CND Shellac Nail Art - Union Jack

So the Olympics may now be over, but it didn't stop me celebrating a little of Team GB on my nails during the weeks of sporting events. I'd been lulling it over in my mind and trying to work out how I could represent GB Shellac style - after all, CND were the nail ambassadors for the athletes this year!

In the end, I went for the look above - not bad eh? And yes, my ring finger is entirely handpainted and I used NO tape to make my edges straight - proud doesn't even begin to cover it :)

For the base colour I layered Purple Purple over Blackpool to create the gorgeous Royal Blue metallic base. Then after curing, on the ring finger I painted Cream Puff in the criss cross shape of the Union Jack, cured, then painted the red criss cross shape on top using Wildfire. I sealed it all in using top coat and there you have it, a beautiful Union Jack!

To paint the Union Jack detail I did opt to use my tiny Orly Detailer brush rather than the Shellac brushes in the bottles (they were too thick) and I promise you, there wasn't a single piece of striping tape in the vicinity of this manicure.... what do you think?

 

Disclaimer - All products used for this manicure were bought myself, for more info about myself and CND Shellac please check out my disclaimer page here. I might not be a professional, but I sure love me some Shellac nail art :)

Skittle Mani with Nails Inc.

Left Hand

Right Hand

Bonjour! Just a little quick one to show you today - a Nails Inc. skittle manicure that I had on about 2 weeks ago.  I used three of the colours I picked up from my TK Maxx Haul that I posted about on Brush up and Make-up! earlier.

They were a purple - Duchess Street, a red - Park Walk and a turquoise - Reeves Mews. All really easily to apply and easy to remove, EXCEPT Reeves Mews that stained my nails - I had to really buff my nail bed in order to get rid of the staining but maybe that serves me right for not bothering with a base coat!

I picked up this pack from TK Maxx recently for £14.99 - that's under £3.75 per polish! It's worth taking a look if you have a store near you as they seem to have a lot of Nails Inc. in at the moment.

Keep posted for some more Shellac nail art posts coming up soon!

Disclaimer - I have not been compensated in anyway by this post. I just like Nails Inc. and occasionally splash out on their polishes.

CND Shellac Nail Art - Tropix Hawaiian Print

Without Flash

With Flash

What? I hear you say. A Shellac manicure on myself?? Yup! Indeed it is. Sometimes I spend so long doing manicures for friends and family that I never get round to doing myself too. So a couple of weekends ago, a family 'Hawaiian' themed BBQ gave me the perfect excuse to try out a little nail art.

When I looked at my collection, nothing screamed tropical more than Tropix so I mixed it up with a little Cream Puff on my ring finger and some Konad stamping too. I did have the honest intention of hand drawing some hibiscus flowers but I just ran out of time got lazy.

So instead I used the Konad Special Polish  in Pink to stamp the double hibiscus flowers from the M29 plate and then sealed with Shellac Top Coat. You can buy Konad from their website here.

Tropix has to be one of my favourite Shellac colours but it just doesn't photograph well. The flash photo is probably the closest as it picks up the almost neon quality of the pink, whereas although the non-flash photo bears no true resemblance to the real life colour, it does nicely pick out the orange hue from Tropix.

Disclaimer - All products used for this manicure were bought myself, for more info about myself and CND Shellac please check out my disclaimer page here. I might not be a professional, but I sure love me some Shellac nail art :) 

CND Shellac Nail Art - Leopard Print Tips

One of my favourite manicures I've ever done I think... Let me introduce you to Hot Pop Pink with leopard print nail art!

I used Hot Pop Pink for the base colour (two coats) and then using a small nail art brush, I freehand painted the leopard print pattern onto the tips and all over the ring finger, using Blackpool. After curing the pattern, I used the small end of a dotting tool to add a Silver Chrome accent to parts of the leopard print. Sealed with top coat and there you have it, in fact, here's a close up 'cos I love it so much!

Disclaimer - All products used for this manicure were bought myself, for more info about myself and CND Shellac please check out my disclaimer page here. I might not be a professional, but I sure love me some Shellac nail art :)

CND Shellac Nail Art - Futuristic Silver Chrome

Oops! I must have forgotten about this one too... just a quick one to show you a rather futuristic manicure on the lovely Stacey from a couple of months back (yes, she is officially addicted to Shellac!).

She wanted something completely different to manicures she'd had done before and one of the new shades I had just added to my collection caught her eye. She picked out Silver Chrome and then opted for the pink and black diamantés along her ring finger and thumb.

Simple yet futuristically effective don't you think?

Disclaimer - All products used for this manicure were bought myself, for more info about myself and CND Shellac please check out my disclaimer page here. I might not be a professional, but I sure love me some Shellac nail art :)

CND Shellac Wildfire Experimentation

CND Shellac Wildfire with Red Caviar Pearls

CND Shellac Wildfire with Blackpool heart nail art

CND Shellac Wildfire with White Konad Stamping and Diamanté nail art

CND Shellac Wildfire with White Konad Stamping and Diamanté nail art

Some more Shellac for you this evening, but this time it's a bit of a Wildfire dedication... These manicure's are from a couple of months ago I just never got around to posting them. Bad blogger!

Anyway, the top two photos are Natalie (I'm sure your recognise the enviably long natural talons!) in preparation for her Turkey holiday. She wanted Wildfire but with a little something extra so we experimented with caviar pearls (cheap ones not Ciaté) first - 1st photo above, but she found them too bulky and we took them off before curing. We played around a little more, and in the end she settled for a subtle black hearts detail on her ring finger - 2nd photo above - which I created with the fine end of a dotting tool and Shellac Blackpool.

The 3rd and 4th photo above come from Stacey's sister Gemma. I offered to do Gemma's nails for Stacey's hen do because she had already had gel extensions applied but the nail art (yellow/blue leopard print) didn't match her outfit. So I buffed off the nail art (which had been done in acrylic paint) and painted her extensions in Wildfire. Like Natalie, she wanted something more, so after browsing my Konad plates, she picked out this little flower design and asked for a diamanté in the middle. I stamped using Konad's special polish in White and added the diamanté before applying top coat and curing.

Disclaimer - All products used for this manicure were bought myself, for more info about myself and CND Shellac please check out my disclaimer page here. I might not be a professional, but I sure love me some Shellac nail art :)

CND Shellac Rockstar Nails

CND Shellac Zillionaire mixed with Gosh Nail Glitter in 05 ruby Red

With flash.

Hola! I found this glitter Shellac manicure from a couple of months back that I forgot to share with you lovely people. So here it is...

This is Stacey once again, you can probably recognise her hands by now, and she wanted something simple and glittery. So we mixed Shellac Zillionaire and Gosh Nail Glitter in Ruby Red into a paste and painted it on, curing between each coat for 120 seconds. I think we did 3 coats before applying top coat to get a solid coating of glitter. It's the same as this Rockstar Toes look I did a few months back on Kate.

It was really hard to photograph the 'glitteriness' (if there is such a word!) of the red glitter that almost looked fuchsia in some lights - the photo with the flash almost picks up on how bright the glitter was but not quite. You'll just have to believe me when I say that the photos do not do this look justice :)

Disclaimer - All products used for this nail art were purchased by moi... check out my disclaimer page here for more information about me and CND Shellac... I know I'm not professionally trained but a girl can learn can't she???