WNAC August Nail Art Challenge: Cobalt & Peach

Hi everyone, how’s your week been going? I’ve been doing a week of catch-up posts when I realized I was two weeks (!) behind, but today I’ve reached the last prompt for the WNAC August nail art challenge and I am posting on time, huzzah! I’ve really liked how easy and open it was – only once a week and with unrestrictive prompts that leave you free to do a wide scope of designs. A lot of the nail art challenges I’​ve seen require something new every day of the month (!!!), which is something lazy ol’ me would never have attempted, and I liked how the prompt gave me a color palette but left me free to do whatever I felt like. I will def be revisiting this challenge in the future when I’m lacking inspiration! So here we go, the last prompt of the WNAC nail art challenge:

Nails Inc Baker Street, China Glaze Son Of A Peach

I really love this color combo, but of course, being me, I had to make it a bit punchier. Enter China Glaze’s Son Of A Peach – the obnoxiously formulated, gorgeously pastel neon-ed peach of my dreams. It never shows up the correct colors in photos (although I did try my hardest!), so I apologize for saying “you need to see this in person to appreciate it,” but…you really do. Anyway, I think I used four coats to get this color perfectly opaque? Like most pastels and/or neons, SOAP is plagued with a patchy formula that makes it difficult to achieve a nice, level, opaque coat. I’ve discussed this many times before because as much as I hate the formula of SOAP, the color is so to die for that I’ve used it a bunch of times on this blog in the past, so I’m gonna stop bitching about it and get to the rest of the mani!

I added a layer of top coat to my middle two fingers and gave it about 30 minutes to completely dry, then I carefully laid striping tape in a criss-cross pattern and quickly painted on a coat of Nails Inc’s Baker Street. Baker Street is another polish I’ve used a bunch of times on this blog – it’s a fabulous cobalt that’s a one-coater if you’re careful, although it does chip very quickly on me, unfortunately. After I applied my coat of Baker Street, I gently pulled up the striping tape, except I forgot which pieces went down first on my ring finger so they all kinda tugged up at once, which is why it doesn’t look as crisp as my middle. In person you can’t really tell that much, though.

Not gonna lie, I’m pretty pleased at how good I’ve become at striping tape (my forgetting which order as noted above notwithstanding). I usually don’t have the patience to try something like this, but once I realized how amazing pointed tweezers were at helping ease of application, I kind of became a pro. Since I’m only ever 50/50 good with stamping and 0% skilled with water marbling {which I think everyone agrees with the MOST difficult nail art), tape designs are my favorite way to create nail art. As long as you know to make sure the bottom color’s top coat is completely dry and to pull up the tape immediately after painting, it’s really easy to make cool designs even for a nail art novice.

I can’t believe August is over already. 2015 has gone by incredibly fast, right? It really freaks me out, but also…August being over means HALLOWEEN TIME is officially at hand! I bust out my autumnal-scented candles right around now and start decorating my apartment in the middle of September because I just can’t wait for fall, and the best part – this year in Southern California it’s supposed to actually be chilly and cool! I will get a real fall season, huzzah! Last year it was in the high 90s all through October and I thought I was going to die – also, it’s hard to plan cute outfits for the pumpkin patch when you have to dress like it’s high summer, bleh. Anyway, I’m already planning Halloween manis, obvs, but I’m not quite sure what to fill September with. If you have any suggestions of what you’d like to see, leave me a comment below! Thank you so much for reading, I’ll see you next time – A x

Favorites Month: Blues

I don’t think I’ve worn very many blues lately, but they’re my favorite tied with greens. This was another category that was difficult to narrow down, but I finally did it:

Wednesday: in the same collection as Zuza, Wednesday is what Zuza would look like if the base color was more faded and didn’t have shimmer. That might sound boring, but it’s a lovely soft – yet not boringly pastel – hue that reminds me of sea glass.

Aquadelic: I alllllmost included Too Yacht To Handle – which is like Aquadelic’s neon sister – here, but I had Aquadelic for years before TYTH came out and I’ll always have a soft spot for this happy turquoise polish. It’s my go-to color when I don’t know what to wear, and you can see from how much is gone that it’s one of my most-used polishes.

Zuza: I fell HARD for most of the colors in Zoya’s Beach and Surf collection, and Zuza might be my favorite. It’s a lovely silvery shimmer in a beautiful aqua base with an easy formula…what more is there to say?

DV8: I’m lucky to own two polishes from the coveted China Glaze OMG Collection, but this is definitely my favorite. It’s got a gorgeous, smooth linear holo flare, and the teal is so freaking pretty even when the holo isn’t visible.

Ozotic Pro 505: Lots of indie brands make similar multichromes today, but a few years ago Ozotic Pro, an Australian company, made a mint off nail addicts around the world snatching up these pricey but magical polishes. One thin coat layered over black makes this polish come alive, and I always spend the rest of the day shifting my hand this way and that, marveling at the fantastical color shift from turquoise to blue to purple to red.

Electric Beat: I used to be vehemently opposed to periwinkles for some reason, but when I saw EB, something clicked and I had to have it! It’s not bright but not too soft, either; the perfect middle-ground for a fun, everyday polish.

Baker Street: A year or two ago I popped into Sephora to pick up Baker Street – the famous bright, perfect cobalt blue – and found a bunch of bottles with fun rhinestone caps on sale. Obvs I bought a few for myself and friends, and it’s remained one of my favorite polishes because of the color and the bottle (oh and its one-coat formula).

Get Your Number: Aw, the first texture I ever bought! I usually layer this instead of putting it on alone since it’s a bit sheer, but ohhhh do I love this medium blue with holo sparkle! It looks like crushed gems on your nail.

Dream: A more recent purchase and I still can’t get over how gorgeous this one is – thousands of irregularly shaped holo flecks flashing against the royal blue base turn me into a human version of the heart eyes emoticon.

Rodeo Fanatic: This deep, metallic peacock blue looks like rich satin in a bottle. Everyone raves about Wagon Trail or Cowgirl Up but this is my favvvv from the Rodeo Diva collection! It’s got that old-school thin formula, but it covers well in two coats and is chic, dreamy perfection.

I wanted to do a little mani playing with textures, so I did a base coat of Wednesday, and once that dried I cut tape into angled pieces and painted Get Your Number on the top and DV8 on the bottom. I painted DV8 on a bit thickly so it kinda messed up on my pointer finger, but overall I’m pleased with how this came out!

Outdoor pic to capture the holo flare of DV8!

See any of your favs on my list? Let me know in the comments! Thank you so much for reading, and I’ll be back next time with my top ten purples. See you then – A x