OPI James Bond Collection

Hello again!

This time, I actually mean it when I say I am back! College work, exams and chickenpox have left me little time to actually take photos and do different nail designs, but now it is summer so I am free (ish) until September.

Anyway, I saw on OPI's Facebook page that this year's holiday collection will be James Bond themed due to the new movie, Skyfall (which totally reminds me of Skyward Sword).

L-R: The Spy Who Loved Me, Casino Royale, You Only Live Twice, Die Another Day, Skyfall, GoldenEye, The World Is Not Enough, Moonraker, On Her Majesty's Secret Service, The Living Daylights, Live And Let Die, Tomorrow Never Dies

I feel like reds are so unoriginal so they don't interest me much, but The Living Daylights immediately caught my eye! It looks like a mostly shimmer collection, aside from the chunky glitter, so I can't wait to see swatches, even though it isn't released until the 1st of October (and probably later in England).

What do you think?

Tie-Dye on the Highway

Hello!
I'm back after an unintentional hiatus in which my nails had to be cut and polish was not being my friend.


Anyways, I wanted to try a sort of tie-dye type design, due to my recent obsession with it, but I thought I'd play it safe and just do a gradient. I first painted all my nails with two coats of a cheap white Natural Collection polish (which, by the way, is surprisingly good for something costing £1-2) before sponging on China Glaze Electric Pineapple at the base of the nail with a make-up sponge. 

Once that was dry, I used a pale pink that may have been Barry M Strawberry sponged onto the middle of the nail and my current favourite nail polish ever to exist (OPI I Vant to be A-Lone Star) on the very tips. Finally, I used Seche Vite on top of it all to make it super shiny! It doesn't really look like tie-dye but resembles it enough to keep me happy :)

P.S Sorry for the even worse than usual photos! Not sure what happened but only one photo turned out even remotely good enough!

Easter/Spring Nails and THE WORST WATER MARBLING EVER

I'm going away over Easter to see my mum so I probably won't have time to post this tomorrow, which is why it's going up a little early. I'm particularly excited for Easter this year as I gave up chocolate for lent and I can't wait to be able to eat it again!

Anyways, I came up with this little nail design as I was going along and it turned out pretty good...

Colours used:

• OPI I Vant to be A-Lone Star (blue)
• American Apparel Factory Grey (lavender)
• American Apparel Army Jacket (green)
• An old unnamed Avon pink
• OPI In My Back Pocket (orange for the beak)
• Barry M Black
• Natural Collection Nail Tip Whitener

To do this, you need to first paint the base colour on each nail and let it completely dry before sponging on the lavender and the green. Once this is dry, dot on the white with a dotting tool, pinhead, toothpick, bobby pin or whatever you can find that would get similar results. For the ring finger, paint a pink oval and dot two black circles near the top for the eyes of the chick. The beak can be dotted on too, but you will need a smaller tool (I used a toothpick). The white egg can be free handed with the normal polish brush or you could use a smaller nail art brush. All my nail art bushes are dirty (I'm awful at remembering to clean them!) so I used a toothpick to outline the egg and then just filled it in with the normal brush. Add a topcoat and voila!

Now onto the water marbling...

Laughing in the Purple Rain

...also known as Illamasqua Stance. 

Yesterday, my friend and I went shopping around Carnaby Street and I ended up buying four new nail polishes that I will be doing something with in the near future. There is a Illamasqua shop there and so I decided to buy Stance from their new Human Fundamentalism collection. The polish is a pinkish purple berry creme and photos do NOT do it justice at all so you should definitely try finding it in person before judging it!

This is sadly the only photo that sort of gets the colour right, although it's a little darker in real life.

Formula wise, it's not too bad. I had to use three coats and there is still a little nail line peeking through if you look closely, but not enough that anyone other than me would notice. It also dried really dull, strangely, but that's easily fixed with a top coat. To be honest, I think I was expecting better after paying £13.50 for one bottle, but I still like it a lot and it's a good summer colour.

P.S my hands are really dry here...sorry!

OPI Germany Collection Preview (Fall 2012)

Hi everyone!

It's finally Easter break! Not that it's really a break for me as I have ten thousand essays and practice papers and questions and notes and everything to do which will be fun, I'm sure.

Anyhoo, OPI announced their new Germany collection a couple of days ago. I don't know what is up with all these European inspired collections, by the way. First Holland this spring...now Germany. That's not a complaint though as I'm European too!

L to R: My Very First Knackwurst, Don't Pretzel My Buttons, Berlin There Done That, Dont Talk Bach to Me, Nein! Nein! Nein! OK Fine!, Schnapps Out of It, Suzi & The 7 Dusseldorfs, Every Month is Oktoberfest, Unfor-greta-bly Blue, Deutsch You Want Me Baby, Danke-Shiny Red & German-icure by OPI.

My immediate favourites are probably My Very First Knackwurst and Suzi & The 7 Dusseldorfs. I don't know what is wrong with me recently but I'm starting to like pinks and purples on my nails more! They definitely remind me of fall shades but I don't know if they represent Germany well as I've never been. Is anyone reading this German? I love hearing what people from the country has to say about names and colours!

Until next time :-)

Orange and blue make a hand full of smiles...

Okay so I had the hardest time trying to think of what to call this. It reminds me of hippyish, summery, happy times and makes me smile every time I look at my hands! I intended to post this on Tuesday but I have had so much college work this week (I had to write two essays last night alone) and have been exhausted. I only have two decent photos today as well as I had an appointment at the hairdressers and by the time I got back, the lighting was awful :-( Luckily, the next two weeks are Easter break so I shall be spending much longer on my nails and less on what I should be doing...

This is three (!) coats of In My Back Pocket by OPI for the base colour. This polish makes me so conflicted. I love the colour, but I can never get it perfectly opaque and I refuse to use more that 3 coats. The blue is a cheap (seriously, they are like £1.99) Beauty UK one that I bought once because it was next to the checkout. The flowers were created by simply dotting 5 blue petals with a dotting tool, although you could use a bobby pin, and one dot of white in the centre.

My laptop's doing this wonderful and not at all irritating thing again where it doesn't like to keep photos rotated...

Anyway, hopefully I will have time to do something a little less basic soon. My nail time has been severely lacking :(

Goodbye!

OPI Wooden Shoe Like to Know? and Max Factor Fantasy Fire (AKA the best thing since the last best thing)

Good evening! Unless it isn't evening where you are, of course.


When I saw the Wooden Shoe Like to Know? bottle in John Lewis, I was VERY excited. I don't own many neutral colours and this seemed to have the best of both worlds as it is a brown with a little shimmer to keep it from looking too dull. I had seen swatches that didn't show it with shimmer, but the bottle led me to believe that maybe I had remembered the swatches wrong. I mean...look at it!

So when I first wore it, I was disappointed. You don't see the shimmer at all. Even in bright sunlight, all you see is this:

Most of the time, even that tiny scatter of shimmer is unachievable. I still like it but it wasn't what I was expecting at all! This is what it looks like in the shade and indoors:

It sucks, right? So I've been thinking of things to use it for to make it better and this morning...I had a brainwave. FANTASY FIRE! Luckily, I live in the UK and after a few weeks of not being able to find it, it now seems to be everywhere so I don't mind using my bottle more. The base makes Wooden Shoe look a little purpler but in my opinion, this only improves it. The following photos are three thin coats of Wooden Shoe Like to Know? and one coat of Fantasy Fire. Prepare for a short photo spam...

THIS is what I wish Wooden Shoe looked like on it's own! The photo doesn't even begin to capture the shimmery loveliness that is this layering.

These next two are blurry to show the colour change of Fantasy Fire. It mostly shines red, but every now and then, you get flashes of green and gold and it just looks so good! I don't even know how to describe it!

Even though this is probably more of an autumn (fall) pairing, I can see myself wearing this quite a lot. I probably would have forgotten all about WSLTK if it wasn't for the goddess of all polish (well...), Fantasy Fire, coming to it's rescue, so this has made me very happy indeed. 


Have you ever bought a polish that has been a major disappointment? What have you done to improve it?