Geometric Gradient Line Nails

Hi there!! This nail art look is inspired by the one and only Chalkboard Nails where she did this design during the 31 Day Challenge and I thought it was sweet. But also on that note, I'm so glad I didn't do the challenge this year. There's just no way, I can barely do my nails once a week let alone everyday. Madness that challenge is, madness. Girl has homework.

This is a bad time of the year for my cuticles :/

I thought all the lines looked really funky, the gradient making is especially so. I mixed up the colours for fun and otherwise I think this looks really cool. I would just stare at the design in school cause of gradient really, gradients are great. 

I got to work with my toothpicks and initially I tried to make the lines thinner but when that didn't work it was chubby lines all the way. I first did the 3 main colours then went to the intersects and did the blending colours, worked quite well if I do say so myself. 

Pink: Models Own - Radiant Pink

Glitter (I had to add some glitter): M&S - Light Mix

Beige: Nails Inc - Sao Paulo Streets

Brown: Nails Inc - Porchester Square

Purple: Illamasqua - Jo'Mina

Light Purple: Barry M - Prickly Pear and Essie - Lilacism

Blue: Essie - Bikini So Teeny

Light Blue: The Face Shop - GR501

Thank you for reading and I hope you have a really funky day!! :)

Green Nails: Illamasqua - Melange

Hello guys!! This is the polish. I'm real here and this is just the best. I'm sure you've seen swatches of this beauty cropping up every now and again and from those swatches I decided I need this polish in my life. And I was right. And then some. If you can look at this polish and not fall in love then I don't know anymore.

I'm not a bottle shot gal but I had to

Can you deal? Cause I can't deal. Maybe I'm not very good at dealing. But is this not the most fantastical green polish you've ever seen?? I need this in all the colours.
Melange is a dusty camouflage/asparagus green (I actually like the sound of that) with the most stunning gold and red/copper flakes (those flakes though, they're wonderful). I'm finding it hard not writing in all caps. IT'S JUST BEAUTIFUL!! I think it's been a while since I've really been wowed by a polish, but Melange has changed everything. Everything. :P

Illamasqua, you've done it again. As I always say Illasmasqua is the only high end brand I'm willing to splurge on and this is one of the reasons. Melange is from this year Autumn collection called Once, it's very ethereal and is evocative of fairytales and that. Seriously, go look at the press photos they are so nice. Melange is the only polish to come out with the collection, but that's all the collection needs. I ran out to get it, I infrequently do that. Melange is worth it. There are so many gorgeous Illamasqua polishes, why you cost so much??
I looked up what Melange is and it's a formation of different shapes and types of rocks which may not be the most exciting thing. But I do geography in school and in the physical aspect, we cover rocks (kind of) and that kind of stuff. But I love geography (hence why I do it ;)) and so I have connections with the polish. I'm great at sounding crazy.

The formula is also totally and utterly flawless. I used 2 coats and they applied like a dream, imagine a dream gliding onto your nails. That's what Melange is like. Also when I messed something up, when I reapplied, I only used 1 coat and the opacity was perfect. This is all you'd ever want in a formula of a polish.

Bonus picture because I can

Thank you for reading this wordy post about this extraordinary polish, I hope you have a fantastic day!! :)

Parrot Print Nails

Hey there guys, hope you're having a good start to your October. I think things have slightly calmed down, at least this week I know things are going to get insane again in a couple of days. By the time you read this I will have done a concert with the BBC and I guess that'll be cool :) I'm quite behind when it comes to writing up posts but I remember being very happy with this design, hopefully you'll think it's pretty sweet :P

This is inspired by a parrot top I got during the summer from New Look, it's cobalt blue with rainbow parrots and it's my favourite top ever. However not too long ago I did a butterfly design (which I also loved) and the colour scheme is very very similar.
So that called for a more green/pink colour scheme which is very feminine, an aspect I like from time to time. I think the green and pink combo is a good one, I added a little bit of blue too for fun. This is the first time I've done something unintentionally artsy and I think it actually works!! Highly suitable for a bird too. The bar glitter is also for a feather effect (like the Nails Inc polish but this is a Barry M but it's totally a dupe for the Nails Inc polish).

I started with a white base, I didn't intend to completely cover it but I'm glad I did. I started with the beaks, and I tried to highlight certain areas with different shades of green. I did the same with the pink, blue and bonus green, trying to make the dark colours fade to lighter colours (art yo). Finally I got my black polish and toothpick and did light strokes and just generally not completely stark opaque lines.
I'm proud that it worked cause when I want to do something artsy it normally doesn't work haha. But success!! Generally I think prints are really nice.
On another note, I added extra glitter to find that it was overkill, and while I managed to pick most of it off some of the glitter was quite jammed on so I painted over it, covering up = another solution.

Base: Barry M - Greenberry, Barry M - Sour Apple and Claire's - Dizzy (which I painted over)
Black: Rimmel - Black Pearl
Green (from light to dark): Etude House - No. 86, China Glaze - I'm With The Lifeguard and Barry M - Kiwi
Pink (from light to dark): Barry M - Dragonfruit, Barry M - Superdrug Summer LE 2013 A, The Face Shop - PK105 and Madame Milly - Pink (no name)
Blue (from light to dark): Revlon - Blue Lagoon and Revlon - Dreamer
White: Barry M - Matt White

Thank you much for reading and I hope you have a wonderful day!! :)

Who's that Pokémon? Marill!

Hey there guys. Man it's been a while since I've written; I've been scheduling due to the masses of homework I receive on a weekly basis. But hey, I have slightly less this week so I get to talk to you!!! Honestly it's been a while since I did this design, but I still remember how much I loved it so let's get started!! :D <-- I'm not even that happy

I'm really thinking of making this Pokémon thing a series cause I seriously ADORE Pokémon nail art. I painted Marill a cute lil' water type. Once again I don't know if Marill is actually good in play or not (I suspect or not), but my favourite Pokémon are the cute ones. I wanted Marill to stand out so I did a nice gradient background, which I liked but it was nothing special. How glitter can magic all things!! After the glitter I felt like I was looking at a magnificent night sky with flower petals falling down. I get very emotive about this kind of stuff ;)

I really do intend of actually getting into Pokémon one of these days. I've rediscovered my cards properly and I want to battle!! From watching gameplay I'm getting more and more interested in it. Also the video-game looks so good and OmegaRuby and AlphaSapphire are coming out kind of near my birthday, so maybe now's the time (if school would let me)!! But more Pokémon nail art is a definite. 

So for this design I used a sponge to do the gradient (it wasn't the best gradient) and the brush of the polish and toothpicks for everything (this is something I would do). I was going to get Marill to do a different pose but I painted the blob too small so things had to change. But in the end it didn't matter cause I still think Marill looks cute :3

Blue Gradient: Barry M - Indigo, H&M - Blue My Mind and Revlon - Dreamer

Snazzy Glitter: OPI - Last Friday Night and OPI - Minnie Style

Blue: Barry M - Blueberry Ice Cream

Black: Lovely Me:Ex - Black

Light Blue: Barry M - Sugar Apple

White: Barry M - Matt White

Teal: Barry M - Guava

Pink: Orly - Basket Case

Thank you very much for checking in here, I hope you have a fantastic day!! :)

Red Nails: M&S - Poppy

Hello!! Red nail polish here and I have been quite a red girl recently. This is such a nice one (though I still believe a girl only needs so many red cremes ;)), and I'm really proud of my swatches this time.

Poppy is a medium red creme polish. It's not ground-breaking but a good one to have. It's pretty similar to other red polishes I have but it does get used over other red polishes I own. I don't really know why, it just works well for nail art.

My close pal-ios gave this to me as a birthday present (along with 11 other polishes) and I didn't know how much I'd use it but it has been one of my most used of the set. It's an M&S polish which are very legit and I have been impressed by it generally. Now when I go to M&S I make sure I check out the polish. I'm sure it has brilliant alternatives for certain colours that would cost over double the price of M&S polish. Pro tip?

The formula of this is really nice, I think 2 thick coats are sufficient but I used 3 thin coats cause that's generally what I do. It was very flowy so it was easy to apply and the brush was a really good shape for my nails, that's a nice bonus.

Thank you for reading and I hope you have a lovely day!! :)

Retro Gladiolus Flower Nail Art

Hi there you!! I wanted to redeem myself for the awful gladiolus flowers I painted a little bit back. They're bad, very bad and I wanted to prove that I can paint flowers cause it seems the opposite the majority of the time. So here's my rendition, it's a bit wacky but I really like it.

The flowers aren't perfect but I really liked them ya'know. The little bonus colours really made all the difference, like the bonus bit of Sugar Apple really heightened the design. I tried to stray from the black outline too. The polka dots were definitely bonus thoughts by the end but I really like them too. This is where the retro comes from.

You know me and my toothpicks. I started with the basic shape of the petals and then did "artsy strokes" from then on. Lots of dabbing and such. The polka dots at the end were moulded around the design with a toothpick.

Base: The Face Shop - GL112
Polka Dots: w7 - Brownie
Yellows: Rimmel - Sunshine, Barry M - Lemon Ice Cream and American Apparel - Neon Yellow
Oranges: Etude House - No. 60, Essie - Fear Or Desire, Rimmel - It's a Scorcher! and Body Collection - Orange Pink (no name)
Greens: Barry M - Kiwi, Illamasqua - Nomad, Max Factor - Cool Jade, Barry M - Sugar Apple, Rimmel - Block Your Green! and Barry M - Guava

Thanks so much for reading and I hope you have a fab day!! :)

Blue Nails: Barry M - Indigo

Hey there guys!! How is it October already?? I was starting school yesterday and now a month has past and it's October :/ This post was a long time coming but my bottle was running low and it's difficult to get polish out!! This is also my final reswatch, you couldn't even call my last swatch of this a swatch cause it was so gross in every way and I didn't even write much about it.

Indigo is a lovely dark blue with purple tones (as you'd suspect with a polish called Indigo) which can be demure sometimes but bright other times depending on the lighting. Really pretty colour here, my favourite dark blue and just a great blue in general. I would so use it more if my polish wasn't so deplenished, I used to use this colour a lot when the bottle was fuller.

This is a pretty old Barry M and I got it in 2011, always been quality that Barry M. This polish made it into my 2012 favourites which attests to it's greatness. You know many a Barry has been in my favourite, it's just the best and nobody does it better. I am pumped to check out the new Autumn Gelly collection :)

I just want to say that the brush of this polish is very thin (not all Barry M's just this one) so that's why it's difficult to get polish out.
I was afraid to use this polish but it was so much more opaque than I expected!! I used 2 coats and that was all I needed. Also why the coats took a bit more effort and patience, it was worth it and not even that big of a hassle. So it's acc great, even more so if you have a full bottle!!

Thank you for reading and I hope you have a nice day!! :)