Nails Inc Villiers Street, Konad Q1/M3

Here's my manicure tonight. I used an old favourite polish that I don't think I've shown on my blog before - Nails Inc's Villiers Street. It's a gorgeous red that I call my superhero colour.

Nails Inc Villiers Street

A little bit of Konad to liven things up, very hard to photograph!

What I used:

• Sally Hansen Nailgrowth Miracle basecoat
• Nails Inc Villiers Street (2 coats)
• Konad plates Q1 and M3
• Konad Special polish in Gold
• Seche Vite topcoat

I love this colour, and I would have been happy to leave it bare, but you know how the Konad calls to me...


I also have a picture of a swatch I did of Models Inc Pastel Pink:

I quite like the colour but I had to use three coats to get it to look like this. I prefer polishes that I can do in two coats. But this would be nice to stamp over in black, I think.


What do you think?

Nails Inc Belgrave Square, Konad M71, M79, BM20 Plus Models Own Beetlejuice!

Here's a manicure that I just kept adding Konad to!

Nails Inc Belgrave Square

What I used:

• Sally Hansen Nailgrowth Miracle
• Nails Inc Belgrave Square (2 coats)
• Konad M71, M79, Bundlemonster BM20
• Konad Special White Polish
• Seche Vite topcoat

I love Belgrave Square. It's almost holographically sparkly in real life, and just such a lovely pink. I don't normally like pink polish, but this is a beautiful one!

Finally, I've just got to post a couple of pictures of this beautiful Models Own colour that I just tried for the first time. I showed you Models Own Golden Green recently, and this is Aqua Violet, from the same Beetlejuice collection. They are lovely duochromes, and as the name suggests, Aqua Violet is a blue/purple. It's also very hard to capture well in photos!

Models Own Aqua Violet - one coat, very sheer

Two coats, showing a hint of purple

Trying to show the duochrome!

What I used:

• Sally Hansen Nailgrowth Miracle
• Models Own Aquaviolet from the Beetlejuice collection
• Seche Vite topcoat

What do you think?

Nails Inc Pallmall, Konad M71

This manicure is one that I did quickly after taking off my Starry Skies manicure - I'm not sure if I like it or not!

What I used:

• Sally Hansen Nailgrowth Miracle
• Nails Inc Pallmall (3 coats)
• Konad Special White Polish
• Konad M71
• Seche Vite topcoat

I guess it's a pretty look, but I'm not over keen on how sheer the base colour looks and I didn't feel like doing more than three coats of Pallmall.


What do you think?

Boots No7, Nails Inc, Models Own - Starry Skies

Here's tonight's manicure...I was watching a film and just kind of made it up as I went along. I was hoping for a starry sky effect...

First coat, Boots No7 Betty Blues, no topcoat

Sponged with Boots No7 Sing The Blues and Nails Inc Chalk Farm, with topcoat

Picture with flash to show the sponging

Finished, no flash

No flash

What I used:

• Sally Hansen Nailgrowth Miracle
• Boots No7 Betty Blues and Sing The Blues
• Nails Inc Chalk Farm
• Models Own Snow White, Sterling Silver, Lemon Meringue, Pastel Pink
• Barry M Grey
• Seche Vite topcoat

I painted my nails with one coat of Betty Blues (which has fast become one of my favourites, it's a beautiful midnight blue with the finest sparkle) and then sponged Sing The Blues and Chalk Farm over the top in a gradual mix. I then added 'stars' in the Models Own polishes, and the Barry M (all listed above) with a cocktail stick.


As you can see from the pictures, the flash really shows up the blues, and these nails look much nicer in bright light, but it's still winter, and I still get home from work when it's pitch dark! I hope I can get some nicer pictures of things in the summer!

What do you think? This one is less of a gradient, but I kind of enjoyed doing it.

Nails Inc Victoria and Albert, BM08 - Keep Calm

Tonight's manicure was my husband's idea - the theme is Keep Calm and Carry On.

Nails Inc Victoria and Albert

What I used:

• Sally Hansen Nailgrowth Miracle basecoat
• Nails Inc Victoria and Albert (2 coats)
• Bundlemonster plate BM08 and Konad Special White Polish
• Seche Vite topcoat

I quite like the result, this is one of my favourite red polishes, it's so bright. A very vintage style red.


Finally, here's a funny picture I took to show you how little nail I have to work with - too bad I'm not allowed to paint my husband's nails...I could stamp loads if I had that much space!

 

What do you think?

Nail Care - featuring Nails Inc, Soap and Glory and more!

It's been suggested that I could write a blog post on the way that I look after my nails, so this post will include the products that I use and the way that I use them! Products are all linked where possible in case you feel like getting your hands on some!

For hand care, I use Nails Inc Kensington Caviar hand lotion (£15/100ml). Kensington Caviar is one of the few hand lotions that I have found that doesn't give me that horrible squeaky feeling on my hands (seriously, I'm not mad, does anyone else get that? It sets my teeth on edge!) so I have used it ever since I got a free tube with a Nails Inc order. I use it 3-4 times a day. I haven't got the prettiest hands around, as you have repeatedly seen, but at least they're soft! It also smells lovely and absorbs quickly.

Nails Inc Kensington Caviar hand lotion

In addition to the lotion, I have a small trick that I use about once a week, especially in the winter. I get a big blob of Soap and Glory 'Greatest Scrub of All' (£9/125ml) which is a lovely face exfoliator, and spend about a minute massaging it into my hands, much as I would rub in hand cream, then rinse with warm water. It leaves you with the softest, smoothest hands ever. Obviously, don't scrub too hard, or too often! I suppose you could use the exfoliator of your choice, but I have a soft spot for Soap and Glory - and a large collection!

Soap and Glory Greatest Scrub of All

For my nails, I use Sally Hansen Nailgrowth Miracle basecoat (£9.65/13ml). This stuff is nothing short of miraculous. I have been using it for about a month now, and have been so surprised by the results. My nails were a mess before, they were all peeling and soft. I started to use this in place of my normal base coat, and within 3 days I started to see my nails get harder and peel less. The peeling has actually stopped now, and there is no bend to my nails at all. They are also getting long for the first time ever. I really recommend this basecoat to anyone with nails that need a bit of care.

Sally Hansen Nailgrowth Miracle

For my cuticles, I actually do very little now. They used to be shocking, grown onto my nail and actually sore. I spent a long time one day soaking and moisturising them and pushing them all back. I had to do this every day for a couple of weeks before they went back to normal. Now, I use Nails Inc Vitamin E Cuticle Oil pen (£12/pen) each time I do my nails, and whenever I remember. I gently push back my cuticles with my metal nail stick after I have removed my polish and washed my hands in warm water. That's it. I don't trim my cuticles, and I'm careful not to pick or bite at them. One of the best tips I ever learnt about painting my nails was to leave a small gap so that you don't flood the cuticle with polish, and this tip went some way towards keeping my cuticles in good condition - I don't ever have to clean polish off my cuticles now and so never have to rub at them.

Nails Inc Vitamin E Oil Cuticle Pen - bit of a shady pic

Nails Inc Buffer, File and metal cuticle stick

The final thing that I have to show you is my favourite polish remover, Cutex Nourishing (£1.60/100ml):

Cutex Nourishing Nail Polish Remover

I love this remover as the nourishing formula cleans the nail completely without making it dry. I know some people like to use acetone on their nails, but I can't imagine how badly this would dry mine out. Since I paint my nails at least every two days, I like to go as easy on them as I can. I have been using this for a couple of years now, and it really suits me. It's also good for cleaning Konad plates and equipment - I did find that a cheaper brand of remover that I briefly tried left a horrible film on my image plates and made stamping harder. It even has the bonus of smelling actually quite nice compared to most polish removers.


Well, I think that's it. One of the most wordy blogs I've posted yet. I promise the next one will be less yap, more nail.


 If you have any questions, please ask! I love it when people give me suggestions for blog topics or nails designs - thank you Sophie and Holly!


Thanks for reading!

Kiko 218, Konad M79

Guest nail time! Just a quick post to show you my sister-in-law Rachael's nails tonight. Just an experiment really.

What I used:

• Kiko 218 (2 coats) - Rachael bought this polish in Spain. She painted her nails first then I Konaded them!
• Konad M79 and Konad Special Polish in black and yellow
• Seche Vite topcoat

I love a polka dot!

What do you think?

Nails Inc Saville Row, Konad M73

Today I decided on a darker colour for my manicure, since I've been wearing the Disco Diva holo for a few days. I went with Nails Inc. Here's the polish before I stamped it:

Nails Inc Saville Row (2 coats)

I found it difficult to capture the colour of this one. In this picture it reminds me of Nails Inc Victoria (my all time favourite) but in real life it's much more purple toned than red - a plum shade, I guess. It goes on beautifully though, very smoothly with an incredible shine. Whatever the formulation of this polish is, it's my favourite type to work with. Love it.

After stamping:

Yellow hand of doom!

What I used:

• Sally Hansen Nailgrowth Miracle 
• Nails Inc Saville Row (2 coats)
• Konad M73 and Konad Special Lilac polish
• Seche Vite topcoat

I really like Seche Vite. I was a little concerned because the lovely Liloo mentioned in a comment that she's not a fan, and I was worried that maybe I wouldn't be too! Turns out it's the kind of topcoat I like though - I like the way you can get a bead of it to flow over the nail. The Konad image was one that I hadn't tried yet, it's kinda pretty. It's one of those ones that stamps very finely though, so I had to be careful not to let bits of the image 'break' away. I'm fairly pleased with the overall result today though.



Also, here are a couple of pictures I took today of the Disco Diva holo I blogged about last time. My husband and I went out to Tesco this afternoon (rock and roll, I know) and there was a little bit of watery winter sunshine. I'm sure I looked a bit mad taking photos of my nails in Tesco car park, but a comment on my Facebook page asked whether the holo effect shows up all the time or if the nail has to be tilted just so. I find that the effect is brilliant pretty much all the time, so I did my best to get a sunny example for natural light! Excuse the tipwear, I bashed it up at work:

Finally, (and my apologies for the mega long post) the eagle eyed among you may have noticed that I have moved my blog over to my own domain name. I just wanted something that was a little easier to pass on, and I've never had a domain name of my very own, so I thought now would be a good time. I really like Blogger, so I'm still using it too.

Thanks for reading!

Jessica Cosmetics Hologram Chic Duo, Seche Vite topcoat

I decided to give the Jessica Cosmetics Hologram Chic Duo a try last night.

When I first started painting, I thought "Oh...this is just a plain silver polish, nothing is really happe-WAIT! Oh my god it's amazing!" Seriously, it's beautiful. As it begins to dry it just gets more and more holographic:

Lovely, right?

What I used:

• Sally Hansen Nailgrowth Miracle Basecoat
• Retro Revival (from the Hologram Chic Duo, one coat)
• Disco Diva (three coats)

It's recommended that you don't use a topcoat with this holographic polish, as it will ruin the shine, so I didn't. It felt weird not adding one. I really love this polish. It goes on very smoothly and starts to change almost immediately from a flat silver into what you see. The pictures don't do it justice at all!

UK readers, I purchased this Duo from http://www.gerrardinternational.com/ - it arrived in 2 days!


Also, this arrived today:

I've been wanting to try Seche Vite topcoat for ages, and found a good deal on the Beauty Bay website - £14.99 for two bottles. Looking forward to giving it a go.


Does anyone have any ideas for my next manicure?

Guest Blogger!

This is non-polish related, but I thought it was important to let you know that I think I've found a guest blogger. Here she is helping me research essential polish purchases:

Pip

She Paints Her Claws?

Silly Konad! Nails Inc Brook St and Ikea Helmer

At first, this afternoon, I was going to do a nice, grown up, pretty Konad. But then I changed my mind...

THE CLAAAWWWW!!!

What I used:

• Sally Hansen Nailgrowth Miracle basecoat
• Nails Inc Brook St (2 coats)
• Konad M59, M79, Q1
• Konad Special Polish in White, Blue, Yellow, Black and Red
• Nails Inc Albert Bridge topcoat

I painted the rainbow using a cocktail stick, and Konad special polish. I'm pretty sure I should have at least tried to put the colours in the right order (being a dispensing optician...) but oh well. It's not perfect, but it's my first go.

Oh, and look what arrived today:

 

Ikea Helmer

Jessica Cosmetics Hologram Chic Duo l-r:Disco Diva, Retro Revival

I bought the Helmer after seeing various other people have found it useful for polish storage, and I'm glad I did! I had forgotten how much I hate flatpack furniture, but after a slight struggle with some basic instructions, I got it together.

Here's how I've used it so far:

Drawer 1 - topcoats, basecoats, stamping/Konad equipment

Drawer 2 - Blues and Greens

Drawer 3 - Pinks, Reds, Purples

Drawer 4 - Silvers, Golds, Greys

 

Drawer 5 - Files, polish remover, cotton pads etc

I'm really pleased with it. I can finally stop storing everything in a cardboard box. At this point, my collection is reasonably small so I've left the polishes laying down so I can see all my colours. Drawer 6 is still empty and you can imagine how many polishes would fit if they were all standing. I have a sneaking suspicion that all this space will just encourage me to buy more though...


What do you think?