Crazy Color - Violette

You may have noticed that my hair looked a bit different in the last four posts compared to when I told you I dyed the ends of my hair purple here. Well basically after just three washes, ALL of that colour had gone. That wasn't really an issue for me since I was getting my hair cut a lot shorter, but if I wasn't I would be giving that dye a big thumbs down! But anyway here is the post explaining what's changed.

So, after my haircut last week, I realised I still wanted funky coloured ends. So I went and bleached a smaller section at the bottom again and repeated the whole process.

This time however, I used a different dye. I used Crazy Color Violette, which is described as an "Electric Purple". After using it, I would say it is actually more of a blue than a violet. Actually I would say it is blue (you'll see why I say that further down). Keep that in mind if you are thinking about trying it.

I bleached about 4 inches and then I applied colour to about 6 inches. I did this so that it would look a bit more gradiented, rather than a stark block of colour at the bottom. Again, like last time, I roughly straightened my hair at each step to ensure a level spread of colour. The consistency was that of the thick cream but it applied easily and spread well. No issues there.

I left it in for about 45 minutes, longer than your supposed to, I know. But I'm glad I did because the strand I washed out at 30 minutes was SO much lighter than the rest. This is the result two says after I washed it for the first time:

I really like it! Definitely going to be keeping colourful ends for a while! When this washes out, what colour do you think I should go for next?

Yes I got lazy with the straightening :P

Glitter Gradienting

Hey everyone, sorry I've not posted since Wednesday. I'm doing The Challenge and was in the middle of the countryside until this morning. I wont really be home for the next three weeks so if anyone would like to do a guest post for me, feel free to type it up and send the HTML to ddshah96@googlemail.com. :)

Anyways, back to the mani:

This is a mani I did a while ago but never got round to posting, so here it is. Glitter gradients are one of my favourite nail art techniques because they are just so easy to do once you get the hang of them and the colour combinations and possibilities are quite literally endless!

For this mani I used China Glaze Traffic Jam, a gorgeous raspberry pink, as my base. I then used Color Club Jingle Jange, a mix of blue, purple and holographic glitters, for the gradient. I topped it all off with a thin coat of W.I.P Midnight, a clear polish with large purple glitter and smaller blue and purple glitter, to tie it all together.

I really like this combo of the icy glitter against summery pink!

Anyway, thanks for reading! x

Hairspray Inspired Nails

So like I told you in this post here, the school play this year is Hairspray and so of course I had to do some nail art to match!

I didn't want to do anything fancy so I just recreated the original logo of the musical.

I tried to replicate the colours and letters as closely as I could. And it was actually really easy to create! All I did was paint the background colours, then using a nail art brush and polish, drew on the letters. Sealed it all in with a nice thick coat of Seche Vite and tah-dah!

Not too bad if I say so myself!

Angelica Brit Pop

I think I may just have found the ultimate budget glitter topper!

Glitter? Check. Multi Coloured? Check. Multi Sized? Check. Densely Packed? Check. Less than £3? Check. Easily Available? Check!

I think we've got ourselves a real gem on our hands!

So what is this gem I'm talking about? Well if you haven't read the title yet, this is Angelica Brit Pop.

And where did I get hold of such an awesome polish from? Primark! Yes, that high-street clothing store that has popped up everywhere! And they have a whole range of polishes available from neons right through to duochromes. And every single one is only £2.50 in store! (You can also purchase them directly via the Angelica website here for £2.75 each)

Anyway back to the polish:

Brit Pop is a mix of large and small hex glitter in a whole array of colours: Red, Gold, Green, Blue, Purple, Pink and Silver suspended in a clear base. Basically a rainbow party in a bottle!

But the thing that really won me over was that it was SO densely packed! A chunky glitter at that sort of price point is usually really sparse but this one definitely was not! And what you see in all of these pictures is ONE COAT!

I started with a base of Bourjois Rose Lounge, which is a neutral jelly/sheer polish. I did about 4 coats to achieve the opacity you see here. I then added one coat of Brit Pop. I didn't use any topcoat at any stage.

And since you probably all know that I love a matte glitter, I obviously had to try it out!

And I love it! Especially since the base was such a neutral colour, it made it look like it wasn't a polish at all. Instead, it looked like all that glitter was carefully placed on, or as if I had confetti on my nails!

Best of all was that the actual glitter didn't go matte, it still shone through and looked really cool against the neutral matte background.

JELLY SANDWICH TIME!! Haha, bit over-exited? Me? Never! ;)

I thought, since I had this polish on anyway, and the fact that the base colour was a jelly, I may as well try out a jelly sandwich! And it totally worked! I used two more coats of Bourjois Rose Lounge on top of the glitter and this is what I got:

(It looked good with just one extra coat but from a distance still didn't look like a proper jelly sandwich so that's why I used two)

So basically, for £2.50 this is one freaking awesome polish!

Prom Nails

It was my school prom yesterday and probably the last time I'm probably going to see most of the people in my year :'(

I'm still tired though so this is just going to be quick,  here's a look at my prom nails:

 3 coats of GOSH Holographic Hero and numerous tiny round blue craft gems.

I did them so that they would co-ordinate with my dress (which I'll post a pic of later) but still have a bit of a wow factor too.

Barry M Amethyst Glitter - Glitter Gradient

An old mani for you all today, but one I still love!

Back in September/October last year Barry m released a 'Jewel' collections, full of gorgeous glitter polishes. I didn't wait long before grabbing myself a couple and one of my favourites it Amethyst Glitter:

Instead of wearing it on its own, I tried it as a glitter gradient and I really do love it!

Amethyst Glitter is a beautiful mix of small and micro hex glitters in an array of jewel tones. There is a mix of turquoise, pink, gold, purple, black and red hex glitters and only turquoise micro glitter. It is so densely packed that one coat is almost opaque! 2-3 make it totally opaque and add lots of depth.

The formula was pretty good, slightly thick due to the amount of glitter but fast drying and smooth. It did dry to a slightly bumpy finish but a good thick layer of topcoat sorts that out nicely.

For this gradient I've layered it over Barry M Greenberry, a lovely turquoise one coater. The density of this polish made the whole process so much easier because there wasn't much base in ratio to the glitter so fading the glitter out was delightfully easy.

What do you think? Have you tried any of the Barry M Jewel collection?

31 Days of Nail Art Challenge - Day 31 - Re-Create Your Favourite Challenge

Okay, so I'm not actually doing my favourite day, but one that I wanted to have another go at.

Truthfully there was about 6 days I wish I could have done again, but I picked Day 10 - Gradient Nails because at the time I wasn't confident about my gradient skills so did a glitter gradient instead. I liked what I created the first time found but felt like I wanted to do a "proper" gradient, so here it is:

I used two of the new Barry M Gelly Nail Paints in Key Lime (green) and Guava (blue). They made the whole process so much easier because the formula was brilliant! I then added a layer of sparse iridescent glitter and then mattified it.

Here's what it looked like before the glitter:

 I really really like these! And I feel like my gradient skills have improved vastly!

Look forward to seeing more gradients from me, I just love the look of them!

31 Days of Nail Art Challenge - Day 30 - Inspired by a Tutorial

Tutorials.

I actually really like them, because they help make rather difficult things really quite easy.

So for this weeks theme I decided to use a tutorial for a style I've never tried before... Braided Nails! I used this tutorial by fellow Brit Blog - Lucy's Stash.

And it was amazingly SO easy! Because all it is really is stripes! And you don't need any special tools or equipment, just some one coat polishes!

Seriously, if you've ever wanted to try these but thought they would be too difficult, go have a try and tell me how they went, I bet you'll be surprised!

O.P.I OPI Ink

Where have I been? Well.... On Tuesday I was about to leave for school when I fell down the stairs and landed on my back on a hard-wood floor! That was the LAST thing I needed especially since this week has been so busy in terms of exams. Anyway I'm okay (ish.. I'm in a lot of pain but it doesn't matter)

So back to the polish. First of all can I say, this is such a difficult polish to photograph!!! But it is so beautiful at the same time!

Here is O.P.I - OPI Ink, a polish that I've wanted ever since I first saw swatches of it!

It is a gorgeous blurple that looks magical in the bottle! The base is right between blue and purple and it is loaded with small glass flecks that shift from blue and purple right through to pink and even gold (although the gold is pretty hard to see on the nail). On the nail it settles as a duochrome deep violet shade in most lights and a deep navy occasionally.

Application was quite good. The first coat was pretty sheer and patchy and a second coat evened out the patchiness but a third coat made it totally opaque. At three coats it has this very luxe look to it.

It really does look like ink, albeit a colour-shifting shimmering ink.

The formula was easy to work with and I experienced no dragging but I was working quite quickly and my nails are quite short at the moment anyway. Dry time is normal but with three coats it did dry faster than I expected.

Under artificial light above, and under sunlight below:

The duochrome can really be seen under artificial light:

Under flash the metallic element really shows through, as does the bluer side of this polish.

So basically what I'm saying is that this is one heck of an awesome polish! It exudes gothic glamour and looks very luxe on.

31 Days of Nail Art Challenge - Day 27 - Inspired by Artwork

Artwork.

I like art and some may even say I'm good at it.

But I chose not to persue it any further than secondary school KS3 (year 9) and I admit I have looked back and wondered what if...

But anyway for this theme I chose to take inspiration from Mondrian, a Dutch painter.

I freehanded this all because I was being lazy and it seemed quicker than using striping tape. It came out better than I though it would!

To make it more like a 'painting' I mattified it:

This is the image I used as inspiration (called Composition II in Red, Blue, and Yellow):

Source Wikipedia

Barry M Sequin Nail Effect - White

I have a new product for you all!

You may have seen or heard about all the new Barry M releases coming out over the next few months (more Gelly polishes, new Sequin Effects and new Confetti Effects). Well I have one of the New Sequin Nail Effects Nail Paints to show you!

This is Sequin Nail Paint in White. (There is also a pink one with the same formula and a black and gold one too).

That is two coats of the polish over a white creme.

It is basically a sheer white base with small hex glitter suspended in it. The colours of the glitters are red, blue, green, gold and silver. I think there is also some sort of texture element to it because when the first coat dried there was visible opaque residue in the polish. Either that or I have a dodgy bottle.

The formula was easy to work with and applied smoothly, but the glitter did like to hide away on the first coat. On the second however, they spread out nicely and a good amount transfered onto the nail.

Okay, here's the truth. It is very sheer. As in so sheer it will NEED a base colour, otherwise it will take about 6/7 coats to get it remotely opaque. And if you actually do that many coat, the glitter will probably just fill your nails.

I decided to mattify it to see what it looks like and well... there wasn't much difference. The whole thing just went a bit cloudier and the base and glitter got duller, but apart from that nothing much else changed.

Removal was the same as any other chunky glitter. Thankfully no vicious scrubbing was required and eventually the glitter did slide off which is a major bonus!

So overall what do I think? Well it reminds me of sprinkles and I can see myself using this a lot for nail art, but I doubt I would wear it as a full mani very often. It was a tad bit 'primary school' if that makes sense to you and the formula was a bit annoying but I think it will quite popular since it's quite different.

You can purchase it from the majority of Superdrug and Boots stores and the Barry M website soon.