March Challenges - Sunshine

Sunshine for #twinsietuesdaynailart - I used Virtous Polish Glory and UberChic  UC3-03 over Ciate Party Shoes and Leighton Denny Brick Road - yellow isn't really my colour and my camera objected strongly to the goldenness of Glory!
The collage is pretty cool - dome wonderful interpretations of sunshine.
I couldn't really have yellow on my nails for too long without stamping over it -I used  Uberchic UC 3-01 and A England Camelot to stamp sunflowers (?) over my sunshine nails.

UberChic UC3-03

UberChic UC3-01

November Challenges - Purple, Watercolour and Flowers

Another brief combined post where I completed 3 challenges.
I started with Watercolour for #wnac2015 - I didn't quite trust my freehand so I stamped a flower outline from Uber Chic UC4-01 with HJ Manicure Lavender and then coloured that in over a base of OPI My Boyfriend Scales Walls. I used a number of polishes mixed with a small amount of nail varnish remover to water them down.
Then Flowers for #pcanovember15 - for this Pancreatic Cancer Awareness mani I stamped with Moyou London Pro XL10 and Hit the Bottle Purple Reign over the watercolour mani. The watercolour background did obscure the detail a little but I think it looked OK.
Finally, Purple for #clairestelle8nov. I used Uber Chic UC 3-01 and Barry M Black Currant (Black Purple) over the Flowers mani and one picture stars the last flower on my passionflower plant.

Watercolour with UberChic 4-01

 

Moyou London Pro XL10 and Hit the Bottle Purple Reign

 

Uber Chic UC 3-01 and Barry M Black Currant

 

July Challenges - Yellow / Blobbicure and Black and White

Every now and then you get a challenge not entirely in your comfort zone and this time I have had to use yellow!
The #30daysofcolourchallenge was Yellow / Blobbicure. I had done a small blobbicure trial in June so I felt slightly more comfortable about that, but yellow ?? Anyway, I decided to use A England Holy Grail and SV by Sparkly Vernis Gilded Lemon Drops as I thought they'd go quite well together.
The result wasn't too bad - I have seen better blobbicures but I was reasonably happy with the mani and I do think the colours worked pretty well.
Of course I had to stamp on it and I thought it would make a nice background for one of the UberChic sketchy flowers so I stamped UberChic Beauty UC 1-03 with China Glaze Liquid Leather.
Finally I decided to use this as my Black and White mani for #30daysofcolourchallenge too so I added some white stamping, using UberChic Beauty UC 3-01 and Hit the Bottle Snowed Under.
I really like black and white stamping combined and I am pretty pleased with this.

As you can probably tell, I did this mani over a few days so I did add a final layer, some more black stamping with Kleancolor Madly Black and Apipila Super plate B - so, its still black and white but also means another entry for #hawaiianshirtmanifriday!

Blobbicure with A England Holy Grail and
SV by Sparkly Vernis Gilded Lemon Drops

UberChic Beauty UC 1-03

UberChic Beauty UC 3-01

 

Apipila Super Plate B and Kleancolor Madly Black

 

An InLinkz Link-up

An InLinkz Link-up

Wiki'd Nails Challenge - Antiblemma

This week's Wiki'd Nails Challenge was Random - you hit the random article button and go with what comes up (or maybe you cheat a bit - there are  a lot of articles about little-known towns in countries all over the world - I have gone with what came up 5th on my search)
So, my random article, which was very brief, was Antiblemma - "Antiblemma is a genus of moths of the Noctuidae family". I googled Antiblemma and found a copper /brown/gold moth.
Time for some reverse stamping. I decided to stamp my moth over the leaves mani from yesterday.
I chose 2 plates, UberChic Beauty UC 3-01 and Messy Mansion MM42. I used one of the larger butterflies from the Messy Mansion plate and a smaller one from UberChic.
I stamped using Mentality Hope and then I coloured the images in using Hit the Bottle Copper Haired Girl and A England Virgin Queen.
I am quite pleased with the outcome.

UberChic Beauty UC 3-01, Messy Mansion MM42
Mentality Hope, Hit the Bottle Copper Haired Girl,
A England Virgin Queen 

 

 

 

 

An InLinkz Link-up

May Challenges - Gradient

The challenge for 23rd May for #clairestelle8may was Gradient. Somewhat foolishly maybe I decided to ask my IG followers what colors I should do, otherwise I'd have gone green / purple :)
Anyway, the first two to comment said red, orange, yellow - oh great - my three least favourite colours, but that's what they said so that's what I did.
I went for China Glaze Red-y to Rave, China Glaze Daisy Know my Name, and Lady Manhattan Red.
I started with a white base, and then I did do a little cheat and painted roughly 1/3 of each nail with each of the colours, just to save a bit of time and mess! Then I did it properly with a sponge until it looked reasonable, banking on the fact that it always looks better after a top coat.
Not a fantastic effort (that in no way resembles a Rocket lolly) I know, but good enough to stamp over.
I stamped with Hit the Bottle Absinthe Minded and UberChic Beauty UC 3-02. The image I chose is a fantastically detailed mix of flowers, leaves, swirls and I think the green stamped really nicely over the three colours. I like the contrast and the way the green looks different against each shade, looking almost chinese I think.
Then later I added the final layer, and for me this is my clear favourite. I stamped with Avon Classic Fit and UberChic Beauty UC 3-01using one of those images which stamps a background, allowing the base colour to show through and I think the effect is pretty awesome! Classic Fit is just a regular polish, not fully opaque but I love the effect I get when I stamp with it. It is dark enough for a contrast against all shades of the gradient base but the yellow and green still show through so that it actually looks like dark green rather than blue adding to the gradient effect, and if you look closely you can still see the bright green stamping under the blue, particularly over the red at the tips.
Ok, so I've waffled for too long because I love it!!! I hope you like it too :)

China Glaze Red-y to Rave,
China Glaze Daisy Know my Name,
and Lady Manhattan Red

Hit the Bottle Absinthe Minded
 and UberChic Beauty UC 3-02 

Avon Classic Fit and UberChic Beauty UC 3-01

 

Wiki'd Nails Challenge - Tattoo

The gang behind the A2Z challenges decided we needed something even more challenging and came up with Wiki'd Nails.
They spent some time hitting the random button on Wikipedia and came up with a set of 10 new challenges, the first of which is Tattoo.
Now I know the intention was for us to be seriously challenged and produce something staggeringly creative but I have been hankering after doing a henna tattoo style mani since I first got Moyou London Explorer 22, so when I saw the word tattoo, I decided that's what I was going to do.
As it turned out, I got the polishes ready and then my Uberchic Beauty plates arrived. UC 3-01 and UC 3-03 both have what I think of as henna tattoo style images so I had to use one of them. I went for UC 3-03.
I started with a base of Leighton Denny Healthy Glow, a lovely slightly pinky nude and then I stamped using Avon Deluxe Chocolate. This has a slight shimmer to it and may not have been the best polish to use but colour-wise I think it was perfect.
I was pretty pleased with these although my camera doesn't seem to think they are so good!
I did go on to use UC 3-01 and A England Rose Bower for a second layer of stamping and back to UC 3-03 and A England Saint George for a third layer - it all ended up being a bit Christmassy but pretty :)

UberChic Beauty UC3-03 and Avon deluxe Chocolate
over Leighton Denny Healthy Glow

 

A England Rose Bower and UberChic Beauty UC 3-01

A England Saint George and UberChic Beauty UC 3-03

An InLinkz Link-up