Emily de Molly No Love Lost, square nails, some glitter and a bit of stamping for International Nail Art Day!

Emily de Molly No Love Lost

I've cut my nails! No breaks, splits or accidents, there just comes a time when they're *too long* and I'm bored with them. And whilst I like the stiletto shape, after a while I start to find it a bit old fashioned and almost 'witchy' (I have long thin fingers anyway) and I'm craving little square nails again. Over the last few weeks I stopped shaping the stiletto curve right down to my nail bed, and let a bit of straight edge grow out. Now I've got just about enough straight sided nail to make a square shape - so here they are!

The polish is Emily de Molly No Love Lost. It's a red jelly with red and pink glitter of various sizes, and really beautiful. It's also the most difficult polish I've ever tried to photograph! In real life it's a wonderful crimson shade, but cameras want to translate it to a dull brick red. I must have taken over a hundred shots to try to get this colour accurate, using two different cameras and every exposure setting I could think of. I'd say these pictures are 'reasonable' but not perfect. It's richer crimson in real life. I googled images of this shade, and they all look brick-red, so at least I know I'm in good company with other bloggers in my difficulty to photograph this. I suppose it is something to do with the transparency of the polish and how it reflect light. Or something. lol!

 Here's the polish in the bottle:

Another nail shot

And a nail macro

Emily de Molly No Love Lost

I used two coats of Emily de Molly No Love Lost, finished off with a coat of Gelous and a final coat of Seche Vite. Then I added some glitter - Lynnderella Bride of Franken. BoF is one of my favourite Lynnderellas, although I think it has been changed to a different version now. It's been a long time since I bought any Lynnderellas. BoF looks purple in the bottle, but there is actually very little colour in the base once on the nail. It contains holo microglitter and blue flashing iridiscent glitter of various sizes, which show up well against red polishes :D

Emily de Molly No Love Lost with Lynnderella Bride of Franken 

Actually I thought BoF needed a little help this time, so I added a few dabs of Nostalgic Rio (an old indie which is a fairly thin suspension of blue and purple glitter in a clear base) to give it a bit more blue sparkle. The pink and red glitters you can see are all part of No Love Lost.

A couple of nail macros to show off the complexity of the glitter combination! This was awesome in the sunshine!

Emily de Molly No Love Lost with Lynnderella Bride of Franken 

And finally, because the plates just about fit on my nails now, and it is International Nail Art day after all, I added a stamp using Bundle Monster plate 317 and Sally Hansen Insta-Dri in Whirlwind White. I'm British and I love my new little square nails <3

Emily de Molly No Love Lost with Lynnderella Bride of Franken 

I purchased Emily de Molly No Love Lost from Sally Magpies; Llarowe also carries a good range of Emily de Molly polishes and ships internationally. Emily de Molly is a very popular brand at the moment (and rightly so, the polishes I've tried are super) and sell out quickly; if you want these you really need to watch out for restocks.

Bourjois Sunny Sunday with Nostalgic Chilly Down

Bourjois Sunny Sunday with Nostalgic Chilly Down 

Well, it's almost a sunny Sunday although there's a bit of a chilly wind so this is quite an apt combination for today! I love yellows, but they can be quite difficult in various ways. I usually go for pale, custardy yellows, or mustardy yellows, as these are easier to wear with my pale skin. Primary yellows don't always look quite right. Apart from clashing with skintones, yellow seems to be the most difficult colour for polish makers to get right - the formulae are often streaky and difficult to apply. I wore an old yellow  (Ruby & Millie Yellow 200P) a couple of weeks ago; although the colour was great, the formula was thin and it took a few coats to get good coverage. So I was delighted to see a new yellow in the Bourjois new spring colours last week!

Bourjois Sunny Sunday 

Sunny Sunday is in the '1 Seconde' range and Bourjois describe the texture as 'silicone gel'. I think the intention is that the polish is a one-coater, and it has a thick, gel like appearance. A one coat application for a yellow polish seems very hopeful, I used two here but it is pretty much perfect! It's a strong, dense canary yellow and I love it! Another plus point on this polish is the brush, it's a flat brush with a rounded tip that makes it really easy to get a neat edge around the cuticles. The polish is a little on the thick side, but not enough to make application difficult. I used a coat of Seche Vite quick drying topcoat to smooth and level the polish.

Bourjois Sunny Sunday 

Although I enjoyed Bourjois Sunny Sunday alone, I wanted to give it a bit of extra zing, so I decided to add a blue-pink colour-shifting topcoat. These sorts of topcoats are usually used over black or dark polishes, but I like the subtle iridescence you get by layering over a light colour.

The strength of the iridescence varies a lot depending on the angle and intensity of the light, from very shimmery to barely noticeable:

Bourjois Sunny Sunday with Nostalgic Chilly Down 

The colour shifting topcoat I used was Nostalgic Chilly Down, which I bought from the maker on Etsy quite a while ago. However, CND Colour Effects in Sapphire Sparkle is very similar and would work in the same way, or a blue flakie like Inglot 204 or Nfu.Oh #40 would give a  more pronounced effect.

Bourjois Sunny Sunday with Nostalgic Chilly Down 

I bought Bourjois Sunny Sunday in my local Boots.