No secret I love matchy-match, and when I have a special occasion, I will do my best to match my nails to the very important outfit – this time, was the super pretty Essie dress from Chi Chi London.
Tag Archives: Kiko
Nails of the week: Green, yellow and blue heart tips (World Cup III)
The World Cup may be but I still have a little back log of WC nails going round! This is the third of four designs, so one more to go!
This is a design I did a few times before and love. It ended up being less out there than the others and many people complimented it as a “lovely summery” manicure!
Nails of the week: silver with colourful leopard print
You know when I say I obsess with things? Together with gradients, leopard print is a great nail obsession of mine.
Nails of the week: Green, yellow, blue and white “tie-dye” effect (World Cup I)
World Cup nails – that is what I’ve been calling them! They are however, a bit more than that: they are showing support to my team – Brasil!
I decided to put into practice the invaluable advice from Michelle Humphrey, the Maybelline nail extraordinaire, and try a “tie-dye” type of nails.
Nails of the week: All American red, white and blue gradient
Promise I won’t proclaim my love for gradients again (ooops). I had an American All Stars themed party, and as usual, I get over excited about themed parties, so went all out.
Nails of the week: silver with pink dots
When I remember a style or design, I usually go crazy about it – and that is what happened when I re-discovered my dotting tools!
Nails of the week: Rainbow gradient
It is no news I love a gradient on my talons, so this week I went a bit further – a four colour rainbow gradient.
The last one I did was a long time ago, and this was due. After seeing a rainbow gradient on some Brazilian nail polish Facebook page, I decided that was going to be the next one.
The technique is the very same I used before: sponging, and I found it a bit more challenging with four colours to make sure all nails had about the same amount of each and that the transition was smooth. But it happened in the end!
I used Colorama’s 40 Graus (red), L’Oréal Banana Pop (yellow), Kiko 385 (blue) and 343 (green), applied a stripe of each to a wet make-up sponge and stamped to previously painted white nails. I went round three times! I then added the magical Electric lane holographic topcoat from Nails Inc and a clear topcoat(Seche VIte) to seal it all.
To be honest, before I did it, I thought it was going to be a bit too much. It turns out I love it and don’t want to take it off. At all. Seven days have gone by and it still looks perfect and I am struggling with the idea of removing it and moving on to the next mani…
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Nails of the week – bright green
Shock horror – this week I have a single colour on my nails!
And it is green- a bright, acid kinda halfway between lime and avocado green, with a lovely golden sheen to it (delivered by the addition of “special golden pearl”
to its fomula).
Sounds great, no? And it is. Pure and pretty. I was going to add stuff to it but decided not to, it shines on its own.
I am wearing the lovely limited edition green number 427, Amable Chartreuse, from Kiko’s Sun Pearl collection. Application was alright, the polish is a bit thick and it feels like the rush strokes will mark, but it settles nicely and they don’t. I am using two generous coats, but the polish is very pigmented. The finish is just lovely – shiny and intense. And it lasted very well.
As usual, Kiko delivers great value for money – this baby was only £2,40 on their sale!
Nails of the week: green marble with tutorial
Always wanted to try marbling, but don’t really have time or patience for water marbling – just the thought of it makes me want to cry.
After obsessing over it in Brazil, where my manicurist gave them to me for the first time, I promised myself I would try the wooden stick marble myself – it seemed much more manageable than its water counterpart!
Well, I did, and I am chuffed with it! I woke up one morning obsessed with green (yeah, go figure!) so I used white (Collection 2000 103 French White), jade (Kiko 343) and mint green (Colorclub) to create this marble.
It didn’t tak me too long; I first applied a base coat on all nails and then started the marbling process one by one. It is important that steps 1-5 are done nail by nail, otherwise the bottom layers dry, the polish won’t mix and gaps will appear!
1. Apply a coat of the base colour in the whole nail (I used the jade green)
2. Apply a second coat of the base colour, but this time, apply generously – quite thick; a bit blobby even!
3. Put 3-4 drops of the other colours on it
4. Using a wooden stick or a toothpick, gently swirl it around as you please, creating different patterns and making sure you cover the whole nail
5. Clean the excesses (I use the same wooden stick, clean side)
6. Repeat on every nail
I then applied a topcoat and removed the excess using the wooden stick with cotton wool at the end, dipped in nail polish remover.
I love this. It took me 3 attempts on my thumb to get the hang of it, and the others were plain sailing. Just be careful not to rub the stick to hard and completely remove the polish, leaving gaps!
Application was much more straight forward than I though; and durability was ace – flawless for 7 days!
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Nails of the week: Pretty pastels
Pastels… and to think at one point I would shun light nail colour in favour of dark ones… pah…What was I thinking?
Truth is, that lilac changed my life… and this week I went for a pastel colours manicure with a holographic glitter topcoat and bird details!
It had been a while since a painted each nail a different colour, so I thought it was tome I did it again: lilac from Miss Sporty (cannot see the number anymore!), pretty blue from Nails Inc, Oxford, pink from Kiko (376), green from ColorClub (no name or number on bottle, sorry!) and this amazing yellow from Nails Inc, Wimbledon. Add Nails Inc topcoat in Electric Lane and a couple of uber cute bird nail tattoos from Nail Art UK and voilà – spring ready nails!
Application was good, all applied evenly and with no streaking. Durability was great – 7 days perfection, no chips, then the cracks started to show; a couple chips in the pink and the birds lost a wing each. Tragic. As I am super busy with my essays, I just fixed the chip with a dot of polish and topcoat and filled the birds in with a Sharpie – gotta love it – to keep it going for a couple more days when I can finally do my nails. Desperate times, desperate measures!
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So Many Lovely Things 