Tuesday 30 December 2014

New Years Fireworks for Divine Caroline

Hey everyone! I'm going to be posting twice today because I have two great tutorials to show you for New Years nails for tonight and there's no point posting them after the event. These are some simple and fun firework nails that I created for Divine Caroline. NYE wouldn't be complete without the sound of fireworks banging in the sky, so it seemed only fitting to have them on my nails too! 


Don't forget to check out the steps on Divine Caroline here.

What do you think? Let me know in the comments!
Alice

Happy New Years! for Divine Caroline

Hey everyone! I can't believe that tomorrow is the last day of the year, I know it's cliche but this year really has gone fast, and so so much has changed. I have a new job, a new boyfriend, a new flat, and I'm ending this year on a truly happy note, even though it's not always been an easy ride this year. I intend to celebrate in style, and what better way that a glass (or two) of champagne? So of course I couldn't resist putting them on my nails! Head over to Divine Caroline for a full tutorial on how to create these nails yourself


Don't forget to check out the steps here.

What do you think? Let me know in the comments!
Alice 

Sunday 28 December 2014

Fair Isle Print for Avon + Tutorial

Hey everyone! I hope you all had a good christmas. Today's nails are keeping in the christmas spirit slightly as I dont quite want to let go of it, but they're also quite wintery so it's fine! I'd never done fair isle nails before so I decided to give them a try and I really like how they turned out. Steps are after the jump


Wednesday 24 December 2014

Christmas Eve Christmas Trees

Merry Christmas everyone! It's technically Christmas here in the UK now as it's 2am, but I just wanted to quickly post some christmas tree nail art that I created for Tesco before I go to bed. It seems like these days I stay up later and later on christmas eve and then I'm knackered on christmas day. I still can't actually believe it's christmas tomorrow (/today), having worked all day it just feels like another working week! 


Tuesday 23 December 2014

Tutorial Tuesday: Christmas Baubles for Barry M

Hey everyone! I really can't wait for christmas now. I'm working all day tomorrow (christmas eve) so it'll be nice to have some time off and see my family and boyfriend. I'm also so excited to see what everyone thinks of what I've bought them. I'm definitely one of those people that watches you eagle-eyed as you open presents, oops! Anyway, today's nails are some festive baubles that I created for Barry M and I also did a tutorial to go alongside them (which will come as no surprise considering all my recent posts!). Me and my sister were upset that my mum put up the christmas tree and all the decorations without us this year, so it seemed only right to put them on my nails instead.


Saturday 20 December 2014

Christmas Holly Negative Space Nail Art for Divine Caroline

Hey everyone! I've finally finished uni for Christmas, and now I feel like I can properly get into the Christmas spirit (not that I haven't been already), especially now I've got all my Christmas shopping out of the way. Today I another tutorial for you, as a wonderful christmas gift to you all, haha! I know you all do like tutorials though so I don't really know why I keep acting like it's such a hardship that they're all I post at the moment. Today's tutorial is for these negative space holly nails. It was one of those designs where an idea just popped into my head, and it was either going to be a disaster or look great, and somehow it ended up looking pretty good. Hopefully you all like it too, and like recreating it! You can find all the steps on Divine Caroline here.


What do you think? Let me know in the comments!

Don't forget to check out the steps here

Alice

Wednesday 17 December 2014

Penguin Snowscape for Tesco + Tutorial

Hey everyone! I have another tutorial for you today, I'm sorry that they're all I ever seem to post at the moment but I have a lot of them to show you and it doesnt harm for you all to be able to recreate what I'm showing you (hopefully). Today's tutorial is for these cute penguins. I realised that I've never done any penguin nails before so I knew I had to do some this year and I decided to create some in collaboration with Beauty at Tesco. Steps are after the jump!


Tuesday 16 December 2014

Tutorial Tuesday: Santa Got Stuck Up The Chimney

Hey everyone! I have another tutorial for you today, this time one that I created for Divine Caroline. I was searching for an original way to create some santa nails when I remembered the song 'When Santa got stuck up the chimney' (not sure if that's a universal song or just in England but either way!), and I decided to create some nail art based from that. To see how to create these nails yourself head over to the Divine Caroline website for the step by step instructions. 


Don't forget to check out the steps here.

What do you think? Let me know in the comments!
Alice

Thursday 11 December 2014

Tutorial Thursday: Glitter Strips for Barry M

Hey everyone! It's been a while since I did a tutorial thursday, mainly because I keep forgetting to post tutorials on thursdays (or tuesdays) because I'm terrible at remembering things! Today I have a tutorial I created for Barry M. I decided to try something a little different, and I'm not 100% sure it worked but I'll let you be the judge. Tutorial steps will be after the jump.


Monday 8 December 2014

VVB Victoria Beckham Nails Inc Collaboration Collection 2014: Review and Swatches

Hey everyone! Today I have a super exciting new release to show you from Nails Inc: two new polishes designed in collaboration with Victoria Beckham. The collection contains two colours, Judo Red*, and Bamboo White*. The press release reads: 'The covetable and collectible duo features two new polish shades – Judo Red and Bamboo White - developed with an exclusive formulation featuring Stretch-To-Fit technology and Bamboo Extract with Silica and is presented within a sleek new bottle design ... Designed by Fabien Baron and customised by Victoria Beckham'. These retail at £25 each so they are very high end but they're absolutely beautiful and the quality is amazing. They're not for everyone but if you're the kind of person to like expensive nail polish these are definitely for you.  

Thursday 4 December 2014

Day at Nail Harmony UK

Hey everyone! So last month I was kindly invited down to Nail Harmony UK HQ to learn how to do gel nails with Gelish. I had a brilliant day there and met great new bloggers like Lex from Talonted Lex, Em from My Pale Skin, Cat from Perfectly Polished, and Metta from Nails by Mets. It was also nice to see Lucy and Sammy (from Lucy's Stash and The Nailasaurus) again. Stupidly, I forgot to take a camera, so thankyou very very much to Lucy for all these images, otherwise I wouldn't have been able to write a post! 

The day started with some pastries and drinks, after a welcome from Georgie (head of Nail Harmony UK!) and Ezara (PR representative), which I definitely appreciated after a hellish journey that morning! The room was all prepared for us as you can see below, with tools and a lamp each for us all. We worked together in pairs so that we could practice on each other, I worked with Lucie and you can see the results of our work after the jump! 

Wednesday 3 December 2014

Baby it's cold outside

Hey everyone! This morning I found ice on my car, which means it's definitely officially winter, and therefore time for winter/festive nail art. I feel like I cant really get in the festive spirit until I've bought all my christmas presents and as I've only bought my boyfriend's I can't really say I've done enough to be able to relax and enjoy the build up to Christmas. I'm setting myself a goal to have finished all my shopping by the end of next week but we'll see how that goes! Today's nail art design is this cute snowmen design I created for Avon. They were super simple to create, even though they might not look it for some people, and they only took about 20 minutes to do. Snowmen are such a go-to winter design but I've actually never done them before so it was quite fun to do something different!


Friday 28 November 2014

Tutorial: Glitter Patterns for Divine Caroline

Hey everyone! I feel like it's time to start the glitter nail art designs now, it's getting cold enough to feel like it's definitely winter, I've been told it will snow this next week but I'm waiting to see if that's true or not. Either way, I wanted to create a glitter nail art design so I created this look and a tutorial for Divine Caroline. Head over to my post on their website for the steps on how to create this look.


What do you think? Let me know in the comments!
Alice

Wednesday 26 November 2014

Floral French

Hey everyone. Just a quick post today, I'm aiming to get up early and do some work for once tomorrow, wish me luck! These are just some quick nails I created with my university nail art society a couple of weeks ago. All you need to create them is 4 or 5 colours and a dotting tool so they're super simple to create. 

Friday 21 November 2014

Barry M Silk Nail Paints Autumn/Winter 2014 Review and Swatches

Hey everyone! Two posts in one night, aren't you feeling lucky! I felt like it was probably about time that I began to catch up on posts as I've barely posted this month. Having started a new job, trying to balance uni, and trying to run my blog and also trying to have a social life is proving difficult. I'm doing my best but I am falling behind with posting and I'm really sorry about that. 

Anyway, today's second post is my review of the recent Autumn/Winter Silk collection that Barry M released to add to their Spring Silk collection. The original silks had a gorgeous matte finish and these are no different. I think these are a little different though as they seem to have more depth to them and they also look really enhanced with topcoat. I've shown you both with and without topcoat in my swatches to give you a comparison, and you can decide for yourself which you prefer.


Tutorial: Floral Leaves for Barry M

Hey everyone! I'm so excited for the weekend, even though I'm working both days I'm just glad this week (and therefore my essay) is over. Anyway, it's been a couple of weeks since I posted a tutorial so I thought it was about time. This is another of the tutorials I created for Barry M a few weeks ago, I'm in the process of creating some more at the moment, I should actually be doing that right now really! This one is meant to be a floral design but I just winged it and I'm not really sure where it ended up, but I do quite like it. The steps on how to create these are after the jump 

Wednesday 19 November 2014

Nails at Fosse Park with Graffiti Nails

So a few weeks ago you might remember that I mentioned I was off to do nails at Fosse Park in Leicester with Graffiti Nails. Stupidly, I forgot to ever post pictures of the nails I did there, So I thought now would be a good time. I did a lot of nails that day, on big and small nails, and on a wide range of people. It was really fun to have some practice on people who weren't my friends for once. Don't forget, you can buy all these polishes on the Graffiti Nails website if you're in the UK, if not, you can buy my nail wraps here. I did the same designs quite a few times, so I've cut out a few pictures, the daisies design and the nude flowers design were both very popular so I've only included one of each instead of the 6 of each I did.


Sunday 16 November 2014

Peacock Nail Art Tutorial for Avon

Hey everyone! Today I have a quick and simple tutorial to show you how to create these easy peacock nails. Peacock nails have never been top of my to-do list, so when Avon asked me to create some I was a bit sceptical. They didn't go exactly to plan and I hadn't imagined them looking as they do, but I actually quite like how they turned out, even if it's not the usual peacock nail art design. I also decided to add some 'studs' but instead of adding studs (and me then picking them off an hour later) I painted them on instead.


Tuesday 11 November 2014

Barry M - Poppy Nail Art for Remembrance Day

Hey everyone! Today in the UK was Remembrance Day, which is represented by poppies. So, I created some nail art using the new Barry M Silk shade Poppy* as I thought it would be quite fitting! I'd also like to quickly apologise for my radio silence, I've another essay to do and I've just started a new job so things are a little hectic, but I'm getting there. Anyway, I absolutely love this shade by Barry M, it's a great addition to the silk range and looks great both shiny and matte (as it dries) you've already seen it in my monthly favourites, and I'll (finally) be doing a full review of the new silks in the next few days.

Friday 7 November 2014

Clock Nail Art for Avon

Hey everyone! It's a been a busy week for me, yesterday I spent the day at Nail Harmony UK's base (who run Gelish for those of you that dont know), and I had such a fantastic time, and met some lovely new bloggers who I hadn't met before, along with Lucy (Lucy's Stash) and Sammy (The Nailasaurus) who I know pretty well! I'll have a post coming for you in the next few days but for now I just quickly wanted to show you these clock nails that I created for Avon. I created these for when the clocks changed but I actually think they work quite well as a design in general, they're not time-specific (GETTIT?). For these I used a variety of Avon nail polish colours as the bases, and then acrylic paint for the clocks.


What do you think? Let me know in the comments!
Alice

Tuesday 4 November 2014

Barry M Autumn/Winter 2014 Aquarium Collection Swatches and Review

Hey everyone! You might remember the Barry M Aquarium Collection from spring of this year, and hopefully you loved it as much as I did. Well, for autumn Barry M has had 2 new additions to the collection, both of which are as lovely as the first set. Unlike my previous review of the first collection, I didn't swatch the duo-chrome, 'Persian' over black, and I think it's interesting to see the differences between the two sets of swatches. The great thing about duo-chromes is that they work well either on their own or over black, so it doesn't really matter either way. The glitter in this collection, 'Atlantis' is also interesting, I've never seen Barry M bring out a glitter with such a multitude of shapes inside.

Monday 3 November 2014

Monthly Favourites: October

Hey everyone! I'm a few days late with this one as I've had an insanely busy weekend. I hope you all had a fantastic halloween, I definitely did. So, it's that time of the month again (no, not THAT time), where I show you everything I have loved this month. I've got quite a varied range for you this month, and of course some nail varnish! Here's what I've chosen:



Friday 31 October 2014

Nailvengers Assemble: Halloween Nail Art for Avon

Hey everyone! It's the end of the month which means another Nailvengers Assemble post, if you don't know what I mean by that, read this post. I'm teaming up with Sammy of The Nailasaurus, Lucie of Lucy's Stash, Allie of Brit Nails and Amelia of xameliax once again to bring you Halloween nails, with this spooky combination look I created for Avon. I'm heading out the door in 5 minutes so this post is very rushed I'm afraid, but I'm super excited for tonight, halloween is one of my favourite days of the whole year and I've been looking forward to it for months! 


What do you think? Let me know in the comments!
Alice

Thursday 30 October 2014

Tutorial Thursday: Halloween Black Cat Nails for Divine Caroline

Hey everyone! Today I have a design that I've been really excited to show you, cat nails! I wasn't sure that these were going to work out as I planned in my head so I was so proud of them when they did. I've left my halloween costume for tomorrow until the absolute last minute so I'm just going as a cat (how original) so I might re-do these nails to go with my costume, or maybe some other cat design. I've created a tutorial for these for Divine Caroline so you can see how simple these are to create yourselves, if you dont want to do the smaller cats you can always just do the larger ones. See the tutorial here. Also these only take two colours: Barry M - Lychee and Graffiti Nails - Jet Black. ALSO, Graffiti Nails currently has 50% off everything for halloween, use the code 'SPOOKY' at the checkout. Go on the website here.


Don't forget to check out the tutorial here
What do you think? Let me know in the comments!
Alice

Tuesday 28 October 2014

Tutorial Tuesday: Dracula for Beauty at Tesco

Hey everyone! Yet another tutorial for you today, I asked in my giveaway a few weeks ago what you all wanted more of and you said tutorials, so I'm currently spamming you with them. Today's tutorial is in collaboration with Beauty at Tesco, and is done using products all available in their range. As halloween is only a few days away I thought it was about time I whacked out some halloween designs. I always struggle to come up with anything original at halloween so after a bit of thinking I decided to do a peeking Dracula design. However I forgot of course that Dracula isn't Dracula without his fangs, which aren't on the nail, so if you would prefer to have the fangs in you can always have the face higher up the nail. 


If you want to see the steps, head over to their Instagram here.

You can follow Beauty at Tesco on Instagram, Pinterest, and Twitter, and visit their website here, and blog here.

What do you think? Let me know in the comments!
Alice

Monday 27 October 2014

Tribal Nail Art for Avon + Tutorial

Hey everyone! Just a quick post tonight, I have no reason behind it except that I've spent my whole evening listening to 1989 and that's enough of an excuse for me, I absolutely love this album, can't wait to torment my friends by repeatedly playing it for the next few months! Anyway, tonight's nails are some tribal nails I created for Avon last month, they were meant to be a simple look but I ended up getting a bit carried away and they're definitely not simple anymore. I also created a tutorial for these so hopefully you can follow it, I got a bit distracted between steps so there's a bit of a jump.

Friday 24 October 2014

Tutorial Thursday: Gingham Studs for Divine Caroline

Hey everyone! This was supposed to go up last night but the schedule didn't work, so here you go! After I posted my gingham nails last month, I had a lot of requests for a tutorial, so I teamed up with Divine Caroline to bring you one! I knew that I really wanted to combine them with more autumnal colours. I'm really liking deep reds this year, even though they stain no end they also look great, and I love how these turned out. Adding polka dots almost like studs was more of an afterthought when I realised that I didn't really want to do all the nails with gingham, and I think it ended up working really well. If you want to see how to create these yourself click HERE to go to the Divine Caroline website.


What do you think? Let me know in the comments!
Alice

Wednesday 22 October 2014

Floral Fury

Hey everyone! I've spent my evening watching 'Cuban Fury' and now that it's fresh in my mind I couldn't help naming the post after it! For those of you who haven't seen it, it's definitely a feel-good film, and it's pretty funny too! I should have really been doing seminar work but sometimes you just gotta watch a film and pretend uni doesn't exist (...right?). Okay, I know it's a terrible idea but just for one night! 

Anyway, these nails were done in our university nail art society, as we're always a bit pushed for time they're not the greatest I've ever created but I thought they were at least worthy of being posted here! I'm not sure of the base colour (I think maybe it's Barry M - Cosmo) and the white and pink are Barry M nail art pens. 


Sunday 19 October 2014

Tutorial: Autumn Birds for Barry M

Hey everyone! I hope you've all had a good week! I'm hoping next week will be a bit better for me. You may or may not have noticed but I decided to take a few days break from blogging, it's not been too long but things were getting a bit on top of me so I thought a few days break might do me good, I haven't even turned my laptop on for 3 days, which for me is a very weird occurrence. Now I feel ready to get back in to blogging, I'm going to try and post a lot more as I have a huge backlog of posts to show you. 

Today's post is another tutorial I created for Barry M, my last design was this toadstool design and you all seemed to love it, so hopefully you like this one just as much! I absolutely love birds, and I knew I wanted to incorporate them into a tutorial at some point, I still get requests to do a tutorial for my Rob Ryan bird nails, but for now this shall have to do! Tutorial steps will be after the jump

Wednesday 15 October 2014

Cosmopolitan Blog Awards 2014 - Pictures + nails!

Hey everyone! I'm definitely a bit late with this post, as the awards happened last tuesday, I have no excuse except being too busy with uni to comprehend writing this, but now I'm trying to put off writing an essay, so what better time to do it? Thanks to all your wonderful nominations, this year I went along to the awards with Lucy and Sammy, and I had high expectations from last year, which were completely shattered! It was an amazing night, and I may have had one (or two) too many cocktails, but that only made the evening even better. It was lovely to spend time with Lucy and Sammy again too, we don't get to see each other much so when we do it's great to have a catch up! Thankyou to Cosmo as well for hosting such an amazing night, and to you all once again for making it possible for me to be there!


Tuesday 14 October 2014

Hugs for Emily - Clouds and Stars

Hey everyone! Today's post is a little different, as it's dedicated to my wonderful friend Emily of Very Emily, who's been going through a tough time recently and we, her blogging friends, were invited by Sarah (Chalkboard Nails) to take part in 'Hugs for Emily', where we recreate one of Emily's designs. I've raved about how fantastic I think Emily is before, but she really has done so much for me, in blogging and in life, I'm proud to call her my friend and I wish there was more I could do than paint my nails to help relieve her problems. 

I decided to recreate this clouds and stars design of Emily's. I really loved the combination of bright and dark colours, and the addition of glitter. It's cute and simple, but also looks fab. Emily's original design was done using cut out nail vinyls, but as I don't own them I had to freehand them and they don't look quite as perfect obviously!

Sunday 12 October 2014

Fruit Nail Art for Avon

Hey everyone. It's been a busy week for me, with the Cosmo blog awards on Tuesday, and my trip to Fosse Park in Leicester yesterday, I'll be posting about both in the next couple of days, but it's been over a week since I posted my own nails on here, so I think it's about time I show you some nail art! I created this fruit nail art for Avon a couple of weeks ago, and if I'm honest I was expecting it to turn out to be a bit of a failure, especially the kiwis. Last time I attempted kiwis a few years ago they were just a big mushy mess, so I'm glad to see my skills have improved at least a bit since then!

Friday 10 October 2014

Gel Series, Part 3: Removing Gel Manicures

Hey everyone! Part 3 of the gel series was supposed to be 'applying and removing gel manicures' with a video tutorial for the application but unfortunately I still cant get my iMovie working so I'll put the video up as a part 4 whenever I can fix it, however long that might take! You can see part 1 here, and part 2 here. Part 3 is the removal of gels, and I know that for some this can be the most daunting part of gel manicures. I often hear people saying that they don't want gels doing as they will damage their nails. Gels SHOULDN'T ruin your nails, unless they are applied and/or removed badly.  Today I'm going to compare two gel removal kits, and also talk about what to do when removing gels to prevent damage.


Wednesday 8 October 2014

I'm doing nails at New Look, Fosse Park, Leicester!

Hey everyone! I have some super exciting, slightly last minute news for you today. This Saturday I'm going to be doing nails with Graffiti Nails at New Look, Fosse Park in Leicester. It's going to be between 10-4, so pop along any time between then for your nails doing by me! You can have either nail wraps or a nail design done, there will be a choice of 4-5 designs available, which you'll be able to see on the day. I can't wait to meet you!


Hopefully I'll get to meet some of you there!
Alice

Sunday 5 October 2014

Gel Series, Part 2: Practising Gel Manicures

Hey everyone! I'm a bit late with posting this, but part 2 was actually supposed to be a video and unfortunately my iMovie has broken and wont open so I'm going to try and fix it but if not I'll have to have a rethink for part 3! So instead, part 2 is a collection of all the nails I've done on other people (and on myself) using gel in the past 2 months. If you missed part 1, where I compared gel starter kits, you can see it here. Because these nails were all done at different times of day in different places the picture quality is definitely not consistent so I apologise in advance!

Friday 3 October 2014

Ciate x Vente Privee Sale - Floral Nail Art

Hey everyone! Today I have some more nail art brought to you by Ciate and Vente Privee, you can see my last design (which explains who Vente Privee are if you're not sure!) from a few months ago here. The sale started on Wednesday at 6am and it's a limited time flash sale, finishing on monday. It is for members only but it's super easy to become a member, just click here and fill in the details and you're done! There are some fantastic discounts available, for instance the Beach House Set* that I used to create this design normally retails for £22, but you can get it for just £8 in the sale! There's also other gift sets on sale, and colours on their own too, it's definitely worth having a look at if you really love a bargain (and who doesn't?), you can see the full sale here.

Thursday 2 October 2014

Gel Series, Part 1: Comparing Starter Kits

Hey everyone! Today I'm starting a brand new 3 part series on gel nails. I should be posting today, tomorrow and Saturday night, but I wont make any promises because we all know how great I am at time keeping! If not everything will be up by Sunday. My first part in the series is a comparison of three gel polish starter kits. I've got the Gelish Pro 5-45 Kit*, the Elegant Touch Lux Gel Starter Kit*, and the Red Carpet Manicure Gel Polish Pro Kit*. I'd like to point out before I start that I am not qualified to do gel nails (although I am hopefully going to be soon!) and these are purely my perspectives as a consumer, and of course as a blogger. Gelish is a more salon-based brand, but both Elegant Touch and Red Carpet Manicure are for home use, and I think it's useful to compare the three to see their pros and cons. 

Tuesday 30 September 2014

Nailvengers Assemble! Gradients - Night Time Sky for Avon

Hey everyone! I know I've done two posts in one evening, but both of these fall on the same day, as it's Nailvengers Assemble time once again! If you don't know what I'm talking about, me, Allie from Brit Nails, Sammy from The Nailasaurus, Lucy from Lucy's Stash and Amelia from xameliax all post one themed nail design at the end of every month. I took a break from doing it last month as I had too much on, but now I'm back, and I'm combining this months prompt of 'Gradients' with some nails I created for Avon this weekend: night time sky nail art! I must admit, these did look a lot better in person, especially from further away. Macro has ruined the effect a bit I think, but nevertheless I do still quite like them, and it's something I've not done before which is always a bonus. 


Monthly Favourites: September

Hey everyone! It's the last day of September (although technically it's now the first day of October where I am) and that means that it's time for my monthly favourites once again. Can you believe I've been doing this for 4 months now? It only feels like a couple of weeks ago when I decided to start it at the beginning of summer, which also shows how fast summer went! So for September I have quite a few nail-related products, I know I've had quite a lot of make-up in my favourites for the past couple of months, but it really is whatever is my favourite that month, and I guess this month I'm going back to my roots! The products I've chosen for this month are:


Friday 26 September 2014

Tutorial Thursday: Matte Autumn Toadstools Nail Art for Barry M

Hey everyone! This was supposed to go live last night but for some reason it didn't work, so even though it's technically friday, here's my tutorial thursday. Today I'm showing you how to do these cute toadstool nails, as I said before in my review of the autumn Barry Ms this whole collection is great for autumn nail art, and straight away the idea of doing toadstools came to mind.

Monday 22 September 2014

Picture Polish 2014 Collaborations: Forget Me Not, Sizzle, Fools Gold and Unicorn - Swatches and Review

Hey everyone! As promised I have four of the new Picture Polish collaborations for you today, including two from my friends Sammy (The Nailasaurus), and Allie (Brit Nails). These are my first ever Picture Polishes and I'm really really impressed, I can definitely see why it has such a good reputation as a company. All of these polishes are good quality, dry quickly and look great, what more could you want?

Friday 19 September 2014

Barry M - Autumn/Winter 2014 'Tribal' Gellies Collection Review and Swatches

Hey everyone! Today I have a long-overdue review of the six gorgeous new gellies from Barry M for Autumn 2014. I've heard this described as the 'Tribal' collection and an email from Barry M said the same thing, I don't know if that's an official term for the collection but I think it suits it. It also suits just being an autumn collection, as the colours are so perfectly autumnal. I've already done quite a bit of nail art with these which will be coming up soon, and I'm sure I'll be doing plenty more designs! 

Thursday 18 September 2014

Picture Polish - Sizzle by Cosmetic Sanctuary Nail Art

Hey everyone! Today I have some nail art for you using one of Picture Polish's recent collaboration polishes: Sizzle* by Cosmetic Sanctuary. Would you believe this is the first ever Polish Shade on my blog? It's not the first to touch my nails, as I've just swatched four of the new releases from Picture Polish (review coming this weekend) and I used Unicorn* (Brit Nails collaboration shade) first. Nevertheless, as soon as I tried this polish I knew I had to do some nail art with it, it's a brilliant neon but also glittery, what else could you want?! I'll have my full review of it for you this weekend, but for now let me show you the nail art!

Tuesday 16 September 2014

Tutorial Tuesday: Polka Dot Owls for Divine Caroline

Hey everyone! I have a brand new tutorial for you over at Divine Caroline today which you can see HERE. My obsession with owls and polka dots continues as you can see, but this time it's a little different because I haven't got a nude background, which I usually seem to have when owls are involved. I really love how these turned out and I hope you like trying them out yourselves!


Don't forget to check out the steps HERE
What do you think? Let me know in the comments!
Alice

Monday 15 September 2014

GIVEAWAY: Graffiti Nails Polish + Nail Wraps

Hey everyone! Today I have an exciting new giveaway to share with you. I'm sure by now you've all seen my announcement of the brand new Graffiti Nails wraps I designed, and to celebrate the launch of our brand new Stripe nail wraps we decided it would be a great idea to hold a giveaway for you all. and you'll hopefully have seen that they will be shipped internationally. Unfortunately, we still cannot ship nail polish internationally, so this giveaway will be split into two parts, as follows:
  • 1 UK winner will receive: 3 Graffiti Nails nail polishes of their choice, and all 4 nail wraps
  • 1 International winner will receive: all 4 nail wrap designs
I'm sorry for those of you who live elsewhere who want to try the polish, hopefully at some point in the near future we will be shipping internationally, and I'll definitely let you know when that's the case! If you can't wait for the giveaway to end, you can buy both polishes and nail wraps here.

There are some terms and conditions to the competition of course:
  • Giveaway is open internationally/UK only as stated above, please do not enter unless you understand that you will only receive nail polish if you live within the UK.
  • Please do not enter if you are a giveaway only account. I will be checking and your entry will not count.
  • Giveaway will close exactly 2 weeks to the opening date, so on Monday 29th September at 12am GMT
  • Winners will be chosen using random.org
  • Prizes will be sent by Graffiti Nails and I will not be responsible for any losses or delays
Enter using the Rafflecopter widget below!



a Rafflecopter giveaway

Good luck! 
Alice

Sunday 14 September 2014

Review Week, Day 7: Illamasqua Once Collection - Melange Swatch

Hey everyone! Here is the third and final post, review week has reached its end, and it's reached its end with one of the most beautiful polishes I've seen in a while: Melange* from the Once collection by Illamasqua. This is my first ever Illamasqua polish and I couldn't be more impressed. The Once collection is all about vintage, and it definitely shows in this polish. It's a hard polish to explain, because there's so much going on in it, but I dont need to explain it, because you can see it right here! 

Review Week, Day 6: Nails Inc Festival Collection

Hey everyone! Two posts down, one to go. I'm feeling a bit more productive now, even if it is nearly 2am and I still have a tutorial to do and edit before I go to sleep... Anyway! No more complaining, someone slap me if I complain again, I love this blog and I'm just very tired and moany this week, ignore me! This next post for Day 6 is the Nails inc. Festival collection, which consists of two glitters and two creme nail polishes. I'm a bit late to the party with these, especially as festival season is over now, but that doesn't take away from how fun and great these polishes are, and I couldn't resist still showing you them.

Review Week, Day 5: Carabella Lacquer Limited Edition Polishes

Hey everyone! I'm making it my mission to post 3 times tonight, even though it's nearly 1am, I am determined that review week will be over and done with by the time I go to bed, but if not then tomorrow morning will see the last of the posts. I bet you're all glad to see the back of it with the amount I've been moaning! I promise I'll be much less moany next week. Anyway, Day 5 is a couple of polishes from Carabella Lacquer. I won these in a giveaway Lucy from Lucy's Stash held in February. The polishes were created especially for the giveaway so I was extremely thrilled to have won them, and they're absolutely gorgeous. The colours are really unique and brilliant quality. I hadn't heard of Carabella Lacquer before trying these but if they're anything to by then this brand is definitely one to check out. You can see her etsy store here.

Saturday 13 September 2014

Guest post for Brit Nails

Hey everyone! I'll be posting the rest of review week tomorrow (yes, three posts in one day!), because I've been ill and exhausted for the past couple of days and I just haven't had a chance to edit or write up a post. Anyway, I just wanted to direct you over to Brit Nails where I've done a guest post for her. So to see more of these nails and read more about them click HERE


What do you think? Let me know in the comments!
Alice

Wednesday 10 September 2014

Review Week, Day 4: Nicole by OPI Summer 2014 Collection Swatches

Hey everyone! Day 2 of review week is going to be short but sweet as I'm going out tonight. Today I'm showing you the new Nicole by OPI summer releases. They're a bit of an odd mix but I actually really like how they look together! There are 3 cremes and one glitter and the glitter works well over any of them, but I'm just going to show you over 2.