 5-free polishes. So when I was contacted by Soigne asking me to review their winter collection, I jumped at the chance to try such a luxury brand.  I was really impressed with these as I reviewed them, although they do have a hefty price tag on them (£11 each), which may put some people off. Yet, the quality does show, so it's more of a matter of whether you can afford them rather than if they're worth it.

Tuesday 19 January 2016

Barry M Autumn/Winter 2015 Speedy Quick Dry Swatches and Review

Hey everyone! Day two of my week of reviews, so far so good with posting but we'll see how it continues. Today is the Autumn/Winter Barry M Speedy Dry Collection*. Just like with yesterday's post I've actually had these sitting on my laptop since October but I've just had writers block when it comes to typing up the post. I've struggled to even start writing it tonight but I'm forcing myself. I think I just need to get over the hump I've created in my head for reviews and then I'll be fine. 

These four polishes were added to the Speedy Quick Dry collection, whilst they are indeed autumnal, I can see them being used into summer. Especially the red, Dead Heat*. They, like the rest of the collection, use a wider brush than Barry M's original designs did, which makes for easy application. As they do indeed dry quickly, this wide brush helps to prevent smears. I've been really impressed with the Speedy polishes so far and these are no exception. 


Monday 18 January 2016

Barry M - Glitter Gelly Autumn/Winter 2015 Collection

Hey everyone! I've got so many reviews to show you, some of which I've had on my computer for months, but I just never get around to posting them. So this week I'm going to try and force myself to do a week of reviews. I used to regularly do 'review week' but I haven't done for well over a year, maybe even two. It may take me 2 weeks, it may take me a week and a half, but I really want to get these reviews out there. I've had these on my laptop since the 25th October, which is just ridiculous. I feel some kind of writers block when it comes to reviews recently and this is me forcing myself out of that rut.

So, day one is the Barry M Glitter Gellies* which were released in October last year, I went to the release for these and I was super excited to review them when I saw them. They very much lived up to my imaginations and I wish that my camera had captured more of their true beauty. These are the first glitters in the gelly range and I love that Barry M have done something a little different with them. It's worth noting that unlike the gelly collections before them, these bottles contain the new wide brush that many new Barry M colours seem to be sporting,

Sunday 17 January 2016

Pastel Frogs (aka a slight fail)

Hey everyone! Today I'm showing you what turned out to be a bit of a failure, which was frustrating because I put quite a bit of effort into these. These were inspired by a t-shirt my mum's goddaughter was wearing over christmas (picture below), but they didn't turn out as I hoped. You may or may not be able to make out (it's more obvious on my pointer finger) that I actually drew the lilypads in light blue. I stupidly chose to use a grey base rather than white and the colours just blended together once I added topcoat. They were actually quite different before which is why I continued with the design! I was however really happy with the frogs which is why I still wanted to show you the design, especially the one on my ring finger.


Friday 15 January 2016

Negative Space Roses

Hey everyone! This week has been such a mixed bad of emotions for me, I started off the week really sad at the news of Bowie's death. Then I started my new job (which I'm loving so far), and it was my birthday on Wednesday. And then I heard the awful news about Alan Rickman, two greats in one week just doesn't seem right. It's definitely been a week of change.

I was lucky enough to have a few days off before I started my new job and that meant I had time to dedicate more than a few hours to nail art, which gave me the opportunity to experiment a bit more than I usually have time for. I've had the Nails Supreme nail art pens for a couple of years now, but I've never really used them as I've found them to be a bit too watery. I decided to replace the polish in them with an old bottle of Barry M - Cotton, which is the most opaque white polish I've used, and it worked so much better. These nails were just a quick experiment I did using them, I didn't use a basecoat or a topcoat because I was just messing around, but I ended up liking them enough to want to show you them.

Tuesday 12 January 2016

Gradient Barry M Stripes

Hey everyone! It's an exciting week this week for me, today was my first day at my new job, and tomorrow is my birthday! So a busy couple of days. Anyway, it's freezing cold here at the moment but I wanted to bring a bit of brightness with my nails. This was a new look for me but they didn't really turn out as I had hoped, I used blue pink yellow and green but you can only really see the blue and green.. and mainly green. But nevertheless I do still quite like them, they are matte after all.

Friday 8 January 2016

Negative Space Saran Wrap

Hey everyone! I hope you're all managing to stick to your new years resolutions so far now that the first week of January is officially over. I haven't actually started my 'get fit' resolution as my birthday is next week so I want to be able to eat as much cake as possible. However, second on my list of resolutions is to try more indies, and this is exactly what I've done for this design. I've been trying out some Ard As Nails polishes, and for this design I used Olly* and Sharona*, but you'll see the rest soon too. 

For these nails I was completely inspired by this design by Chelsea Queen from ages ago (took me forever to find that link!), but rather than doing watercolour nails I wanted to do saran wrap. I also tried to make it my own a little bit so of course it's nowhere near as gorgeous as the original, but I'm still pretty happy with how they turned out.

This is my first manicure using Kiesque's Liquid Pallisade*, and it has absolutely revolutionised doing nails for me. I know it's been around for a while but I've not really dipped my toe (or should I say finger) in at all and I can tell I've definitely been missing out. I've already done 4-5 designs using it and I'm sure there will be more, but this is the first to be posted. No more faffing around with tape (although I'm sure it will still get use somewhere). I'll be doing a full review on it soon but I think it's clear that I love it. 

Wednesday 6 January 2016

Starry Night for Avon

Hey everyone! I have so many designs on my computer that I can't wait to show you but they're all unedited and I've left it until late to post again so I'm going to show you something not-so-original but still something I was pretty happy with. I created these for Avon a couple of months ago but it was around the same time as I did my galaxy alien nails and I thought they were a bit too similar to post so close together. So they've been sitting in my 'to post' folder for ages and they've ended up as one of those designs I never get around to posting. So here you go! 

Sunday 3 January 2016

Cute Octopuses

Hey everyone! My first post of 2016, I'm excited to see what this year will bring for me and for my blog, but today I start with these super cute octopuses (yes I had to google the plural for octopus). It seems right to start the year with a design I'm super proud of. These were inspired by Julia Heffernan, more specifically this design she posted on Instagram. I knew straight away that I wanted to do a design based off it, I adapted it slightly but I tried to stay true to the design as much as possible. I hope you like them as much as I do. I posted on Instagram about how sad I was to take these off, I actually only got to wear them for around an hour before I had to move on to something else. But at least they will forever be immortalised with pictures!