Friday Triad: inspired by Nail Polish Society

Hi everyone!


Another month has passed so it's Triad day again, the last Friday of the month where Juanita, Michelle and me take turns picking a manicure that is the inspiration for all three of us. This month was Michelle's turn and oh, boy, did she cheat!!! She chose this beautiful manicure by Emiline from Nail Polish Society... and the original was done using nail wraps! How can a girl do something similar? I actually checked and the exact same wraps are still for sale, but that would be cheating, right? Oh... wait...

But no, I decided to take the inspired-by route and used just nail polish and tools, and this is the result:

I started out with the simple part... painting my thumb with one coat of Colour Alike Mint (a mint colored stamping polish that can double, be it reluctantly, as a creme polish), my index with two coats of Zoya Talia, my middle and ring finger with two coats of essence Wild White Ways and last but not least my pinky with two coats of Hema Living Coral.

After that I took a big leap out of my comfort zone that contains all clear outlines and images and dove head first into the grungy, splattered side of things.

I started by creating a base using a fan brush. Way back when I started doing nail art (when I thought a different colored nail was just about the epitome of edgy and stamping was something I hadn't even heard about yet) I got a set of brushes. You probably know the sets I'm talking about, dirt cheap on eBay, lousy quality and one rinse with acetone and all the bristles start to fall out. All other brushes have long disappeared but the fan brush was still at the back of all my other tools, dusty and neglected. No more though, I dug it out and cleaned away the layer of debris time left on it so I could finally give it a try. I put four small blobs of nail polish in a line, wiped the brush through it a few times to mix it a little and confidently swiped it across my ring finger. And you know what? I liked it!! I did a bit more dabbing to fill in some bare spots and carefully cleaned it for future use as I'm not going to let dust settle on it again.

So after the fan brushed base had dried, I searched my collection of plates for images I could use. I ended up with UberChic Texture-licious 1, 2 and 3 and Moyra 53 Textures and using Talia, Mint, Living Coral and Wild White Ways I started stamping bits and pieces of lines, squigglies, dots and what not to end up with the result you can see in the picture.

One coat of Seche Vite to seal it all in and I was ready to take pictures... or maybe not. Something about my manicure didn't feel right and finally I decided the mint thumb was too much, so I removed it, painted a coat of base coat, two coats of Talia and a coat of Seche Vite and started to smile when I looked at the result... way better and definitely camera ready :)


The line up:

Zoya Talia, Colour Alike Mint, essence Wild White Ways, Hema Living Coral

I have to admit I had some serious doubts about this manicure. Not because I didn't like it, but real life hasn't been much fun lately (not even mentioning the kitchen disaster that is still ongoing) so I totally didn't feel like painting my nails. But I couldn't let my friends down so I pushed myself to at least come up with a palette that I liked and when I finally picked the right colors, everything just seemed to fall into place. I even started having fun fiddling with the stamping and of course trying that fan brush. I guess it shows that nail art does cheer me up, even if I don't think it can.

Sooo... all philosophical talk aside, I REALLY can't wait to see what Michelle and Juanita did with this inspiration. I have to say I'm pretty happy with my interpretation, even if it's past midnight already and I have to get up for work in less than six hours *cringes* On the bright side, that means I only have to wait a little while to check out their creations :)


In case you're wondering... the nail on my ring finger looks longer than my index or middle finger. In real life they are the same length. I have injured the top joint of my finger so I can't bend it like my other fingers (it isn't painful though, it just won't cooperate ;)