Nails of the week – cold tones and silver glitter

A pretty pale mint green dress with silver sequins from Lipsy was my choice to attend a wedding, and I thought I would give myself a manicure to match.

I first thought of contrast, but then decided to go with several cold colours and a sprinkle of glitter to glam it up!

Most of the nail polishes I used are from Nails Inc; the lilac (Cambridge), the blue (Oxford) and the lime (Wimbledon). The green is Anna Hickmann in Vibe and the pale mint green (which is a perfect match for my dress) is H&M in Pear Ice cream.

Have to say that for being creamy colours, all of them were easy to apply and two coats were enough for the a solid finish. I had tried the blue and both greens before, and they didn’t disappoint. The lilac one bubbled a bit, that was annoying; but as it was in the corner of the nail, it didn’t bother me as much as it would normally.

The lime colour is stunning; I must wear it again soon,alone, need to come up with something interesting to use in more extensively!

Then I applied the glitter puff – I am in love with them! This time I used the silver again, but not on the tips but near the cuticles, as I used the gold a couple of weeks back. I am having to hold myself now to buy a bigger set from eBay, damn, they can glam up any manicure!

Rating:

Nails of the week – warm tones with gold French manicure

Once again, I went a bit colour crazy! I have so many lovely nail polishes, that sometimes is super hard to choose just one, so I decided to do a warm colour palette – from yellow to red.

The polishes I used were :

Yellow: H&M summer sunrise
Orange: Impala aleixo
Lighter pink: Impala confeti
Darker pink: Miss Sporty number 130
Red: Colorama 40 graus
Gold: Barry M effects foil gold

I had used the yellow and the red before, in fact, this red is one of my favourites. I found the orange a bit sheer, still with two coats; the darker and lighter pink were alright, application was smooth for all. Durability was surprisingly long, as

I tend to wear off my French manicure by typing; when I removed, seven days after applying, I felt it could’ve gone for longer! Ace!

I am really into French manis nowadays!

This is a very bold look, but I don’t think it interfered with my clothes or was too out there for eyes to pop; people usually noticed (and complimented!) after looking carefully and closer. I absolutely love the colours combination – and I am dying to do a cold colours one… we shall see!

I had a friend at home, so she also left with a slight more demure creation of mine; a purple and lilac French manicure, using a lilac from Miss Sporty and Collection 2000’s purple rain.

Rating:

Eye make up challenge: lilac

I really like lilacs and lavenders on my eyes. It is a great colour for brown eyes and a great trick for the morning after that heavy night – it really helps brighten up tired peepers.

This is a look I find quite discrete, although the darker line gives it a little something of “special” occasion to it.

I first applied a primer and a light eye shadow on the brow bone, inner corner of the eye and halfway the lower lash line, from the inner corner. I swept the lilac across the lid generously and applied plain white eyeshadow just in the middle of the lid, for extra luminosity.

Then I drew the line following slightly above my eye socket with a darker shadow using a pencil brush, then blending it with a small shader brush. I also used this brush to apply the darker shade on my lower lash line, one-third from the outer corner and on the upper lash line, just below half from the outer corner too.

To finish off the look, I applied mascara and a set of lashes and put some light coloured pigment on my brow bone topped off with some sparkle.

Quite an easy look to achieve, it looks very pretty and, in my opinion, not too over the top.

Products I used:

MAC lilac eyeshadow in Beautiful Iris
Lancome Ombre Absolute eyeshadow in Black Blue
Sephora white eyeshadow from palette
MAC pigment in Vanilla
MAC eyelashes 33
Duo eyelash waterproof glue
ELF eyelid primer
Kryolan Glamour Sparks in golden
MAC brushes 208, 219, 231, 239 and 212
Smashbox Photo op under eye brightener
MAC eyebrow set (discontinued)
Maybelline One by one volum’ express mascara

Level of difficulty:

21Mar2012

Nails of the week – blue/pink duochrome

Posted in Beauty by Dani - So Many Lovely Things

This week I am a bit rushed off my feet – my office moved to a brand new building and I am still a bit lost and until I get used to it, I think I will have this feeling of putting some extra effort into going to work – although, that can be easily explained by the fact I have probably paid a record number of visits to various high street shops in one day; office is near Oxford Street, in London, and the temptation is just too much!

I am also going to Paris for a long weekend (yay), so that has also contributed to my lack of time…

However, I finally found a few minutes to show you my talons: this week I am wearing Andrea Fulerton’s Smile in a storm. Having used two or her duos in the past, and being very excited about those, I almost forgot I had this one; I bought it ages ago, so decided it was time to try it.

It consists of two polishes on a double ended brush; one is gunmetal grey, super sparkly and the other one is an iridescent topcoat. Together, they become a very pretty, although subtle, duochrome which varies from a light, grey-ish blue to darker blue and then to lilac and pink. Sometimes, depending on the light, you can get a glimpse of the grey, but maybe because I just used one coat of each. The reason for that is because the polish builds up quite thick. I had some problems with bubbles, when adding a third coat (second of topcoat), so removed it all and applied again, this time settling for less.

Apart from the bubbles, and the fact that the double ended brush makes it a bit clunky when applying, I am happy with it. Even with an extra shine topcoat, I noticed the finish is not too shiny, and someone even asked me if I had my matte topcoat on! Colour is fab and durability great!