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Barry M

Freehand, Gradient, Uncategorised

Valentine’s Day Mish Mash

13th February 2014

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This mani features a few of the designs from the nail wheel I posted at the start of the week. It’s been quite a while- since I used any of these techniques so it was a good chance for me to refresh my skills!

This is my first shot with the new Barry M Silk polishes and I must say that I really like them. It seems that opinion is divided but I personally love how fresh they are and I’m a sucker for a Barry M innovation. It’s a kind of finish that I haven’t seen before – somewhere right in the middle of shimmer and matte – and the colours just scream out Spring to me.

I used Barry M Blossom and Pearl as the base colours for this manicure.

On my first finger, I created a gradient using Barry M Heather. Gradient tutorial here.

On my middle finger, I used striping tape with Barry M Gold, W7 Baby Pink and Sally Hansen Lovely Lilac. Striping tape tutorial here.

On my ring finger, I freehanded the roses using Revlon Bordeaux, W7 Baby Pink and White Acrylic Paint. Rose tutorial here.

On my thumb and pinky, I did some nimbus nail art using a bunch of colours that have already been mentioned here but most notably Revlon Bordeaux and W7 Baby Pink. Nimbus tutorial here.

It’s all topped off with a coat of Glisten and Glow HK Girl.

Freehand, Glitter, Uncategorised

NYFW Nail Art: Nonoo AW14 Inspired

8th February 2014

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NYFW has brought a much needed surge of creativity for me. I was browsing the Vogue galleries for a few hours today but for nail art inspiration and I found it, once again, in the Nonoo collection. You can see last year’s Nonoo inspired nail art here.

Nonoo’s aesthetic is right up my street – the clothes are all smart and sophisticated with clean cut lines but still edgy and youthful. The piece that stood out for me was this sweatshirt. The combination of textures shouldn’t work but she makes it work and it still looks hella classy!

Image credit: Vogue.co.uk

I used Sally Hansen Ion as my base colour here. Next I freehanded two lines using Essie Penny Talk to lay a copper base for the metallic look.

I drew the brown lines using NYC Midtown Mink and went over the copper with Barry M Majesty – a textured polish from the Royal Glitters collection.

Finally, I finished it off with two coats of Rica Glossy Glam to smooth everything over.

Uncategorised

The Lacquer Legion Reinvention: Glequins… One Year Later

27th January 2014

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The first ever day of The Lacquer Legion is upon us, and what a day it promises to be! Along with my fellow Lacquer Legion admins Chalkboard Nails, Work/Play/Polish and Rebecca Likes Nails, we’ll be announcing a new theme every month and today’s theme is Reinvention.

I must say that like many of you, I was fairly stumped by the prompt at first. After a lot of thinking, I decided to look back to see what I was doing a year ago and see if it was something I could somehow reinvent. It turns out the blog post I published on this day last year was ‘WTF is a Glequin?‘ so I thought today would be the perfect opportunity to dive back in to Glequin nail art and ‘reinvent’ it with a more grown up look.

You can follow all The Lacquer Legion action on Instagram (Statigram link), Twitter, Tumblr and Facebook using the hashtag, #LLReinvention and don’t forget to share your links on The Lacquer Legion’s Facebook Page.

I used Barry M Burgundy Crush as my base colour.

One nail at a time, I used one coat of clear nail polish and stuck on the diamond shaped glequins (colours #2 and #5) using a toothpick dipped in clear polish to make it sticky at the end. I actually filmed a tutorial for applying Glequins which you can see on my YouTube channel here!

It’s all topped off with two coats of Glisten and Glow HK Girl to smooth everything over.

Freehand, Uncategorised

There is Beauty in Simplicity

21st January 2014

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I really love simple geometric freehanded nail art although it’s something that I don’t count myself as particularly good at. When you’re working with such a simple design, you really have to put a lot of thought in to the colours to make it work. It’s something that I want to practice as I absolutely adore these kind of looks whenever I see them on other nail artists. So I’m getting the ball rolling today with some geometric nail art.

I started off with a base colour of Barry M White.

Once that was dry, I used a black striper from Born Pretty Store and Barry M Guava with a striping brush to freehand on the details.

I topped it all off with two coats of Glisten and Glow HK Girl top coat.

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Baby Blue Quilted Nail Art

18th January 2014

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Yesterday I asked what nail art I should do next on Facebook and one of the suggestions was a Quilted Nail Art. I’ve only done this kind of nail art once before and I totally defeated the object when I put a top coat over it! It smoothed over the quilted effect so it just looked like a diamond pattern on my nails.
This time around, I used a textured polish and skipped the top coat to get a very nice, 3D quilted effect!

I started with a base of Essie Bikini So Teeny and used a coat of HK Girl to dry it nice and quickly on the nails where I was planning to do the quilting.

I used striping tape to mark off a criss cross pattern on my nails. Next I painted two coats of Barry M Pearl Lady over the top.and removed the tape while that was still wet.

The swirly decal is from Born Pretty Store and I just attached that with some clear polish and added two top coats to seal it in. And finally I painted two coats of Barry M Pearl Lady over Bikini So Teeny on my pinky finger.

Christmas, Glitter, Stamping, Uncategorised

My Christmas Day Nails

26th December 2013

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I hope everyone had a very Merry Christmas and indulged in plenty of good food and family time! This week between Christmas and New Year is always a bit of a funny one. We’re all trying to get back in to the swing of things but there are still bank holidays and plans to be made. I’m going back to work on the 2nd so I’m just making the most of my time until then – I’ve mostly just been chilling out and sleeping!

These are the nails I wore for Christmas day! I originally painted some with an icy blue theme but ditched them for something more festive in gold and red. Make sure you click to continue reading to see both looks!

For this mani, the base colours are Essie Jag-U-Are and Barry M Majesty – a textured gold glitter.

For the fair isle pattern, I used Winstonia Plate W120 and BK Matt White.

I totally missed this plate before Christmas eve but it has to be one of the best Christmas stamping designs I own. Although I did have a nightmare transferring it on the stamper from the plate and then actually lining it up properly on my nail! I had to try 5 times before I got this one right!

I created the dots using a tiny dotting tool and Barry M White.

I topped off the red nails a coat of Glisten and Glow HK Girl.

I really liked these nails but just thought the colour was too ‘winter’ and not enough Christmas.

I used Maybelline Ceramic Blue as my base colour. The accent is 2 coats of a holographic glitter from Claire’s.

The swirly stamping design is from MoYou Fairytale 02 Plate using Barry M Silver Foil

The deer decal on my index finger is from She Sells Seashells.

Again, it’s all topped with Glisten and Glow HK Girl.

Freehand, Holographic, Stamping, Swatch, Uncategorised

A-England Dancing With Nureyev Swatch

15th December 2013

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Press Sample

A-England has just released their Ballerina Collection. As always the shades are inspired by, and named-for a little piece of history. This time, it’s ballet history. There are four shades in this collection, each one a soft silver holographic with a tint of colour. The shade I have here is Dancing With Nureyev which has a blue tint. I used two coats for this swatch and you’ll also notice it works for stamping, even over the very dark plum base!

My base colour is A-England Dancing With Nureyev and added the ruffian style accents with Barry M Plum.

For the accent nail, I switched up the two colours using Barry M Plum as the base with Dancing With Nureyev to stamp on a slice of the pattern from MoYou plate Suki 08.

It’s all topped with a coat of KBShimmer Clearly on Top.