Gallery

  • Emily de Molly

    No Love Lost
  • High Elbow

    Crummock Water
  • Dots!

  • Pocket Money Polishes - I Want Candy

  • Pocket Money Polishes Magic

    Gradient: Chanel Paradoxal and Dior Waterlily
  • Emily de Molly - Serenity

  • Fellrunning

    Dryburn Moor
  • Elevation Polish - Opal

  • Darling Diva Polish - Serendipity

  • Derwentwater

  • Pocket Money Polishes - Summertime

  • Nail Lacquer UK

    Eat My Cake
  • Scofflaw - Whiskey Tango Foxtrot

  • Hodge

  • Chanel - Taboo and Peridot

  • Chanel - Bel-Argus and Azure


Sunday 29 September 2013

Polka dot nail art with Chanel Rouge Flamboyant 38 and Barry M Lychee

Polka dot nail art with Chanel Rouge Flamboyant 38 and Barry M Lychee
 Chanel Rouge Flamboyant 38 and Barry M Lychee

Nail of the day! This is one of my favourite reds, I've had it for many years. And what better to do the dots with than my current favourite nail art polish, Barry M Gelly Nail Paint in Lychee. I like an irregular pattern of dots, and I was thinking about the Fly Agaric fungus (Amanita muscaria) as I was painting this!

Polka dot nail art with Chanel Rouge Flamboyant 38 and Barry M Lychee

Polka dot nail art with Chanel Rouge Flamboyant 38 and Barry M Lychee

Polka dot nail art with Chanel Rouge Flamboyant 38 and Barry M Lychee

Polka dot nail art with Chanel Rouge Flamboyant 38 and Barry M Lychee


It's two coats of Rouge Flamboyant, which is semi jelly. I bought this shade more than 15 years ago (it was my second ever Chanel polish - after I got Rouge Noir, I decided I wanted a classic red too), and it's discontinued now. I just googled the colour to be sure that it IS discontinued, and there is a bottle for sale on ebay at a ludicrous price. I really don't get this - it's just a red nail polish, why on earth would anyone think it would be worth $100?

I bought Barry M Gelly Nail Paint in Lychee from my local Boots earlier this year, and it's become one of my go-to shades for nail art. I like wearing it on it's own too.

Saturday 28 September 2013

Butter London Teddy Girl and Pretty & Polished Elvis' Pink Cadillac

Pretty & Polished Elvis' Pink Cadillac (over Butter London Teddy Girl)
Pretty & Polished Elvis' Pink Cadillac (over Butter London Teddy Girl)

Just a simple mani that combines two of my favourite things - a pretty, sugar pink cream and a black glitter! I wore Butter London Teddy Girl for a day, the added the Pretty & Polished. Teddy Girl is a super-girly pale pink; it's quite opaque - I used three coats here and the application is pretty good for such a paste shade.

Butter London Teddy Girl

Butter London Teddy Girl

Butter London Teddy Girl
Butter London Teddy Girl

Then I added a single coat of Pretty & Polished Elvis' Pink Cadillac. This is black glitter in a light pink jelly base; the pink is a little brighter than BL Teddy Girl and it pulled the mani a bit brighter - which I like. I think it would probably take rather a lot of coats of Elvis' Pink Cadillac to get a good density of colour, so I'd consider this to be a layering polish. In the bottle, there are larger black hexes, but I didn't get any on my nails. This wasn't entirely intentional, the larger black hexes seemed to be firmly stuck to the bottle - but I do prefer the simplicity of a single size of black glitter so had I got any out I'd probably have put them back in the bottle.

Pretty & Polished Elvis' Pink Cadillac (over Butter London Teddy Girl)

Pretty & Polished Elvis' Pink Cadillac (over Butter London Teddy Girl)
Pretty & Polished Elvis' Pink Cadillac (over Butter London Teddy Girl) 
I really enjoyed this mani and I wore it for several days - including a super weekend away for a great 21 mile fell race. So I'll wear this combination of colours again to bring back happy memories :)

I purchased BL Teddy Girl at my local Boots and Pretty & Polished Elvis' Pink Cadillac was a gift from a friend.



Thursday 26 September 2013

Picture Polish Freya's Cats - Gradient and Stamping

Picture Polish Freya's Cats with black gradient and stamping
Picture Polish Freya's Cats with black gradient and stamping

Picture Polish Freya's Cats is a cobalt jelly with scattered holographic shimmer. It was part of the recent blogger collaboration series released by Picture Polish in August; this one was designed by Nihidra; check out her post about this polish for the story of the name and some wonderful swatches!

I wore Freya's Cats alone for a couple of days, but I'd been planning this mani from the outset. I'm a bit of a number nerd,  I love maths - so when I saw this plate in the new bundle monster set I just had to have the whole set. The plate is BM-311. I added a black sponge gradient to the bases of my nails with American Apparel Hassid and then stamped on my design with Konad Special Polish in black. Although Konad Black is the devil to clean up, it's hands down the best black I've ever tried for stamping, so I always use it and just live with clean up and the fact that it's probably the messiest make up product I've ever owned. Needless to say, I was NOT prepared to use this for a gradient around my cuticles! 

Picture Polish Freya's Cats with black gradient and stamping


Here are a couple of macro shots to show the lovely sparkle in Freya's Cats!

Picture Polish Freya's Cats with black gradient and stamping

Picture Polish Freya's Cats with black gradient and stamping


Picture Polish Freya's Cats with black gradient and stamping


I purchased Picture Polish Freya's Cats from Sally Magpies, and Bundle Monster BM311 (as part of a set of 25 plates) from Amazon. American Apparel Hassid was a gift and Konad Special Polish in black has been around in my stash since I bought my first stamping plates a few years ago.

Wednesday 25 September 2013

Nelly Polish *Forest* - swatch and review


Nelly Polish Forest
Nelly Polish Forest 

Nelly Polish Forest is a beautiful soft dark green shimmer with a subtle holo. I think there is also a hint a duochrome shift in there too - I can see a touch of purply-brown around the edges of my nails in some lights!

The pictures are three coats of Forest with a thickish coat of Seche Vite quick drying topcoat. I could probably have got away with two coats of Forest, but I'm in the habit of doing three! Nelly Polish Forest dries to a matt-ish finish, so it does need a good topcoat to add shine and bring out the beauty of the pigment. 

Nelly Polish Forest



Nelly Polish Forest

Nelly Polish Forest
Nelly Polish Forest 

The last couple of pictures are taken with my DSLR and macro lens (the others are with my compact) in brighter sunlight and show the detail of the pigments a bit better. One of the things I like most about this polish is that there are no signs of brush strokes - I'm usually wary of shimmers because of their tendency to show brush strokes and often apply them with a sponge, but I had no issues at all with this formula :)

Nelly Polish Forest

Nelly Polish Forest
Nelly Polish Forest 

Hilary, the maker of Nelly Polish, kindly sent me this as a sample for review, along with a couple of other gorgeous shimmery colours I'll be posting about soon. You can buy Nelly Polish Forest on Etsy; it comes in either a powder form, that you mix up yourself with clear polish, or as a ready made polish. This is the ready made version - whilst I'm intrigued by the idea of mixing up my own polish, I don't really trust myself to get it quite right so I was a bit of a coward when Hilary asked me what format I wanted the polish in and asked for ready made.

Saturday 21 September 2013

Gosh Frosted Sand - Silver & Purple

GOSH Frosted Silver and Frosted Purple
GOSH Frosted Silver and Frosted Purple

I'm not sure about textured polishes, so I've held off buying any of the OPI Liquid Sands, since none of the colours yet have really called to me, but when I saw these 'Frosted Sands' shades from GOSH in Superdrug the other day I couldn't resist. Especially as they were buy one get one for half price - so I bought two! There are just three colours in the range, Frosted Silver, Frosted Gold and Frosted Purple. Frosted Purple is actually a very pretty lavendery-gunmetal. I really don't get along with gold nail polish at all, so the choice of two from the three colours was very easy for me!

I decided to try them together as a gradient; I applied one coat of Frosted Purple, then added the gradient with the two colours painted directly on a damp make-up sponge. I went over the gradient twice to get a good density of colour, but even so the mani was very quick and easy to apply. And the two colours are made for each other!

GOSH Frosted Silver and Frosted Purple

GOSH Frosted Silver and Frosted Purple

GOSH Frosted Silver and Frosted Purple

GOSH Frosted Silver and Frosted Purple
GOSH Frosted Silver and Frosted Purple

Here are a few macro shots to show the texture a bit better.  I really like how the texture worked out on the mani; I'm not sure if it would be quite so good if I'd just brushed the polish on but the sponge application technique isn't a lot of extra effort even if you're only wearing a single colour, so I'll probably sponge the last coat if I wear either of these colours alone in future.  I'll certainly be checking out the GOSH stand again to see if they release any other textured colours; I like these a lot!


GOSH Frosted Silver and Frosted Purple

GOSH Frosted Silver and Frosted Purple

GOSH Frosted Silver and Frosted Purple
GOSH Frosted Silver and Frosted Purple

I purchased GOSH Frosted Silver and Frosted Purple from my local Superdrug last week.

Tuesday 17 September 2013

Blue and yellow gradient with dots.............


I couldn't come up with a snappy name for this mani! It's a blue and yellow gradient with brown dots! The colours were inspired by an exhibition of small portrait works by Chris Ofili I saw recently. In the one which really caught my eye, the subject was wearing bright blue and yellow against her brown skin and hair. Ofili is best known for his use of elephant dung in his paintings - hence my use of the brown dots.

The base for the mani is a gradient of Butter London Jasper and Illamasqua Noble:


Butter London Jasper and Illamasqua Noble


Butter London Jasper and Illamasqua Noble

Butter London Jasper and Illamasqua Noble
Butter London Jasper and Illamasqua Noble

Then I added dots in a range of brown shades - Essie Case Study, Nails Inc Hampstead Gardens, China Glaze Mahogany Magic and Essie Little Brown Dress.





And a few close ups of the dots to finish with:





I really enjoyed wearing this - I wore it for about a week, until my nails had grown an unacceptable gap around my cuticles. All the polishes here are old favourites from my collection, apart from Butter London Jasper, which I purchased recently at my local Boots.


Friday 6 September 2013

Tape design with Barry M Lychee

Tape design with Barry M Gelly Nail Paint in Lychee
Tape design with Barry M Gelly Nail Paint in Lychee

I've been wanting to try a tape design for a while, and finally I got around to buying some nail striping tape. I'd been a bit unsure about which sort to get, but when Sammy at The Nailasuarus opened her nail art supplies shop, I thought getting what she uses would be a great start, since this girl really knows her nail art.

I decided to start out with something very simple; just parallel lines becoming gradually closer together. Once finished, it does look a bit like it could be based on the fibonacci number series, but this was not intentional; I just placed the strips of tape in an attractive (to me) layout by eye. Interesting that my random arrangement came out looking close to a fibonacci sequence - I have been taught this in some detail in the context of design of stripes for weaving but I was NOT thinking about this at all when I did this mani!

Since this was my first experiment with tape, I worked over an existing mani which I was about to remove - this glittery watermarble which has plenty of variation in colour and texture.

Tape design with Barry M Gelly Nail Paint in Lychee

I placed the strips of tape on the nails of one hand at a time, making sure to press the ends of the tape down well at the sides of my nails so the polish didn't get underneath at the edges. Then I applied a thickish coat of Barry M Gelly Nail Paint in Lychee to cover the tape and the polish underneath. I removed the tape whilst the polish was still wet on each nail, waited a moment or two for the polish to become touch dry then moved on to the next nail. When I had the design done on the whole of my right hand, I waited a bit longer before applying Seche Vite topcoat to be sure the topcoat would not smudge the design. Then I started painting my left hand. I always paint my right hand first - partly because I think it's hard enough painting my right hand with my left in any case, so why make it harder by having wet nails on my left hand whilst I'm painting - and partly so I can use my right hand to *practice* on, since I always photograph my left hand!

Barry M Lychee is probably my most used polish this year - apart from the fact that I really love the colour to wear on its own, it seems to be perfect for nail art; it is really opaque and densely pigmented so it covers just about any base with ease.  I've used this colour with great success for dots and water marbling recently - I might try it out for stamping next!

Tape design with Barry M Gelly Nail Paint in Lychee


The overall result is a bit 'segmented' - it reminds me of annelid worms (or maybe even the michelin man) but I rather like that. In fact I think I might try some combination with textured or matt polishes in the future to emphasise this effect!

Tape design with Barry M Gelly Nail Paint in Lychee

There is a bit of shrinkage from the Seche Vite; the existing mani was already quite thick and I think the combination of a one thick coat of polish over dry polish and topped by SV was a little risky. In real life the tips of my nails aren't noticeable at all, but I can't hide the shrinkage in the photographs.

And a couple more macro shots to finish with:

Tape design with Barry M Gelly Nail Paint in Lychee

Tape design with Barry M Gelly Nail Paint in Lychee
Tape design with Barry M Gelly Nail Paint in Lychee


I purchased my Barry M Gelly Nail Paint in Lychee from my local Boots earlier this year. I got my striping tape from The Nailasaurus Emporium.



Sunday 1 September 2013

Pocket Money Polishes Brown Eyed Girl


Pocket Money Polishes Brown Eyed Girl
Pocket Money Polishes Brown Eyed Girl

Today I want to show you the last of my Pocket Money Polishes September colours. This is Brown Eyed Girl - a complex mix of brown, gold, copper and hot pink glitters with a sprinkle of holographic microglitter that holds everything together!

Pocket Money Polishes Brown Eyed Girl
Pocket Money Polishes Brown Eyed Girl

Brown glitter is a real favourite of mine, and so is hot pink matt glitter, so this one presses all my buttons. I considered using a light pink base for this, but Char at SoYouBeauty has already done that (and it looks fantastic), so I decided I'd go for a more autumnal look effect with a pinky brown base. I used Rescue Beauty Lounge Bruised, which is somewhere between a brown and a plum depending on the light, and added a bit of simple water marbling with Pretty Serious The Pink One to accent the pink glitters in Brown Eyed Girl. Pretty Serious The Pink One is a stunning pink - click through to my post from a few weeks ago when I wore this on it's own to see just how bright it is!

Pocket Money Polishes Brown Eyed Girl



Pocket Money Polishes Brown Eyed Girl

Pocket Money Polishes Brown Eyed Girl

I wanted quite a heavy, glitter-bomb look for this mani, so I used two coats of Brown Eyed Girl. The glitter is perfectly suspended and applies smoothly and plentifully without any need for fishing or careful placement. The arrangement of glitter is just how it came out of the bottle. Because I'd put a lot of glitter on my nails, I used two coats of Gelous to make sure the mani is perfectly smooth and then a thick coat of Seche Vite to seal and dry.

Pocket Money Polishes Brown Eyed Girl

Pocket Money Polishes Brown Eyed Girl

Pocket Money Polishes Brown Eyed Girl
Pocket Money Polishes Brown Eyed Girl



Brown Eyed Girl (and the other colours in the September Sparkle collection - which includes the black and white glitters Angels and Forever and the pretty blue Keep The Faith) go on sale at 6pm today at Pocket Money Polishes website. I was lucky to be able to buy a preview bottle of this last week. RBL Bruised is an old favourite from my stash (I got this in swap a while ago, if I remember correctly) and I purchased Pretty Serious The Pink One from Sally MagpiesLlarowe also stocks Pretty Serious polishes and ships internationally.