2014, Year of the Horse

Chinese New Year is just around the corner so obviously a manicure was needed. Isn't the design cute? It's inspired by the illustration below:

I did something similar last year and thought it would be fun to continue with the series!

I didn't have the patience to do the same design on my right hand so my roommate suggested I do swirls. They turned out way better than I thought they would and I added some studs to finish off the look:

They're really simple but still really cute!

Products Used:

Essie - Grow Stronger Base Coat

Sally Hansen - 300 White On

Sally Hansen - 360 Rubies and Diamonds

Sally Hansen - 370 Black Out

Seche Vite - Quick Dry Top Coat

- Becca.

Blue Birds

I've actually been planning this manicure since December so I'm glad I finally had time to do it!

The design is based off of the lovely print above. The original post can be found here!

I love the base colour which is Essie's Parka Perfect, it looks so wintery and it has a little bit of sparkle to it as well!

I had one of the super sweet ladies at the cafeteria compliment me on these, she told me I could make a fortune painting nails!

Products Used:

Essie - Grow Stronger Base Coat

Essie - 855 Parka Perfect

Sally Hansen - Eel Skin

Sally Hansen - 130 Blue Me Away

Sally Hansen - 300 White On

Sally Hansen - 360 Barracuda

Sally Hansen - 370 Black Out

Seche Vite - Quick Dry Top Coat

- Becca.

Radiant Orchid: Take Two

Here's a more graphic versus literal interpretation of radiant orchid.

I was going to do all of the nails like the ring finger and thumb but I thought the single line of chevron was too cute to add to!

My roommate also informed me that the chevron looks like little hearts and therefore this is a very appropriate design for valentines day.

Products Used:

Essie - Grow Stronger Base Coat

Essie - 929 Recessionista

Essie - 1023 The Girls Are Out

Essie - 1037 Topless & Barefoot

Seche Vite - Quick Dry Top Coat

- Becca.

Radiant Orchid

Radiant Orchid is Pantone's Colour of 2014!

What else to do but orchids? 

My roommate and I actually spent forever trying to come up with something more original but it was basically her saying I should do an orchid exploding and then me saying I should start with a sketch on one nail and build up from there... Needless to say we scraped those ideas and I just went with this instead.

I made a tutorial for the orchid here, you should check it out!

Products Used:

Borghese - B476 Incantanto Purple

Ciaté - 074 Big Yellow Taxi

Coco & Lulu - 432 Macaron

Essie - Grow Stronger Base Coat

Essie - 922 Mojito Madness

Essie - 929 Recessionista

Essie - 1023 The Girls are out

Essie - 1027 The More the Merrier

Sally Hansen - 300 White On

Seche Vite - Quick Dry Top Coat

- Becca.

Year in Manicures: 2013

2013 is officially over so here's a quick look back at some of my favourite manicures of the last year!

All Mapped Out - June 31st
I really like the aesthetics of this manicure and was so pleased with how the watercolours turned out!

Breaking News - June 22nd
Aside from these being a SHINee design, they were also the nails I had for my high school graduation so they're pretty special to me!

Happy (Holly)days! - December 21st
Arguably my most-viewed design of the year, I liked the simplicity of this design and how it was festive without being too in-your-face about it.

Big Yellow Taxi (aka Mr. Taxi) - August 31st
I loved this design for a few reasons. First being the design itself, second is that it reminds me of SNSD's Mr. Taxi and the third is that they're the nails I had when I started University!

Christmas Wishes - December 25th
In my mind this was the cutest mani I had all year; I'm a sucker for simple dotted nails. It's also based off a Christmas card from my neighbors and it was a huge hit at family Christmas.

The Summoning - November 24th
It took me a while to think of these but once I did I loved them! They were the perfect combination of watercolours and typography (another love of mine).

Coffee Shop - June 29th
Another kpop mani! This design still makes me laugh because I don't drink coffee, I just liked the song, but while I had them on people kept telling me how much they liked coffee too!

Wolf - June 1st
I couldn't leave this one out after laboring over those wolves! They were difficult but I'm still really proud of them.

Geometric - October 17th
Simple but pretty. These made me realize how fun it can be to work with geometric patterns as opposed to real "themes" or concept driven designs.

And that sums up my top 9 manicures of 2013!

Do you agree with my choices? What would your choices have been? Let me know in the comments, I'd love to hear from you guys!

- Becca.

Happy New Year!

I'm about 2 weeks late but I hope you're all enjoying the new year! Happy 2014 everyone!

I wanted to have some classy back and gold nails to ring in the new year so I played around with some glitz to make it happen!

I had some fun with caviar bead placement and freehand gold swirls (that my friends kept insisting must be stamps - but they aren't!). While fun to do and gorgeous to look at, the glitter (as always) was a bit of a pain to take off but so  worth it! (The name of the gold sparkles also happens to be Kissed at Midnight which I thought was appropriate for the occasion!)

Again I hope you all had a great new years eve and I hope 2014 will be even better than 2013!

Products Used:

Essie - Grow Stronger Base Coat

Essie - 941 Good as Gold

Nicole by OPI - NI G03 Kissed at Midnight

Sally Hansen - 370 Black Out

Seche Vite - Fast Dry Top Coat

Gold Caviar Beads

- Becca.

Still You

 I've been slacking with posts again, I'm so sorry!

My friend asked me to make a manicure for Eunhae's Still You music video and since I was considering it already anyways I took on the challenge.