August 5, 2015

Spring-y Nail Art inspired by...

**I wrote this post way back in the spring, thus the spring-y colors and title!**

Today's post probably has the least interesting object to take inspiration from: a box of Kleenex!  I don't mean to say that the pattern isn't interesting; it's a very pretty box of tissues, and I'm quite happy with the way my design turned out, but... it's a box of tissues.  Not exactly something that usually springs to mind when I think of "artistic inspiration," y'know?


For some silly reason, I didn't take any pictures of this manicure in my standard poses, so this is the only one I have of all of my nails.  Oops!

The colors that I used for this design are: 6 Harts Polish "Blue Eyed Bunny" (pinkie), Above the Curve Nail Lacquer "Rockin' Robin" (middle finger), Zoya "Prim" (pointer finger), and Zoya "Zuza" (on my thumb, which I didn't even get a shot of!).  The white background on my ring finger is Salon Perfect "Sugar Cube."  (I don't have links for either of the first two polishes, because they were designed for a limited-edition indie polish collaboration box and those two colors aren't available individually.)

 

I really wanted to do another video tutorial for this design, seeing as it's been a long time since the last video I did, but I simply couldn't find an angle that I was happy with, so I settled for a photo tutorial!


1. I started with a white background, then waited an absurdly long time for the white to dry.  When using striping tape, you always want to make sure that the background color is completely dry, or else the tape will peel off your nail polish!  (Placing the tape was kind of a pain - I'm really regretting not having any nail vinyls!)

2-4. Once I got the tape lined up, I took a small nail art brush and gently dabbed on each color.  The lightest blue, the one right at the cuticle, is very sheer so I had to use two coats.

5. After painting on each color, I took the tape off, starting with the last piece of tape that I'd placed.  Unfortunately the tape pulled up a tiiiiny bit of the white, and at the base of my nail the tape actually broke, leaving some behind on the nail!  So I did my best to paint over the wibbly lines with my smallest nail art brush.

6. Add a coat of top coat after it's all dried thoroughly (to avoid streaks), and ta-da!  Always snap a close-up photo of your nail next to the inspiration. :)

What do you think of this design?  What's the weirdest thing you've ever taken inspiration from for nail art?  Want to see more photo tutorials, or want me to try harder to find a good angle for a video tutorial?  Let me know in the comments!  And if you're really aching for some different types of posts, be sure to give me your feedback here.

Finally, don't forget to enter my blogiversary giveaway, which you can find here!

1 comment:

  1. Lovely! Why, for generations, artists have been finding inspiration in the most mundane of objects. Why not a box of tissues? :-) By the way, you mentioned nail vinyls in step #1 above, and I said to myself I said, "Hm, what are nail vinyls, I wonder?" While scrolling through a nifty site looking for skinny stripes for the HP nails I want to do, I came across these and... squeeeeeeee! :D
    http://www.twinkledt.com/collections/nail-vinyls/products/harry-potter?variant=991678547

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