Red Mosaic

Hi Goddesses

You may have seen my guest post yesterday for Gnarly Nails which featured a teal mosaic.  I loved it (you can see it here and here) and was entranced by how simple it was and also how striking and glorious.

So guess what I did?  Yup, did one in every single colour lol. So you've got 1 a day coming up for the next week, in red, blue, green, pink, purple and mono.  I am in love with them, and I hope you'll like them too.

The design is pure simplicity and there is no such thing as "going wrong" - this is a random pattern.   Here are some handy hints if you fancy doing this yourself -

* use your lightest or plainest colour as the base.  It's much easier to build darkness or intensity than take it away

* try to pick polishes with different finishes for added pow wow.  I usually pick a dark, a light, a holo, a glitter and then 2 others

* usually I use 6 polishes

* after you've painted your nails the base colour, draw your mosiac with a black striper.   I use China Glaze Ink, but use any of your preference

* pick your first polish that you're going to "colour in" with.  I prefer to colour in with a dotting tool, but of course you can use a brush if you prefer

* always pick your most dramatic colour first - so I usually pick the darkest - it's much easier to see the pattern build if you start with contrast

* try to rotate where the same colour will go on each nail - I try to make sure each colour goes once on the base, the tip, the side, the middle and then 1 other place

* if you wanted to, you could re-draw your black lines at the end for more emphasis

* you'll see in the next couple of days that I experimented with different coloured lines - trust me, the black works best, although white did give an interesting effect

So, what polishes did we have on the go for the red version - 

base - Zoya Sooki

Deborah Lippmann - Just Walk Away Renee - blackened red

Ozotic 621 - holo red

Milani Red Sparkle - glitter

Wet n Wild Rockin Rubies - the glitter with the speck of sugar in it

Nivea Brilliant Passion - the lightest red, with a hint of gold shimmer

Zoya Poshe - matte red

Stupidly, I thought the matte would be great .... and then had a classic Joey moment of nodding my head when I realised I was still going to have to top coat the whole thing.  Duh.

I loved this red one.  I wore this to work for 3 days and for the first time ever, I got GASPS when I showed my mani to people.

Interestingly, this is a super easy mani when you only do one hand.  It's much HARDER when you do both, partly because of trying to do your mosaic lines with the wrong hand - hellooooo disaster - and also it takes MORE than twice as long.  Go figure, lol.

Anyway, hope you liked this version - tomorrow will be the blue :)

Enjoy xx :)

Mirror Mirror on the Wall, Which is the Christamssiest Red of All ?

Comparison Post – Christmas Reds

Hi Goddesses

I love my reds, and I love my sparkly reds in particular, and I own quite a lot of them.  But that never fails to stop me going ooooooh and aaaaah when I see someone else swatch a sparkly red J

So I thought it would be fun to see how 5 of them compare.  This post features –

Thumb = Sephora by OPI What’s Your Poison

Index = NOPI Sensational Scarlet

Middle = CG Ruby Pumps

Ring = Milani Red Sparkle

Pinkie = SH Downtown Rubies

Sensational Scarlet already has her own post here, and Downtown Rubies will be loaded up in the next couple of days, as will OPI Smitten With Mittens and CG Ring In The Red.  This post does not include 2 other great reds – Wet N Wild Rockin Rubies, which you can read here, and Studio M Slammin Red, which you can read here.

Wow!  That’s a lot of sparkly reds!  I love the whole hand shot actually and the *range* it shows.  “Sparkly red” would seem to be quite a narrow category, but we’ve got so much variety here from bluey reds to semi jellies, to pure glitter that won’t spread to 1 coat wonders.  Let’s zoom in.  First of all, let me show you the 1 coat shot, which really highlights their differences -

Thumb = Sephora by OPI What’s Your Poison

Much as we all hate the NOPI bottle, I LOVE the SOPI bottle.  There’s something just so chunky about the wand, it’s delish.  What’s Your Poison was released this year, and is the odd one out due to how much silver it has in it.  It’s a fairly sheer base, with loads of silver glitter and some red, so that as it layers on you get a real depth of colour, and multi tonal red glitteriness. 

I used 2 coats here, and it went on fairly easy.  I think this is probably a great one to use on tips if you want a contrast – other than that it’s a bit bright and white to be a true Christmas red.

Index = NOPI Sensational Scarlet

I do love this one.  It’s very very special, despite the bottle shape!  This sits in an amazing ruby red syrup.  There’s glitter, there’s holo – there’s all kinds of Christmas wonder in here – and there’s also some flashes of blue from the holo.

This does dry quite gritty.  Usually I top this off with some Gelous to smoothe it out.  As you can see tho, tonally this is very much the odd one out due to how much blue is happening.

Middle = CG Ruby Pumps

Ah, she’s so pretty.  Where do you start with this one ?  well you can’t really go wrong, can you?  Aw I LOVE this one! 

Ruby Pumps is gorge gorge gorge!  It’s halfway between a jelly and a cream (not quite so sheer as a jelly) and has all this micro pieces of dazzle in it.  Amazing!  This one really vibrates on the nail, and for me is the most Christmassy of the 5.  I love the shade of red it’s built on, in fact, I love everything about it!!  (AND it’s smooth to the touch).

Ring = Milani Red Sparkle

This one is described as a 1 coater, but I put 2 on anyway. Texturally it’s very similar to Barry M’s Red Glitter – a matt polish packed with pure micro glitter – there is literally no way to see the polish this is embedded in, it’s PURE glitter!

You’ll either love or loathe the matt effect.  I’m not a matt fan, but I like the odd nail to be different, and I can also see how this would be a great contrast polish, on the tips.   MASSES  of sparkle in this one.

Pinkie = SH Downtown Rubies

This one will be having its own post in a day or so.  It’s a really good red glitter – probably somewhere between the Milani and Ruby Pumps – but it spreads like snot!   The application is the hardest part.  This really goes on like tar, and takes at least 3 coats to get good even coverage.

But she do look pretty J

So there we go, the sparkly reds.  Ruby Pumps is definitely my winner, but I am ITCHING to try Smitten with Mittens – I have a feeling that she may come out as the overall winner.

Enjoy xx J 

J

Top Tip – if you’re ever unsure what a nail colour looks like, go to Google images, which will give you plenty of contrasts and compares.