Thursday 29 November 2012

ManGlaze Nawsome Sauce Swatches - and I made a lightbox!

I finally got round to making a lightbox! I can post swatches again! I think it turned out okay, the pictures still aren't as good as I'd like (the lighting still doesn't seem consistent) I think I just need to tweak the lighting and my camera angles a bit. I think my pictures look a bit better lighting-wise though, compared to old posts. What do you think? And how many times do I need to say lighting?

This is Nawsome Sauce by ManGlaze. I've said in the past how much I love ManGlaze, their polishes have fun names (Butt Taco?) and their Facebook humour amuses me.

ManGlaze Nawsome Sauce

ManGlaze are true matte polishes and the formula is wonderful, especially for a matte. I used two coats and it went on nice and smooth with no drag.

ManGlaze Nawsome Sauce

ManGlaze Nawsome Sauce

ManGlaze Nawsome Sauce



I also took some bottle pictures because ManGlaze bottles are awesome.

ManGlaze Nawsome Sauce


Do you own any of this brand? What do you think of them?

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Tuesday 27 November 2012

Funky Squares

Hello! I have to let you in on a horrifying secret...I haven't bought a nail polish in almost 3 months. What's worse, it wasn't even a conscious decision. (I know, who AM I?) I must remedy this before I break out in a sweat. Definitely going to stop by Illamasqua this week I think, I have my eye on something. Having an Illamasqua store in my city is both a blessing and a curse!

Anyway, I've christened this mani Funky Squares. I first saw this style on Lucy's Stash and decided to try it myself. Admittedly, I'm not a fan of my chosen colours. It seemed better in my head!


Stupid, awful lighting. MAKE A LIGHT BOX, WOMAN! 

My base colour is Barry M Indigo. The gold is H&M Golden Treasure, and the silver is China Glaze Icicle. The pink striping tape is from eBay.




I feel like doing this again but with different colours. I wanted to use black tape, but for some reason in my 10-pack of striping tape, there was no black. Annoying!


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Wednesday 21 November 2012

Illamasqua Nomad & Stance Cling Film Mani

Hi! I have another cling film mani today. I know it's sort of a lazy person's mani, but when you're stuck for time you can get good effects in minutes. Plus, I just had to try it using Nomad and Stance by Illamasqua, two of my favourites. They always look so good together. 

I used the same method I described in this post. 




See what I mean by how good they look together? I can't get enough of Illamasqua! Do you own any of their polishes? I think I have about 16 now. Must get swatching.

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Thursday 15 November 2012

Lightning Glitter

Hi! I did not even realise I'd reached 700 followers, I'm awful. Planning a giveaway that should be up soon. Only a small one but y'know, I can only dream of sponsored giveaways!

I'd been meaning to use BM-305 for a while because it has that lovely lightning bolt stamp. I had trouble getting it to stamp crisply though, it was intent on defying me. Pesky stamp. I've said stamp a lot.


Base colour is Barry M Gelly in Blackberry. I did a glitter fade using Barry M Silver Multi-Glitter, which is one of my favourite glitters, it's so pretty. I used Barry M Silver Foil Effects for the stamp. As usual it's a Barry M fest on my blog!





Kind of unsatisfied with this, gonna need to try that stamp again!

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Thursday 8 November 2012

Rio Beauty Marble Nail Art Polish - London Collection - Review


I'll start by admitting I am terrible at water marbling. So bad. It's just something that has never worked out for me, and I've only ever done one that was even worth posting (and that took about 47 tries)...I just end up looking like I've fallen into a bucket of random nail polish colours. So, when Rio Beauty contacted me and asked if I'd like to review a product, I decided to give it all another go and chose the Marble Nail Art kit.



It arrived very quickly and I sat staring at it for a while like it was my nemesis. I had to open it in the end though as the pretty colours on the box lured me in! 

This is what you get in the kit - 


5 bottles of Marble Nail Art polish (Orange, Black, Green, Red, White)
1 collapsible rubber marbling pot (I was overly excited by this)
5 Practice Nails
5 Orange Sticks
Masking Tape
1 mini bottle of Acetone
1 bottle of 2-in-1 base and top coat
Instruction Leaflet
Design Chart
Step-by-Step DVD

I decided to watch the DVD first instead of just jumping right in.


The DVD is quite short so won't consume much of your time, but it manages to squeeze everything you need to know in. I found it quite helpful to actually see somebody doing it. 

After the DVD I had a go with the practice nails (something I'd never thought of doing before) as you can see my first couple of attempts weren't great, but I got a bit better as I went on! The nail polish is described as having a thinner consistency than regular polish, which didn't seem evident to me at first, but I noticed it did spread out better on the surface of the water.


The design card included with the kit is helpful as it shows you how to create a selection of patterns.

Now it was time to try it on my real nails. This was my first attempt, and I actually managed it! Sure, it's not perfect, but since my previous attempts have been so disastrous, I was really happy with the result! 



I'm not sure what it was about the kit that enabled me to actually complete a water marbling mani successfully, as I know it is possible to do it with regular polish. It may have been the fact that the polish spread out on the water better, or actually seeing somebody else do it on the DVD. If you run in to trouble, there's a handy troubleshooting section in the instruction leaflet.

Here's another couple of designs I did using the kit. I messed up my ring finger a little on the first, but we'll ignore that! Practice makes perfect when it comes to marbling.



3 manis actually worth posting, I'd consider that a success! Now I've figured it out a bit more, I'll be trying lots of different colour combinations and patterns.

I'd recommend this kit for people that are new to water marbling, or to those who have struggled with it in the past. It contains everything you need to get going and would make a nice gift for somebody just getting into nail art.

Would you use this, or buy it for someone else? Or are you already fantastic at marbling? (In which case I probably hate you)!

You can buy this kit on the Rio Beauty website for £24.99.



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Tuesday 6 November 2012

Cling Film Nails

Hello! That time of year is upon us again where there is little to no sunlight...which leads to me running around the house looking for the best light source to take pictures. I think I need to invest in a lamp or finally make a light box. I have no idea what kind of lamp to buy though. All I know is, English Winter = dull!! 

I decided to try a cling film mani at last (or saran wrap/plastic wrap, whatever you may call it) after seeing how simple it is and how nice the effect can be. 

My base colour is Barry M Turquoise, and the top colour is Barry M Grey. 


They're easy to do. All you need to do is - 

- Prepare a few small balls of scrunched up cling film, one for each nail
- Paint on your first colour and leave to completely dry
- Paint on a coat of your second colour, and immediately dab a ball of cling film all over your nail, picking up your second colour as you go. Finish with a top coat to smooth it out.

The result is this water colour/marbled effect.




So pretty! Definitely going to try more colour combinations.


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Friday 2 November 2012

Ed Sheeran Nail Art 2.0

Hi! First of all I'll say if you're sick of hearing me talk about Ed Sheeran, I'd skip this post! :P

So I finally got to see Ed last night, at the Apollo in Manchester. I can't even tell you how amazing it was! It was so so so great. It's sick how talented he is. At one point he did a cover of Wayfaring Stranger and he sang some of it acapella without a microphone, and it was just beautiful....even if it did take him ages to get the crowd to shut the hell up so he could do the quiet songs. I may have teared up a bit when he did Kiss Me, but that song just gets to me! Gah, I love him so much. If you ever get the chance to see him live, do it, seriously. I took my best friend with me, who is a metalhead...and even she said it was lovely!

Obviously, I themed my nails for the night...I always have to! I first did Ed nails back in April, and that post is the second or third most viewed on my entire blog. Lots of love for Ed! 

Anyway.

Click to enlarge (I really need to widen the columns of my blog).


My base colour is Orange Soda by 17. I painted all the details on with a small nail art brush, and a striping brush for my thumb. I used a make-up sponge for the orange and white gradient. The banner on the heart turned out a bit squiffy. It's always hit and miss when I do them!






I like these more than the first ones I did!

Here's a picture of Ed I took last night:



Okay, I'm going to stop talking about him now. I'll save that for my poor friends! 


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