Thursday 31 July 2014

Striping tape diamond crosshatch design in red, orange, and white

How's about another pain-in-the-ass striping tape mani? This one may not be as bad as that right angle black and neon green one was, but I did both hands this time, so really you could say the expenditure of striping tape was about the same. I did this one back in mid-June: Why it takes me so long to post things sometimes, I don't know. Clearly I just need to quit my job and do my nails full time.


 
VIDEO TUTORIAL AT THE END OF THE POST!


Monday 28 July 2014

Turquoise and holo lightning bolts

A quick and easy mani for you today featuring lightning bolt nail vinyls from Nailvinyls.com. Linda was a big sweetie and sent them to me along with some other of her vinyls to try out. We all know how much I love these things, so I gleefully accepted! I had also just received my first GG Couture polishes in the mail (had to order that spectraflair top coat) and so I had some fun with this simple mani with a subtle splash of holo on the middle nail.

 
VIDEO TUTORIAL AT THE END OF THE POST!


Sunday 27 July 2014

Lazy Sunday: Pure Ice glitter gradient

This simple two-polish mani was done about six weeks ago and like many of my other recent posts it seems, it got burried somewhere in my Mac hiding from publication. The inspiration for this mani? The polish line itself: "Pure Ice". I saw these two colours at Walmart and thought they would work beautifully for a simple icy glitter gradient. Doesn't hurt that Pure Ice is only $1.97 each at Walmart... and that's regular retail price!!!

 
VIDEO TUTORIAL AT THE END OF THE POST!


Friday 25 July 2014

Mani swap with Dorra of Didoline!

Why is it that all french nail bloggers are so amazing??? I mean seriously. What. The. Heck. I am so happy to share with you today a mani swap with one of them, the super sweet Dorra of Didoline's Nails! Dorra chose to replicate my super time-consuming neon and black hypnotizing square mani and I went the simple route baha and chose one of her Fashion Friday nail arts, this one inspired by the Fausto Puglisi 2015 Resort collection.


Thursday 24 July 2014

Pink and grey holo fancy chevron scaled gradient

Further to my futuristic teal mermaid-esque scaled gradient, today I'm having some more I Love Nail Polish (ILNP)* holo fun! This time with 'fancy chevrons' - who knew errthin' be gettin' fancy these days? I'm pretty sure this is one the sexiest mani's I've ever done. Yep, I just called nail art sexy.


 
VIDEO TUTORIAL AT THE END OF THE POST!


Wednesday 23 July 2014

The Great Polish Giveaway hosted by Nail Polish Canada

Img credit: Nail Polish Canada
You best enter this!! Nail Polish Canada is hosting a massive giveaway that is currently at 135 nail polishes of varying brands - but high quality amazing brands like Cirque, NCLA, piCture pOlish, OPI, Cult Nails, A England, and the list goes on to a maximum prize of 200 nail polishes! That's basically all of our dreams.

I've nominated Cult Nails' 'Nevermore' to be added to the grand prize. You may be thinking why, it's just plain black? Well, yes, this is true, which why it is an absolute essential for any nail artist. Every time I use black in my nail art I always reach for Nevermore because it is super glossy, seriously opaque (a one-coater!) and its application is always flawless. I'm halfway through my own bottle and I just add a tad of nail polish thinner and it's back to its original fluid consistency. I figure if you're going to win dozens of amazing nail polishes, you need at least one perfect black!

Here's some examples of where I've used Nevermore in nail art:

Geometric print pattern
Matte flakie skittle over black
Neon holo jelly wavy skittle
Hypnotizing black and neon squares














Enter in the rafflecopter widget below, and you can gain extra entries by following me on Facebook. I don't use Twitter so you can forget about that part :) The giveaway is open to Canadian and USA residents.

Leadlighting with neon holo jellies

Last week I reviewed six awesome new neon holo jelly polishes by Beyond the Nail. Today I've got some nail art using a technique that is completely new to me, but I got to use all six polishes from the BTN collection - score! 'Leadlighting' is a relatively new nail art technique first popularized by Messy Mansion where you dab sheer jelly polishes over a white space with a stamped black pattern to fill in the pattern. Karen of @sharingvu on Instagram began using jelly polishes to fill in spaces she freehanded with Chinese calligraphy brushes (also known as 'sumi' brushes) and white/black acrylic paint over a black/white base. I was directly inspired by Karen's take on the leadlighting technique but put my own spin on it by painting a swirly and dotted pattern I have done elsewhere, and evidently, I'm not using just any sheer jelly polishes, I'm using NEON HOLO JELLIES!


 
VIDEO TUTORIAL AT THE END OF THE POST!

Monday 21 July 2014

Work appropriate mani Monday: Rose water decals over not so apparent gradient

Another slightly dated mani for you today, cause I'm purging myself of old nail photos! These were done about a month and a half ago with water decals I randomly got of Mynailproducts.com a while ago. I actually thought that the decals would be transparent (not white) and so you'd see the bottom half of my gradient, but as it turned out they were white, so my initial gradient efforts were lost anyways when the decal covered up the bottom half of my nail. Boo.


Sunday 20 July 2014

Looping effect over iridescent teal

Found this one in my unpublished folder, looks like I did it in May. In any case, I'd bought KB Shimmer 'Teal Another Tale' because, well, it's teal, and it's sparkly, and even shifty. So pretty that I didn't want to interfere with its magical colour properties so all I did was add a simple white looping effect freehand design, some dots, and swarovski flatback studs for extra bling (picked them up at my local craft store).


Friday 18 July 2014

Split baby blue and gold with crackled studs

Studs! The first time I've ever used any, actually. Born Pretty Store sent me these super cool crackled leopard studs and I thought they were pretty unique compared to the typical monochromatic studs we see everywhere these days. I used the colours in the stud as a point of reference and picked my polish colours from there.


 
VIDEO TUTORIAL AT THE END OF THE POST!

Thursday 17 July 2014

Mani swap: Nude flakies, black holo chevrons and scaled gradients

Today I have for you a mani swap with Danele of Lowcountry Lacquer. She is most active on Instagram, and so I was happy when she asked me to do a #maniswap because I just love her fresh take on the chevron! She is always doing up awesome clean yet edgy mani's and chevrons appear to be one of her fav things. I obviously gravitated towards her nude flakie and black holo chevron mani cause, I mean, flakies and holos??? Drool.


 
VIDEO TUTORIAL AT THE END OF THE POST!

Wednesday 16 July 2014

Neon holo jelly wavy skittle

Neon holo jelly time with Beyond the Nail's new summer galaxy collection! You can see drool-worthy swatches of these six beauties here. Today I have for you my first nail art look using these versatile polishes. By versatile I mean that that they are indeed neon and holo, and because they are jelly in consistency, you can build them up on their own, use them over a similarily coloured creme base polish, as a holo topper over a dark polish, or to make jelly glitter sandwiches...! Is there a nail polish type out there that can do more than that?! Nope, don't think so.


 
VIDEO TUTORIAL AT THE END OF THE POST!

Tuesday 15 July 2014

Neon. Holo. Jellies. Heaven on Earth by Beyond the Nail


Enough said right there. As I've said before, I don't always swatch polish, but when I do, it's cause it's f&#%ing awesome. This is Beyond the Nail's summer galaxy collection, which includes six neon holo jelly polishes. You just died. Please know that I will not be held liable for the circumstances that led to your death.

I have a full review* of these polishes with macro pics after the jump - but tiny hint - I LOVE THEM.


Monday 14 July 2014

Work appropriate mani Monday: Neon and nude

Who says you can't wear neon at work? If someone does, they're lying.

I wore this look for a week at the office and no one told me I was fired. Therefore, you too can wear neon at work. But for real though, I am of the opinion that you can mix nude and neon (at least a lemon-lime neon) and pull it off, assuming it compliments your awesome personality.


 
VIDEO TUTORIAL AT THE END OF THE POST!

Sunday 13 July 2014

Black holo up in smoke

Back in May I received my first Colors by Llarowe polish and I was oh so excited because I've never owned a holo polish that strong. I also decided I wanted to try out the 'one stroke' brush technique, popularized by nail artists such as Tartofraises and Lucy's Stash. These ladies do some crazy amazing floral designs with one-stroke, but since I had no idea what I was doing I went for a random mess that ended up looking like swirly smoke. Chalkboard Nails did some smoke nails last year, but using a watercolour technique.

This random smoke look was actually done two months ago back in May... sometimes folders just get left unpublished after a while and I forget all about them. Nail blogger problems. No video tutorial as such, but do check out the ladies mentioned above for some tips on the one-stroke technique.


Real estate nails: Sold!

So my sister, who you've had the pleasure of seeing her nails done by me in this post, is a real estate agent in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada and I decided I wanted to see if I could make a sale just by posting real estate-themed nails. I'm probably pressing my luck, but whatever. Remember Jen, I get 10% of your cut!


Friday 11 July 2014

Triple raz holo teal scaled gradient: Mermaids from the future

Another scaled gradient, you ask?! Yep. And I'm not apologizing. Someone on my Instagram actually commented that I do too many of them. You know what I thought?? I don't give a. I just love the clean, crisp yet deep look they give off. There's something about lines without actually having blatant lines in artwork that has always been appealing to me, like Lawrence Harris' work. I'm Canadian, so yeah. Deal with it.

The lovely folks at I Love Nail Polish (ILNP) sent me some holo babies* to play with and I was oh so delighted. Christa aka beauty blogger Chrissy AI reached out to me and told me I didn't even have to trade my liver. I was relieved. Here's my first look so far with my new (and very first!) ILNP's. Turned out like a mermaid from the future if you ask me, featuring my fav colour, teal.


 
VIDEO TUTORIAL AT THE END OF THE POST!

Thursday 10 July 2014

Eos lip balm: Bestie twin nails

This #bestietwinnails idea pretty much happened by accident when Tracey of @missbellatracey on Instagram and I were chatting up our usual crazy. I think it went something like this: Tracey sending me what seemed like countless pics of her new Eos lip balms and me being like I like the colours of those flavours. That's pretty much why I bought mine too, cause the colours were soooo pretty.

And so, this simple thick Eos-colour inspired ruffian mani was born:


Wednesday 9 July 2014

Nail time with the sister - Orange gradient

I did my sister's nails! Which is actually quite a challenging feat because she hates that shit. I thought I wouldn't see the day where she asked me to do her nails, but she actually came to me because she was headed to a wedding. I got so excited I didn't know where to start. I had to calm down a little and not get carried away, reminding myself that my usual go-to psycho striped/scaled gradient/colour-blocking pattern of madness look would not be suitable for a wedding.

She would be wearing an orangey-coral toned dress, so I went with this simple gradient with a thin white triangle look.


Tuesday 8 July 2014

Curved deep blue scaled gradient with glitter placement

Dive into the ocean! That's how this mani makes me feel. Except I hate salt water and love this mani.


 
VIDEO TUTORIAL AT THE END OF THE POST!

Monday 7 July 2014

Work appropriate mani Monday: Not so appropriate shrinkage

Further to my last post where I exposed the Seche Vite "shrinkage" phenomenon, I thought I'd use this work appropriate mani Monday post to demonstrate more of this top coat travesty.

I originally did this mani back in May, but never published it, because, well, it's pretty obvious why. Look at those horrendous edges! The tip wear without any actual wear! These shots were taken maybe a couple of hours after I painted them. Seche Vite fail.

Seche Vite bottle image credit

Saturday 5 July 2014

Polling the people: Splatter mani comes out on top

Today on Instagram I decided to take the opportunity to unload some of my old unpublished mani's. I have quite a few... it's kind of stupid actually. I don't know why, I guess I never got around to posting them and then when I thought about it I was like ermmm.... these are fugly now. In other words, the mani's were done either when my nails/nail care was crappy, before I got my new camera, or after I got my new camera but had no idea how to use it.

So I threw together a couple looks, the theme being 'how to wear chrome', and asked my followers to vote for their fav mani out of the 4 looks that I would post by itself:

Source: @simplynailogical (Instagram)

Friday 4 July 2014

Purple magic simple looping effect

So the 'looping effect' mani is one of the very first designs I did when I first started doing something other than just one colour plus a stripe of another colour down the middle of nails. The earliest looping effect mani I have on record courtesy of photo date stamps is sometime in 2010. This was all way way before I was doing anything fancy, and before I'd discovered that an online world of nail art existed. The first time I spoke of the looping effect on this blog was right around when I launched this blog, so February of 2014.

The base polish and the two striper polishes I used to create this look are all products included in my 10k followers on Instagram celebatory giveaway, which you can enter to win if you have an Instagram account, see giveaway rules etc. here.

 
VIDEO TUTORIAL AT THE END OF THE POST!

Wednesday 2 July 2014

Hypnotizing black & neon squares

Further to yesterday's plain corner gradient post, here's the finished product. No, this is not a stamp. No, this is not freehand. No, this is not a pre-cut nail vinyl (I wish, seriously). This is the result of me turning into a crazy person and placing probably over 50 pieces of striping tape one by one while my eyes go crossed.


Tuesday 1 July 2014

Neon green and yellow corner gradient

In my Gradient Guide, which I published maybe two weeks ago, I included a thumbnail of a neon green 'corner gradient' but hadn't yet published the actual mani. Here it is! Truth be told I did this mani on May 24th... I know cause that's what my pic file creation date says. I never got around to posting it mostly because the end result (which is part 2, to be revealed in tomorrow's post) is rather confusing and I didn't make a video tutorial. I figured I would do one eventually and then be able to post the mani along with a video, but.... too much work. You won't blame me when you see the final design tomorrow.