Hello and welcome one and all to my guest post for the
lovely Katherine of
Nail Art and the Sims! I am Skye of
Curly Polish and I hope that you like what I have to show you today :-)
I would just like to apologise in advance for some of the blurrier pictures; I intermittently have very shaky hands and these were the best pics I was able to get when I did this mani - I could barely hold the camera still :-/
In the spirit of Katherine's request for
Christmassy manis, I have a wintry mani to show you today. I chose to do a snowflake mani as these are some of my favourite designs at the moment and I'd never tried them before. Looking back, this isn't strictly a
Christmas idea, but hopefully my heroic efforts at nail art will make up for that in your eyes :-)
 |
| The guilty parties stand to attention! |
The polishes I used for this mani were:
- Collection 2000 Hot Looks - # 23 Show Off (blue shimmer)
- Rimmel Pro Finish - #420 Aqua Cool (blue creme)
- Model's Own nail art pen (silver)
- Essence Stamping Polish (white creme)
- Collection 2000 - #20 Cloud Nine (white shimmer)
- Collection 2000 Sparkle Topcoat
Firstly, let me show you my snow-kissed masterpiece:
 |
| Yay! It's winter on my nails! |
 |
This angle reveals the depth of the snow
and my best snowflake (ring finger)! |
This is the most intricate mani I've EVER done and I'm quite proud of it. Given my shakiness that day, it took quite some doing, but I think the end result was worth it :-) Apart from the snowflakes, themselves, I think my favourite part of this mani has to be the shimmer-to-creme gradient which added so much depth to my design - I can't stop staring at my nails every time they catch the light!
Read on for more info on how I did it, and for a swatch of the base colour :-)
How did I do it?
 |
An elegant work in progress: I just love the two tones here!
I could have stopped here, as the mani was looking quite delicate,
but in the end I decided to stick to the plan. |
Firstly, I used two coats of my base colour (the blue shimmer). I then decided to sponge on a cornflower-blue creme to give my mani some nice wintry depth, and to add an interesting contrast.
I normally don't like to wear blue polishes as they tend to wash me out with their cool tones, however, this warm creme is one of my favourite colours and I will have to swatch it properly for y'all soon! I then freehanded some snowflakes and stars (asterisks) on top of this. I'm a person with very shaky hands and when I did this mani, the shaking was particularly bad. I'm also a bit heavy-handed at times, and so I ended up having too much polish coming out of my nail art pen towards the end of my drawing. As a result, some of my snowflakes look less like flakes and more like blobs... but I think I did a good job mostly :-)
As you can see above, I used a nice thick white polish (Essence stamping polish) to dab some snow onto my tips. I chose a thick polish because this would give my 'snow' more texture and depth. Further down the tips I tried to create some brush strokes for this same reason. I then added dots of a shimmery white polish for more depth (see
this post on my blog for a full-nail swatch) and topped off the snow with a shimmery silver top coat. Unfortunately, this last polish is virtually invisible in my photos, but it makes the snow look real frosty in person :-)
Finally, I'd like to show you the base coat I used for this mani - an electric/ice-blue shimmer. I don't use this polish very often, because I realised a few years ago that it made my fingers looked like the motorway signs in Scotland (where I lived for three years). Having since moved back down to England, I should perhaps wear the colour again as I received a fair few compliments before I covered it up with snow ;-)
 |
| A beautiful blue base |
Interestingly, this mani is the first that's made me wonder about the direction of my art. Do I do it so it faces me the right way up (as I have to see my hands all day), or do I do it so that y'all can see my art the right way up? This mani sorta works both ways - though I actually like it best your way up - but this may be a real dilemma for me in the future! What do you guys prefer? Let me know in the comments!
I hope you all enjoyed this post, even
despite its length. My posts are NOT normally this long; I am quite a wordy person by nature, but I also added some extra info here that I don't normally offer (e.g. my how-to), because I really liked this mani and wanted to share my thought process with you. I hope it gave you a good insight into
my approach :-)
I also hope that you'll consider checking out my own blog to see what else I've come up with; just click on the link in the introduction or find me on FB under '
Curly Polish' :-)
No matter what you do now, I wish you a very Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah/Kwanzaa and Happy Holidays wherever you are in the world, as well as peace and happiness for the New Year. Have a great holiday and keep your loved ones close <3
'Til next time :-)
- Skye x
