My Dark Valentine

Today I have a Valentines Day mani to show you. It's a little bit on the dark side but I wasn't in the mood for pink. I wear pink quite often but for some reason, never feel like wearing it around Valentines!

I've always wanted to see what NYX Dorothy looks like matte so this was the perfect occasion to do so. I love this polish, a black jelly base packed with large hex and small red glitter. I'll definitely wear it again on it's own very soon! The thumb and pointer are just a regular black creme mattified with Essie Matte About You.

I stamped the ring finger with the Born Pretty lovely heart m59 stamping plate which at the time seemed like a good idea but I'm not really a fan of how it turned out. The bubbling hearts are too sweet for the look I was going for but then again, it's the only detail that keeps it withing the Valentine these! I also added some loose hex glitter pieces to the ring finger for a slight french tip.

Salt n Peppa over Mango Sorbet

I was really excited when some pretties from Lush Lacquer arrived in the post. I had seen swatches of Salt n Peppa all over the blogasphere and Instagram and always thought it was such an interesting and cool polish.

The first Lush Lacquer I tried is the famous Salt n Peppa. A mix of black and white hex, square and bar glitter in a clear base with some iridescent glitter mixed in to add to the fun. If you love glitter, you'd love this! They weren't skimping on the glitter either, it's so packed with it that one coat is all you need. No fishing or placement required and the formula isn't too thick and goopy like some other densely packed glitters I've tried!

This is one coat of Salt n Peppa over a franken I've recently concocted from some old leftover polishes. I think I'll call it Mango Sorbet because the pastel orangy shade reminds me of just that!

Lava Flow - New W7 Glitters

When I was browsing through nailpolishdirect.co.uk last week, I came across some new W7 polishes. I used to see W7 as one of those very cheap and random brands which had inconsistent formulas and which I would only use for white and black cremes. Then I tried one of their "Dazzle" glitters and a couple of their "Planets" polishes and became quite obsessed with this £1.95 brand!

They have impressed me lately and I couldn't believe my eyes when I spotted these three glitters! They reminded me of Indie polishes so much. I hadn't seen any swatches at all or even heard about them but since they were so cheap I decided to get them anyway! I'm so glad I did! L to R: Mosaic, Salt N Pepper, Lava Flow.

One of my followers on Instagram has just told me that Mosaic is a dupe for Nails Inc Sprinkles Pudding Lane, with the same gold and dark blue glitters. I wish they would bring out more with different base colours!

Here is two coats Lava Flow which consists of black and red glitter suspended in a white milky base! Although I have one coat of OPI Alpine Snow on, I was quite surprised at how opaque Lava Flow actually is!

Asymmetric Periwinkle Bandit

As I haven't done a scotch tape mani in a while and today I had a little extra time on my hands, that's exactly what I went for. I should probably have the Union Jack or some sort of red, white and blue on my nails today since it's the Queen's Diamond Jubilee but to be honest, we're not really celebrating. In fact, we are going to the theatre to watch Rock of Ages, hopefully it's a good one.

Today's design is inspired by one of my favourite girls on IG, Nicole. If you have an IG account and want to follow her, search @nic_tchelly.

I started with Collection 2000 BMX Bandit which is a periwinkle blue much like CG Secret Periwinkle and Essie's Lapis of Luxury. Collection 2000 is usually a shelf I don't go near when I am in Boots but every now and again they do put out a mini collection that has some amazing colours. BMX Bandit (I love that name) is part of the Dynasty, Hoola Hoop, Wham collection which has been around since circa summer 2009 but I still love it.

For the asymmetric lines I also used Zoya Trixie which is one of my favourite silvers and the black with blue micro glitter is a franken I made a while ago called Starry Midnight Sky.

And here is a look at BMX Bandit on it's own! Isn't it beautiful? And gotta love the price too, £1.79 or 2 for £3!

Elvis' Pink Cadillac

I think it's really cool that for the past few months indie polishes have been a huge trend! In my opinion, they bring something to the table that commercial brands were lacking! There is definitely a gap in the market for indie polishes and their unique looks.

Pretty & Polished Elvis' Pink Cadillac and Midnight Masquerade are the only two I currently own, as far as I'm aware we don't have any good indie polishes over on this side of the Atlantic and getting them shipped from the States can be very costly. I bought these directly from Chelsea's Etsy store.

I posted pictures of EPC on my Instagram feed a couple of months ago but then forgot to post them on my blog too until I was going through the picture folders on my laptop and saw that they were still in my "to post" folder!

 So here you have it. This is 2 coats of EPC over a thin coat of Jessica Samba Parade as the formula in EPC is a little on the sheer side and I like full opacity. Needless to say, I'm really happy with this polish! I just can't get enough of the black glitter and hex pieces swirling in the marshmallow pink shade.

And here is a bottle shot of Elvis' Pink Cadillac and Midnight Masquerade. I love that fuchsia and green glitter suspended in black jelly!

Skulls and Bows

From the moment I saw this mani on Kayla Shevonne, I knew I had to recreate it! I squealed because it was just so cute! Then I beat myself up for not having thought of it before! How I have not yet done a mani with skulls, bows and black dots is beyond me, so thank you Kayla for doing this awesome mani! If you haven't yet visited Kayla's blog, do so now! She inspires a lot of my nail designs and her tutorials are really detailed and easy to follow!

I wore this many for 4 days (doesn't happen very often) and I can see myself doing it again, even with a different base colour because it's so quick and easy, yet so cute!

I used an unnamed pink as my base colour! Stamped with Konad Black polish and BM211 and added a coat of Nubar Black Polka Dot! The bow is fimo.