Monday 25 June 2012

Antique Turquoise

I saw this tutorial on The Beauty Department and I knew I needed a slice of that pie! For someone creative, I'm pretty uninterested in nail art.  I love it on other people, but I never have confidence in my ability, and so I tend to steer clear to avoid totally buggering it up and being left with hideous nails and an hour of my life down the drain (ombre and marble nails spring to mind!). See this post for my only other dip into the nail art ocean!

Anyway, I saw this concept and I thought it should be within my skill range! I'd just painted my nails with Essie's Mint Candy Apple (see this post for pics), so it seemed like the perfect time to give it a go!







All you need for this is: A freezer bag, something to protect your table, an old piece of paper or something to dab off excess colour on to, a paintbrush (but a cotton bud, or orange stick covered in cotton wool would be fine), some nail varnish remover, and your metallic colour or choice.  Obviously I had already painted my nails but if you hadn't you'd want to do that as the first step.
So, step 1) paint your nails 
2) Depending on the size of your freezer bag either just scrunch it up (or cut a section off and scrunch that) 
3) Paint your metallic colour onto the scrunched bag)
4) Dab it off a couple of times onto scrap paper (this way you can also see if you've got it scrunched enough/got enough paint on it and then edit accordingly)
5) Press it onto your nails, once or twice until you're happy with the pattern
6) Reapply paint to the scrunched bag after every couple of nails, or as you feel you need to
7) Dip either your paintbrush or cotton bud/orange stick into nail varnish remover and use it to clean up your fingers! 
8) Apply your favourite top coat, then sit back and admire your handy work! 

Honestly this took me about ten minutes (if that) and the only tricky bit was getting the mess off my fingers, but that's because I used the worlds worst brush, so if you used a nice smooth brush it would be even quicker!

I have ended up with more gold than the original tutorial but I still really like the effect - it reminds me of vintage crockery.


Let me know if you end up giving this a try! And if you have any relatively easy nail art ideas I'd love to give them a try! 

I hope you're all well, and thanks for reading.

x

10 comments:

  1. ohh never seen this before!! very nice :)

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  2. This looks so cute! I'll definitely be trying it!

    http://www.sandra-thepuzzleofmylife.blogspot.com/

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    1. Thank you, let me know if you give it a go! I'd love to see how yours looks! x

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  3. oh my gosh, this is SO me.
    i just wish my nails weren't so shitty so i could try this :/ so instead, i'm going to marvel at how beautiful yours are ;)

    -alexandra
    http://alexisinodak.blogspot.com/

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    1. After our discussion about turquoise I thought you might like it!
      My nails aren't that great but thank you very much :)
      I hope you're well.

      x

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  4. I love these they are so sweet! I often avoid nail art as like you say its time consuming an often goes wrong! these are great though! Nicole x

    http://ramblingbeauty-nicolelou.blogspot.co.uk/

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    1. I know, it does just feel like too much effort doesn't it? I find painting my nails a time consuming process with all that drying time, let alone taking a chance of ruining it all with nail art! I found these surprisingly stress free and easy though!

      x

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  5. the turquoise is such an awesome colour.x

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