Category Archives: nails

Olympia Beauty Show 2012

Extreme nail art! Scroll down for more pictures

After registering as press to the Olympia Beauty Show and receiving my badge, I was delighted to finally attend the event on the 23 of September.

The exhibition is one of the “UK’s premier beauty trade events” and this year it took place at Olympia’s Grand Hall, in Kensington, London. Registration is free; but only open to therapists, salon and spa managers/owners, make up artists, hairdressers, nail technicians and beauty students.

I must mention that I was very impressed with the communications prior to the event; I received various emails with press releases, interview opportunities, and general information to enable me to make the most of my visit.

There was a media lounge and the social cloud, where attending press could talk directly to some exhibitors, swap cards, get some samples for review, as well as have a sit, have some coffee and water. There were also press releases from various companies and a few goody bags – always fun to see!

Nailed it!

This year, I have to say, it was all about nails; so many nail product stands! Gel manicures were really all the rage; lots of brands launching gel ranges, doing demos, massive queues of people wanting to have their nails done.

I am lucky to have healthy and strong natural nails, know to do my own manicures which are well finished and last in a great state for 7-10 days, so I am still a traditional nail polish gal. Plus, I get bored of the colours really easily. For all that, I haven’t bought into the shellac advantage, but I can totally see why people are going crazy for them – anything that promises busy women 14 days of nail peace is nothing short of a miracle! Even more established brands, are launching gel manicure ranges.

OPI, China Glaze, NuBAr, Minx and other big nail brands names were represented (OPI had a massive stand with own security, heaving with people!). I also met people from a cool polish brand and salon, Filthy Gorgeous, which have a line with striking colours. Their bottles come with a cute (and working!) plectrum. I was giving a lovely purple shade called Judy Baby and hope to try it soon!

Tantastic

Tan was also massive. Loads of stands offering spray tans to the exhibition attendees, in addition to selling the tools and materials of the trade. I have still to review self tanning products in the blog, so I am delighted I met Nicky from Sienna X, who offered me a sample version of a cute kit they are releasing for Christmas and also one of their gradual tans (really looking forward to trying this!), as well as a lovely bronzer I cannot wait to review, its texture is lush! They had a massive stand which was buzzing with professionals ordering for their salons – I was happy to see that, as Nicky was so lovely to me!

“The eyes have it”

Brows and lashes (fake and extensions) were well represented. Designer/stencil brow bars were everywhere, and the people responsible for the prettiest lashes ever, Paperself was also present – and doing a free application of their minis, so I left with the gorgeous Peacock (in love!). Have to say, I directed a good half a dozen people to their stand, as they asked me where my pretty lashes were from!

For the pros

Obviously, they were lots of stands with furniture e tools for salons and equipment for aesthetic face and body treatments, massages and alternative therapies.

Something I had never seen before were tanning tights. Yes, your heard it right- tanning tights. You wear them for 10 minutes, the tan transfers to your leg, afterwards, you can still wear them as normal tights!!!

Where is my make up?

The only think I missed were more make up stands. Really, I couldn’t spot many, I think I only spotted NYX and New CID!  Please more make up next year!!!

The exhibition also had four live stages, with presentations on the business of beauty, creative nails, make up art and medical beauty to give professionals an all round support on their business. There were competitions – artistic make up and nails, so I spotted some wonderful designs walking around! All buzzing, very organised, a great atmosphere.

My purchases weren’t as crazy as they could have been, seriously, so much temptation!!! I bought a couple of OPI polishes, three NuBar polishes, two Minx nails foils packets, a couple pots of glitter and crunched gold and silver foils for nails of course!

Overall, I had a fantastic time and would love to go back on the second day, sadly, I work all day, but I will certainly be going back next year.

Nails of the week: purple with glitter flakes

Click to enlarge

Another thing I cannot have enough of is glitter flakes topcoats. They have this power of making any nail polish amazing. adding an extra dimension to any colour.

It is no secret I am a huge fan of duochromes and colour changing polishes in general, so no surprise I fell head over heels for the amazing flakies from Brazilian brand Specialittá.

I really like them, they do really different colours and effects lines. I placed an order online and got a friend to bring it over to London for me… I must have bought a good 10 bottles, so watch this space!!!

This week, I am wearing Collection 2000 Purple rain with Specialittá Hits Fox Trot over it. Fox Trot is part of their Mundo de Danças (World of Dances) collection which has lots of glitter flakes polishes.  This one has a jelly-ish purple/mauve base and is laden with pretty flakes, which change colour from pink, reds and golds to pale green. The colours are quite subtle but really pretty, and the change can be seen on many different types of light! Gorgeous!

Application was smooth,I used two coats of each polish (as I like plenty of flakes!!!) plus the topcoat, and durability is fantastic.

Pretty overall; very happy with it!

Other polishes from the collection will be coming soon; I bought three from their 12!

Any amazing flakies out there for me to go crazy about? Would love to expand my collection!

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Nails of the week – holographic black with silver French

Oh, the French manis… I cannot stay away from them for too long! I just find them so elegant – and quite simple to do!

Recently, I received a little haul I did in Brazil; I bought the polishes from Specialittá’s website and got them delivered to my friend’s mum home. My friend was about to come to London, so she kindly brought them to me!

I love this brand’s polishes; they apply well, have great colours and the durability is fantastic.

With this one, is no different – I am wearing a holo from their No Olimpo range, in Zeus which is a dark graphite/black. The colour is super pretty, the effect has great depth and it comes through under different lighting, which is more than I can say for others holos I wore in the past.

Most pictures were taken with flash, to show the best of its holo goodness… the one in the bottom left hand side corner was taken on natural light, so still a pretty good show there.

While one coat is quite sheer, two will do for great coverage, but I used three coats.  I them applied Barry M foil effects in Silver to create the French manicure.  I finished it off with Seche Vite top coat. The gloss finish is amazing; it looks sooooo shiny and perfect! And after 10 days it is still pretty much intact!

Very happy with this mani!!!

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Nails of the week – glitter sprinkles

After re-doing my nails twice in a week, all I wanted was something to last seven days.

During one of my regular walks though House of Fraser in Oxford St (I work really close, and sometimes go home via the shop – it is almost therapeutic, but can be very dangerous) I walked past the Nails Inc. counter and fell in love with one of their polishes from the Sprinkles range.  They have four shades, and I bought Sweets Way, a pinkish white base with silver, pink and blue glitter.

Application was smooth. Two coats will give you good coverage, but I went for three. The texture is not too rough and durability was really good. There was a small amount of chipping (just glitter coming off) from day five,  but I blame that on myself, as I forgot to use a topcoat.

A really cute shade. Extremely delicate and seriously reminded me of sweets sprinkles!

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Nails of the week – purples and blues

This has been a weird nail week for me, nothing seemed to make me happy.

I started it with a colour I was very excited about: Estée Lauder Ultra Violet. The colour in the bottle is stunning, a fine glittery purple base with multi-chrome ranging from dark pink to the greens and yellows.

It was a disappointment, with two coats, there was no sign of the amazing colour effect. It was just a dark plum base with some magenta sparkles, not that this is not pretty, but it was a let down. Application was fine, and durability was ace.

I applied the foil transfer in a nice holographic magenta, but foil transfers rub off too quickly, even with Seche Vite on top! In three days, it looked a bit rubbish and I had to remove it!

Staying close to the purples, I used Color Club Total Mystery, a metallic  deep cobalt blue base with magenta sparkles. Application was awful! Colour Club polishes take sooooo long to dry, that I had to redo 4 nails as I got marks on them. I usually never go back to nails just on application, so it was a big pain. Once it is dry, though, it won’t go away – durability is amazing! I then applied the striping tape near the tip, in a similar colour to the foil, a holographic magenta. Again, the tape only lasts a few days, so I knew this one was going soon…

And that is how I ended up with two manis in a week; not that I don’t like doing it; I love! However, I just don’t have enough time, so once a week is just about what I can manage!

So, what do you think about my not-last-longing manicures of the week? Do you use the foil transfer/striping tape? Any tips to make it last?

Rating:

 for both, mainly for the art durability let down; otherwise, would give a three star!

Nails of the week- purple with multicoloured foil

Yes, I have been totally MIA. I have the best excuse for it though; I was on holidays!!! Yay! Well, not so much yay as I am back. Boyfriend and I spend 11 amazing days in the US – New York, Chicago, northern Michigan, plus a quick dash over the border to Canada, to Toronto and Niagara Falls.

So I had to wisely choose holiday nails, which would look pretty on my holiday snaps and to last me a week until I had to change it for the wedding I attended. I knew I was going to wear red for the nuptials, as I was wearing the prettiest yellow dress, so decided to go purple before that.

I bought an unbelievably bargainous ColorClub set from TKMaxx, I mean, £7.99 for six polishes and a topcoat. Amazing. I bought the Alter Ego”Keep it under cover” set, with lovely berry shades.

I recently discovered the foils sheets; so ordered five varieties from eBay, plus glue; and I had been looking forward to using it, as the effects I saw were very pretty!

My choice was the ColorClub Secret Agent as a base and after it dried I applied the glue with irregular strokes, let it dry until I couldn’t see it anymore and pressed the foil sheet rainbow Swirl, a pretty silver base with blue, green, pink, lilac and yellow swirls, on to the nail. The colour transfered nicely, and it was pretty easy to do; I applied a bit more glue where I thought there were gaps or I hadn’t applied enough first time around and repeated the process. I then applied a topcoat.

The result was fantastic. I was delighted with it. Pretty, very pretty and quite different.

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Now, the durability wasn’t the best. Whereas the polish was great, after a few days the foils started to rub off, especially on my index finger… bits of it were coming off, and even though it wasn’t a massive problem, as the base colour was still going strong, it lost a bit of its appeal.

Still, I am certainly going to do it again (actually, I have already, as I had a plain red manicure for the wedding, and removed it a couple days ago to replace with a new foil effect one!).

Rating:

for the prettiness

Nails of the week – Pink and silver

Inspired by Chanel, I decided to use pastel pink ad silver on this weeks nails. However, I went against to trying to replicate their latest design using the colours, as it made my nails look very small…. hum….

Anyway, the combination is a winning one and I used Kiko Candy Pink and Barry M foil effects in silver.

I decided to do what a friend described as an “upside-down French”; with the strip following the cuticle line shape, a bit different from the half-moon.

Kiko’s nail polish was easy to apply (very even for being a light, creamy colour) and I used two coats. Barry M’s quality is exceptional, as I mentioned before; only one coat for the strip. Great coverage, lovely shiny silver.

Durability was top. Seriously, ten days now as I am going on holidays and waiting to do my manicure, so it will last longer when away.

I really like this one. Found it very feminine and delicate!

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Nails of the week – black with details

Right, this week I did something I rarely do: I change my nail colour halfway through the week.

I bought a pack of nail art striping tape, and was really looking forward to using it for the first time.

The selected tape colour was red, to combine with Barry M black nail polish, into one of my favourite colour combos.

Barry M polishes are great with an amazing value, really, I cannot say this enough. Two coats, easy to apply, great coverage and durability, glossy finish.  Then I applied the tape close to the tip, around the point a French manicure would end. I found application easy and quick.

The problem is, after a few days, the tape started to peel off, and being particular as I am, I decided to remove it. So after three days, I took everything off, re-applied black to all of my nails apart from the ring finger, on which I applied a beautiful black and white nail wrap from Nails Rock to create an accent nail.

The wrap was quite old; and I found application very easy – for this one, there was no heat-me-with-a-hairdryer palava. It was just a sticker. And the staying power was much better than the giraffe print Nail Rock wrap I used before. I found this foil beautiful, very glossy and striking. It did start to come off when I applied bronzing oil repeatedly to my body during a sunbathing session, but really, it was expected! Only problem: it was so hard to remove!!!

So, there you go, although I had a “costume change” in the middle of the week, I was extremely happy with both versions of this week’s nails, I think they were both very classy!

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Nails of the week – red glitter

How much do I love this mani? I describe it as Dorothy’s ruby slippers for your nails. Seriously. So sparkly, a real jewel!

I had this week’s mani all figured out, but had this urge to paint them my old time favourite red. But an ordinary red wouldn’t do, so as if by fate, I stumbled upon this gem at Topshop: Barry M glitter polish in red.

The coverage is amazing, this polish is laden with glitter. I put on a coat of Colorama’s 40 Graus underneath, and one coat of the glitter would be enough, but I settled for two. What a beauty it became.

For being glitter, the durability wasn’t amazing; a couple chips appeared a good five days after application. But nothing too bad.

Overall, I was delighted with this one.

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Nails of the week – orange with gold French

A couple of weeks back I went to the Cointreau rendez-vous and as part of the activities, I had a mini manicure. The colours available or varying shades of – you guessed – oranges, including corals.

I had my nails painted a lovely shade, but being particular about how they get painted, they didn’t last 24 hours on my hands. However, I decided to keep within the colour scheme and painted my nails this lovely shade of orange-coral from Impala, called Twenty Years. On top, I applied Max Factor’s Bronze, for a gold shimmer.

Two days later, I applied a gold French manicure, using Barry M foil effects nail polish.

I have to say the colours complemented each other very well. The Impala polish was quite opaque with two coats; the Bronze on top delivered the right amount of golden shimmer. Application was smooth, and durability great, even with the French.

Overall, a cute look.

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