Floral & Polka Dot Nails - Mani Swap

I decided to do a mani-swap with my good friend @shakun_05 on Instagram. For a mani-swap I choose one of the other persons designs to recreate and they recreate one of mine. Then we put them into a collage and post them on Instagram! This is my first ever mani-swap and I loved it! It was really difficult to choose one of Shakun's designs as she is so talented, but I ended up going for a rose and polka dot design and she recreated my Cath Kidston nails!

I started off applying a base coat on my index finger, middle finger and pinky and my  DIY peel off base coat on my ring finger. Once that all dried, I applied OPI Alpine Snow on my three fingers and Butter London Scallywag on my ring finger. Scallywag is a very dense glitter and is easily opaque in 2-3 coats. It could be used as a topper, but since it's so dense I always just go all out and cover my whole nail. It's super sparkly and beautiful and works great for glitter gradients too!

I used H&M Serenity Now for the blue polka dots and the roses. It has a jelly finish so the dots aren't fully opaque. If I were to do it again I would use Barry M Damson as it's wouldn't leave the dots inside the dots (if that makes sense). I then used Alpine Snow again and a tiny brush to add some detail to the roses and Essie Navigate Her to apply the leaves.

Every since I started instagram (over a year ago!) I have always used Essie Navigate Her for flower leaves. It's the perfect green that isn't too in your face, but just adds a bit of subtle colour. It really completes the look!

I absolutely love how this turned out. And I'm also in love with how Shakun's mani turned out! It's beautiful.





What do you think of the mani's and recreations?
xx Elaine

Monday Randoms

The second post for my Monday Randoms! These posts basically look at the nail art I've never decided to post for some reason. Some might be nail fails, other might be photo fails etc.

The first is this glitter gradient using Butter London's Rosie Lee and (I think) OPI's Don't Bossa Nova Me Around. Glitter gradients are some of my favourite manicures to do, they're super easy and always look so pretty. I really like the colour combo, but I always find that glitter gradients don't look half as good in photos as they do in real life. It's always so disappointing! My photo skills for this one are pretty crappy too.. why on earth did I not photograph my whole pointer finger???

Second is this cute floral manicure. I kind of love them and hate them at the same time. I think they're cute, but it isn't how I wanted them to turn out. It seems like I might have a OPI Brazil collection curse, because all these unposted nail art photos all include the brazil collection!

I used OPI Don't Bossa Nova Me Around and Live.Love.Carnival as well as Wembley by Nails Inc for the gold.

Finally, my polka dot nails. I actually love these! I think they're super cute and want wear these all the time. I specifically photographed this for instagram though. For Instagram I only need to have one photo, whereas for the blog I like adding a few more different ones. Anyway, these did make my instagram, but never made it to my blog! I really love them though...


I hope you guys like my unposted nail art photos!