JUST TOO PRETTY!!!
“A poetic beauty look that expresses all the energy, playfulness and lightness of summer” indeed!
Find the colour combination and the shimmer just stunning!!! Surprisingly, I really like the colourful bottom lashes in the video, in blue and orange!
And, surprise surprise, I am in LOVE with the nail polish, I believe it is Azuré. Ooooh.
See the collection on the Chanel website.
Oh yeah, I have an obsession with gradients too… and this time, I used three linear holos to create this lovely gradient effect on my nails, in silver, blue and dark grey.
I kind of regret having added the dark grey; it would have been just as nice in silver and blue,plus the darker colour was less pigmented than the others, so at one point I really thought it wouldn’t work…
Work it did, and I was pleased with the result. This time, I applied only one coat of the all white coat, and it worked fine – less time waiting to sponge and less layers of nail polish. I used a silver holo from ColorClub and blue (Apolo) and dark grey (Zeus) holos from Specialittá Hits “No Olimpo” range, applying the sponging technique.
Application, as mentioned, was a bit sketchy, but turned out ok in the end. The ColorClub holo takes aaages to dry. Durability, however, was fantastic: 14 days – yes you read it right – 14 DAYS with absolutely no chips (I skipped a week of doing my nails, partly for being lazy, partly because it looked so good I felt bad removing it!)
Black and red, red and black… I cannot get enough. Definitely my favourite colours.
This week I had a wedding to go to, and was wearing a red (surprise!) dress, so decided to match my nails.
I used Colorama Black as base on all fingers except the ring one, where I applied the gorgeous Barry M glitter in red (seen in full glory here) as an accent. I used the same red to do the French mani on the black ones.
I love it, really. The glitter tips just looked so pretty (the Barry M glitter polish is amazing!), and the black was so glossy (Seche Vite topcoat used!). Application was fine; two coats of each polish were applied. Durability was good; by the 6th day the glitter started to wear off from the tips, but a good run nevertheless.
You were warned there was going to be a flakie fest here… well, here is another one.
This flakie, suspended on a sheer light orange base is from Risqué, a Brazilian brand, and it is called Cobertura Encantada – enchanted coverage, in free translation, and it really is. I used on top of a gorgeous dark-ish orange, with a very discreet metallic sheen, called Garota Verão, from Colorama – and I have to say, this one needs to be worn alone, it is beautiful.
The glitter flakes, even on an lighter colour, shifted subtly from gold-green to orange-light red. I really liked it. Most of the time, they were just very shiny vivid gold, as seen on the pictures. I couldn’t quite capture the shifting :(. I saw some pictures of it over black and it is amazing… but I am sooo tired of wearing flakie over black; they end up looking quite similar…
Application was alright; smooth. I used two coats of Garota Verão (could have done with one, really – it is very pigmented), and three of the glitter topcoat – it is not the most saturated flakie I have ever seen, but three coats created a good coverage.
Durability was ace and I was very happy with this one, nothing too exceptional, but nice. Overall, a good combo!
Flakies!!! My obsession is truly at full steam after I got back from Brazil with a suitcase full of flakie polishes!
This week, I tried this green and blue shifting glitter flakes polish, from a brand I didn’t know before – Sancion Angel. This is from their Jóias do Nilo collection and is called Cipreste. It is well saturated of flakes and they have great shifting – looks really pretty! I applied two coats over two coats of Colorama Black, a pure shiny, well, you guessed, black!
Application was easy and durability was great. I am glad I liked the brand, as I have other four flakies to try! Cannot wait!
I told you I was going to have marbling done on my nails again…
This time, I went for a lighter base, Close, a metallic greenish aqua with some gold hints, then my lovely manicurist in Brazil, Irma, added Dancer, the metallic dark blue and Gaia, the metallic mauve, all from Brazilian brand Naty.
She used the same technique as before (see my previous post), with the wooden stick, and the patterns are really lovely!
I then got my toe nails painted with Gaia – I love it!
Durability was great, and in a few weeks I will try it myself…
I will confess straight away. I did not do this myself. This is one of the few manis posted here I haven’t. When I am in Brazil, I always go to the same manicurist. She, however, doesn’t tend to do anything artsy, as her clientele base usually goes for basic colours.
After insisting a bit, she told me she could do the marbling but not with water (“That takes too much time, especially to clean!” Irma said), but mentioned she could do something similar with a stick. Of course, I said yes.
Now, my second confession: I forgot to take down the name or photograph the nail polish colours used. Do-oh.
Basically, she applied purple first and made sure some areas were very saturated with polish. The she generously blobbed pink and blue around the nail and using a wooden stick, mixed the colours in random motions – big circles, tiny ones, waves…. to create the patterns. The secret is not to “stir” too much otherwise the colours will blend. Also, careful not to leave gaps without polish as you “scratch” the nails with the stick!
And this is the result. I really like it. It is different, very detailed and each nail is completely unique! As you can see, my nails are well on their way to recovery since the moving disaster. Yay!
It lasted well – a whole week, no chips, with an ordinary topcoat – I didn’t use Seche Vite there.
I loved this mani so much that have another one on… which will be published next week – and with the names of the nail polishes used!
Yes, I am still obsessed by gradients. I just love them. So, I gave myself another one: a lovely yellow, orange and red, to go with my tropical mood, as I am on holidays in Brazil (hence the lack of posts).
I used the H&M bright yellow summer sunrise, Impala’s orange aleixo and one of my fave reds ever, Colorama’s 40 graus. I used the sponging technique and applied the gorgeous Nails Inc electric lane topcoat. Ended up with a good seven layers and a lovely heart nail tattoo on my ring finger, from SkinArt UK to finish off the design!
It lasted very well – eight days including pool days!
This mani lifted my spirits, it is cheerful and looks forward to the summer!
Yet another glitter flakie, from Sephora this time. I keep buying them and they are ever so similar, but I cannot help it!!!
This is called Purple Jewel and I do regret not having applied over purple, to see how it would come out.
I applied over black and this polish is laden with flakes, really saturated. With two coats, I barely had any space without flakes on my nails.
The colour shifting is amazing, from green to yellow, orange and fiery red. Really pretty.
It is however, very similar to flakies I posted before, namely Ana Hickmann Glow and Specialittá Hits Cha Cha Cha, which cost me a fraction of the €5,90 of this one.
Still, I really like it, as I mentioned before, it is way more saturated in flakes that the two mentioned above and I think three coats would probably cover the whole nail, creating an almost metal effect. Maybe next time….
Durability was good, but it shrunk an awful lot when I applied the topcoat!
You probably guessed, I am talking about OPI’s liquid sand. I got myself a set of minis to try them all!
The first one was the lovely blue “Get your number”. It is a lovely indigo blue glitter with some holographic glitter in it, so really laden with sparkle.
It applied ok, I missed the wide brush from the full size version… the little one is mega fiddle and the opening of the bottle tiny!!! It really needed three coats and I am not sure if this is because of the matte formula, but it took a long time to dry and it was a bit gloopy. It also took a while to go matte, which is not a problem – it kinda developed in my hands!
Durability was ok, as it is quite rough and it won’t take a topcoat, towards the 6th day it started to chip at the edge, more like glitter flakes coming off and leaving gaps.
Now… I quite like it. It is different. The texture gets to me a little bit. It is rough. Also, it is such a sparkling polish, amazing colours, holographic bits, but it all gets a muted somehow when it goes matte. I say glitter should ALWAYS sparkle, and although there was plenty of pretty shiny flecks, that was lacking a little bit.
Apologies for the rubbish pics, it was another week I was too busy and took just a few quick snaps!
So Many Lovely Things 