MUA Bright Coral Nails

I'm becoming quite the fan of MUA nail polishes. They're cheap as dirt - £1.00 each - have pretty good colours and have as much staying power as other lower priced polishes. They've updated the packaging too which I'm totally feeling.

I Heart Mehndi

One of my best friends just got married, on what was one of the most emotional, beautiful, tiring weekends of my life. And on this weekend of love, I fell hook line and sinker for the art of mendhi. I'm not talking about the stuff that you get done on a beach in Ibiza, I'm talking about the good stuff, done with patiences and care by someone who really knows what they're doing. This delicate pattern, drawn freehand was knocked out in about 5 minutes by a talented mendhi artist before she went on to the next.

Whether I'll still be loving it in 10 days when it's practically faded and leaves and faint orange blur smeared across my hand is a different question. But for now, I'm smitten!

Polka Dot Nails - Step by Step

Following my experience with the worst top coat ever, I decided to give my nails a little TLC by having a go at some nail art. Now, considering my artistic skills aren't too hot, I decided to go for something simple – polka dots.

What you need
Base colour
Colour for dots
Top coat - NOT this one
Toothpick
Patience

Here’s how to do it

1. Apply one (or two) coats of your base colour and let it dry

2. Take your toothpick and dip into your chosen dot colour

3. Using the toothpick, place the first dot in the center of your nail

4. Create a pattern - using the first dot as your guide

5. Leave to dry (this may take a while if the dots are large)

6. Finish with a top coat

Tips

• Always do your centre dot first – that way you can maintain the pattern across the nail
• Scrap some of the excess polish off toothpick so you don't end up with a big blob of polish on your nail
• If you don't have a steady hand don't try to double-dot. Chances are you’ll never hit the same spot twice and you'll end up ruining the pattern. I learnt the hard way
• Be patient – it will take a while for the dots to dry so make sure you’re comfortable and there is something good on TV.
• You will need a top coat – even it it’s just a clear nail varnish, the dots will be slightly raised so will need protecting.

Happy dotting! 

Worst Top Coat Ever

After years of never using a topcoat on my nails, I succumbed to the idea that it may actually help my manicure last longer. Seduced by the long lasting gel manicures but looking to find something a little cheaper I decided to buy Sally Hansen's No Chip Acrylic Top Coat.

Once my two coats of Barry M was perfectly dry I applied a layer of the top coat, even adding some under tip of the nail as the product had suggested. The formula was a little thick and difficult to manipulate but after drying it looked great, in fact it looked great for the rest of the day.

However I went to bed, and woke up to find my nails like this.

Hairline cracks had appeared all over my nails which obviously led to the polish flaking and crumbling away as the day went on. I’ve never seen anything like this before so assumed that it was down to the top coat.

Naturally I took to Google to see if anyone else had experienced the same thing and found this (click the image to enlarge):

More than a few customers have complained about the very same thing on the Sally Hansen US site. Out of 26 reviews on the site, only one of them was positive. See for yourself HERE

This is when I got really annoyed. It was bad enough to not even get a full 24 hours wear out my polish before it chipped. However to find out that this is an ongoing problem that the manufacturers are clearly aware of, yet they still insist on putting the product on the marking is infuriating.  

There are two morals to this story:

1 – If it ain’t broke, don’t try to cover it in a top coat.

2 – Do your research, that’s what the internet is there for.

Sally Hansen No Chip Acrylic Top Coat - £Even free would be too much

Product Lust: Nail Lacquer

As I've written time and time again, when it comes to nails, I really can't be bothered with base and top coats. I'm normally doing my nails in a hurry/on the bus (sorry for the smell) so don't really have time to be thinking of protecting my polish. I just pray that it at least gets me through the day, then start the whole process again 48 hours later.

These limited edition dual ended nail lacquers from Elizabeth Arden could just well be the stuff that my lazy dreams are made of.

Available in two shades, these polishes have a beautiful pop of colour at one end and, what is described as, 'a gel like top coat' at the other. Perfect to pop in the bag for those times you need to give yourself a last minute manicure - which is in my case, most days. Why has no-one done this before? We've had duel ended lip-glosses, mascaras and eye-liners spilling out of our make-up bags for years!

As well as this teal colour, the US website also lists a lovely, dusty lilac type hue too. According to today's Stylist magazine, these beauts will be £14.00 when they go on sale here.

These are definitely on the pay day wish list

Hard As Nails

When it comes to nail varnish, I don't tend to stick to a particular brand. In my personal opinion all nail varnish chips after a day or two unless it's a gel manicure. So with that in mind, I just buy whatever colour catches my eye.

The latest eye catching gem was this lovely offering from Maybelline. This particular polish was from their Forever Strong Pro range, the bottles claims to contain calcium, iron and silica which will give you 7 days of lasting polish.

I can't really comment on the longevity as I can never be bothered with top coats and base coats. HOWEVER I do really like the colour, so that's enough for me!

Maybelline Forever Strong Pro in Green Miracle - £4.09 in Boots
(Buy one get one half price on all Maybelline products in Boots at the moment)

Rose Gold Nails

I've been searching the web for a purse friendly rose gold nail varnish for a while. Not really sure why, I just conjured up the idea that it would look nice and I was determined to find one.

I didn't have much luck until I spied a friends nails at work and she told me to head on down to Topshop, so I did. I hadn't paid much attention to their beauty range before but if your after a slightly unusual nail colour you should check them out. They had a few rose gold tones - some matte some with a glittery finish and the one I chose which has a metallic foil look to it.

Suffuse from Topshop - £6

Pictured with two coats

Morning Mocha

I love this colour from the MUA range. It's a really pale mocha-grey tone which I haven't seen any other ranges do.

Unfortunately you need to do around 3 coats to build up a viable shade. But for a £1.00 polish in a colour you can't get elsewhere, who's complaining.

MUA Shade 19. Available from Superdrug.

Pomegranate Jelly

I lusted after Barry M's Gelly Paint range from the moment I heard about it. As soon as they came out, I hot footed it to Superdrug and purchased it in Pomegranate. A delicious raspberry type shade that looks perfect for Autumn

The plus points
It's a really luscious thick formula (but not gloopy) that looked really good after one coat. (Pictured after two)
Super high shine - in terms of shine, it does what it says on the tin. A friend of mine even commented on how shiny my nails looked.
I really love the colour.

The not so plus points
It lasted no longer than my regular Barry M polishes. Granted I didn't use a base coat, but I never do. With long lasting gel manicures being so popular at the moment, you may be fooled into thinking that this polish has extra staying power because of the name. It doesn't. But to be totally fair, it doesn't actually claim to be extra long lasting.

With the only real plus point being the high shine, if you're not totally in love the colour selection, I would suggest giving this one a miss. You can achieve the same shine with a good top coat, and it will probably last longer too!

I want! Barry M Gel Effect Nail Paint

Sorry for the nail obsession at the moment, but I just noticed on twitter that Barry M are set to release a gel nail varnish collection. I’m guessing this is in response the growing trend for shellac mani/pedis at the moment. They promise to give a lasting high shine finish, which was one of the main things I loved about my shellac manicure. And at £3.99 they’ll come in a damn sight cheaper too.

Can not WAIT to try these. Excited! 

Nail Magnet

Barry M's latest range of magnetic nail polishes offer a new take on the nail art trend.

Instructions are written on the side of the bottle, but basically you paint on a base coat and let it dry. Then you do a second coat and immediatly rest your cuticle on the groove of the lid allowing your nail to hover over the magnet for around 5 seconds.

And voila! Easy nail art. The magnet somehow pulls the polish apart to create these cool highlighted diagonal stripes across the nail.

This nail range currently comes in metallic red, black, blue and purple, and the good thing is (so I hear through the blogsophere) each bottle has a different magnet that makes a different pattern so you can get them all then mix and match patterns and colours. Not bad for £4.99 a pop.

Product Lust

Vibrant nail varnish in a Rubik's cube style box! Need I say more?

beautyconcepts.co.uk