Gradient with Mentality Duchess and Manglaze Lesbihonest

Mentality Duchess and Manglaze Lesbihonest

Just a bit of fun today! I love pinks......and gradients, and mattes............ so here's a combination of a lovely new pink matte I bought recently (Mentality Duchess) and an old favourite (Manglaze Lesbihonest). I love how this worked out - and it's great to know that the Mentality Mattes (which I've just discovered recently) work well in gradients with my collection of Manglaze shades.

Mentality Duchess and Manglaze Lesbihonest

To create the effect I used one coat of Duchess all over my nails, then added the gradient using both colours painted onto a slightly damp makeup sponge. I like matte gradients - matte polishes seem to blend nicely together and the sponging gives a nice finish too.

Mentality Duchess and Manglaze Lesbihonest

I purchased Mentality Duchess from Sally Magpies and Manglaze Lesbihonest is an old favourite from my collection. Manglaze polishes used to be a bit tricky to get hold of in the UK but Sally started stocking this brand too recently - which great news for UK matte polish fans.

Monochrome matte gradient - Barry M meets Manglaze!

Barry M Silk Nail Paints Pearl and Manglaze Matte is Murder 

Well this was intended as the base for a lovely glitter I have to review, but once I'd made the gradient I liked it so much I decided I'd wear it alone for a bit and add the glitter tomorrow! Manyana, lol!

Barry M Silk Nail Paints Pearl and Manglaze Matte is Murder 

I started out trying to apply the black gradient (Manglaze Matte is Murder) directly to my bare nails but that didn't want to work so I painted a thin coat of Barry M Nail Silk Paints in Pearl as the base. With hindsight I could have used a matte topcoat for the uncoloured part I wanted, but I'm happy with how it turned out in any case. I added a bit of Manglaze Santorum on my sponge to warm up the transition between black and white.

Barry M Silk Nail Paints Pearl and Manglaze Matte is Murder 

I purchased Barry M Silk Nail Paints in Pearl from Tesco; I've had the Manglazes in my collection for a long time (I had a friend in the US send them for me, but now you can buy them at Sally Magpies in the UK.

Mentality Brute........ with Nail Art :)

Mentality Brute with Manglaze Matte is Murder

My first foray into Mentality polishes! I've always loved matte polishes, so I don't know how these stunners from Mentality managed to pass me by, but I'm really glad I found them. Better late than never!

Here is Mentality Brute alone; this is two coats. Application and coverage are perfect, and this colour just glows!

Mentality Brute

I added some geometric nail art with Manglaze Matte is Murder, since I've just joined FingerFood's Theme Buffet  nail art challenge, and this weeks theme is geometric.......

Mentality Brute with Manglaze Matte is Murder

For all of my nails except my ring finger, I taped off the parts I wanted to stay blue with scotch tape, then painted over. This is the first time I've tried taping in this was; I got the idea from Lucie's tutorial at Lucy's Stash. I deliberately left less of my nails exposed between the tape than Lucie did, since I wanted more of the blue in the end result. I'm pleased with how this turned out and I'm definitely adding this to my library of nail art techniques!

I purchased Mentality Brute from Sally Magpies; Manglaze Matte is Murder is an old favourite from my stash but Sally has just started selling Manglaze too. Outside the UK, Manglaze are available direct from the Manglaze website and Mentality from the Mentality BigCartel store.

Check out the other super geometric nail art in FingerFood's challenge - I love geometrics!

Vampy matt gradient with Manglaze polishes - and *magic* dots!

Manglaze Fatty's Got More Blood, Santorum and Matte is Murder

I've been enjoying dots and gradients recently, and I've always had a soft spot for matt manicures, so I decided to combine all these things to try out something just a little bit different! This is a gradient with three Manglaze polishes (Fatty's Got More Blood (deep red), Santorum (brown) and Matte is Murder (black) and shiny topcoat dots.

Here is the gradient before I applied the dots. I painted my nails with Santorum, then added a gradient with a damp sponge in the normal way. Fatty's Got More Blood at the cuticle, Santorum in the middle and Matte is Murder at the tips. The colours are close; this was deliberate, I wanted this gradient to be subtle. The Manglaze polishes work really easily together to make the gradient - I was a little nervous that if the gradient wasn't smooth, then I wouldn't be able to rely on topcoat to make it smooth, but there was no problem at all. In fact I like the finish of the Manglaze polishes so much with the sponge application I might start sponging the last coat when I use a single Manglaze colour.

Manglaze Fatty's Got More Blood, Santorum and Matte is Murder

Then I added large dots with a clear topcoat. I used Sinful Colors Gel-Tech topcoat for this - this is a thick topcoat which dries fast to a high shine. I didn't want to use a thin topcoat or clear polish that would spread out over my nails before it dried, and I wasn't sure that SV would play nice. The Sinful topcoat worked perfectly! 

The topcoat really accentuates the differences between the Manglaze shades and the dots stand out very effectively from the base:

Manglaze Fatty's Got More Blood, Santorum and Matte is Murder

In this macro shot you can see how adding a shiny topcoat brings out all sorts of sparklies in the Manglaze polishes - I know there are many people who add a topcoat as a matter of routine but I like the matt finish far too much to ever do that. Not to whole nails anyway!

Manglaze Fatty's Got More Blood, Santorum and Matte is Murder

In different lights, the effect is more pronounced. The next couple of pictures are under my desk lamp:

Manglaze Fatty's Got More Blood, Santorum and Matte is Murder - artificial light

And finally, this shot under a daylight bulb shows the sparkle and the differences in the colours with the topcoat. The topcoat really does act like magic and brings something different out from each colour of the matt polish!

Manglaze Fatty's Got More Blood, Santorum and Matte is Murder - Daylight bulb

I got all of my Manglaze polishes in swaps at various times, but here is a link to the Manglaze website. My Sinful Colours Gel-Tech topcoat was a gift from a friend in the USA.

Untried Polish Challenge Day 14 *In Season* - Essie Fear & Desire / Essie Off The Shoulder

Essie Off The Shoulder / Fear & Desire

OK, it's a dotticure really, but the base is a sort of gradient with two of my untrieds! I got into the dottig mood last week when I was playing around with Enchanted Polish I'm Kind of a Big Deal, The base colours here are two from Essie's summer collection, but they are from LAST year's summer collection! Still, I'm getting through my box of untrieds nicely and the end of this challenge is almost in sight. Two more manis to go!

I call it a sort of gradient because I think the formula of the two Essies is a bit sheer for getting a decent sponge gradient - I started off sponging but ended up just painting the two colours into each other fairly roughly to get a distinct colour change that will show through the dots. Here is how my nails looked before I started dotting; a bit messy but it is only the base after all......................

Essie Off The Shoulder / Fear & Desire

The colours are OK, nothing outstanding in terms of either colour or formula. I bought them from a market stall some months ago for a couple of pounds each........ knowing at the time I'd probably not wear them, lol!

I used Seche Vite to make sure the base colours were properly finished and entirely dry. Then I added randomly placed and randomly sized matt black dots using ManGlaze Matte is Murder. No more topcoat, I wanted to keep the effect of matt vs shiny!

I love the way this turned out - it reminds me of a tropical frog, although my husband commented that my nails look like ladybirds. I see more dots in my future...................

Other bloggers taking part in this untried challenge are:

Jonochi at Just Add Polish
Masha at Lost In Lacquer
Raine at Lacquer Lily
Amy at Fancy Side
Amanda at Designer Nail Accents
Sam at Polished Art
Lizajane at Organic Neglect
Blueberry Pie at Blueberry Nails
Kristina at Lacquer Fetish 

Missy at Gnarly Gnails
Uni at Acetone FIles
Erica at Coat of Mani Colors
Isabel at Little Fairy

Raux at Raux Polish