Las Vegas Nails!

I'm in Las Vegas baby!! Just landed super early this morning. It's my graduation/ birthday present so instead of birthday nails I skipped straight ahead to Vegas nails!

 

Here we have diamonds and hearts! I used Sinful Colors Black on Black as the base then did the shapes in OPI Alpine Snow before going over them in Zoya Sooki.

 

A for Ace. Again, Sinful Colors Black on Black as the base, and I used a Kiss nail art pen in white to do the letter.

 

Clubs and spades (my fave)! OPI Alpine Snow is the base then I used a Kiss nail art pen in black to do the shapes because the brush and nail polish just wasn't working for me. I found it a lot easier to draw with a pen than brush. My thumb is also white but has a black A, like my other thumb. I did a coat of Essie Good to Go over all my nails, but for some reason it discolored the black nail art pen and made it look a little grey (as you can see here), which is kind of crappy, but I didn't feel like doing it all over and using Seche. 

Hopefully this brings me some luck!

Until next time,

The Wicked

Pirates, Orly and an Announcements!

So I ended up adding to my POTC nails because I liked my thumb too much to change it lol.

I did change three of my fingers as you can see.

index: 2 coats OPI You Don't Know Jacques

middle: 1 coat Nicole by OPI Razzle Dazzler

pinky: 2 coats OPI You Don't Know Jacques

Then I used the Kiss nail art pens. I used the white one for the skull and the black one to make my You Don't Know Jacques nails to look like wooden boards (hopefully that was easily figured out).

Next on the agenda.. Orly! So after I took the above picture I decided to redo my nails, and I could not figure out what to do for longest time. I wanted something sparkly but couldn't decide on what. Finally I just decided to do the Milani jewel fx Gold on all my nails, but I left my POTC thumb lol. Of course, as my luck goes, 20 minutes later the doorbell rings and it's my Orly polishes! So I ended up having to swatch all the colors on only my thumb (I'll do full swatches later on).

From the Precious Collection:

Royal Velvet, 3 coats

Ancient Jade, 1 coat

Pure Porcelain, 2 coats

Gilded Coral, 3 coats

 From the Pinup Collection:

Bubbly Bombshell, 3 coats

So these are the introductory swatches and the amount of coats I have on. I will be doing full swatches and I'll go into more detail with each color. But overall all the polishes have really nice formulas, smooth and good coverage. The more frosty/ iridescent colors are on the sheerer side so they do need an extra coat or thicker coats to be completely opaque. The cremes are great and are pretty much opaque in 1 coat, which is pretty impressive. I liked that a lot. Also the range of colors in the collections was great. Also, I thought it was worth mentioning that Bubbly Bombshell was amazingly easy to remove. As you can see, it is a glitter and glitter is usually a pain to remove, but this one removed just like a normal polish. Awesome. Probably one of the best features about this polish, I haven't seen that with a glitter before.

And now for the announcements! Firstly, today is my birthday!! Yay! Just had to get that out there in this special post. Secondly, We are the Wicked will be going on a short 10 day hiatus. We are going to be in Denmark and Sweden so starting tomorrow we won't be posting for 10 days. But there is plenty of other stuff to check out here! We will try our best to find something interesting stuff and possibly post from there, but no promises. Maybe Swedish and Danish trends? Hmm? Possible. 

Until next time,

The Wicked

Nail Art Options

When thinking about nail art, most people don't realize how many options there are, but there are SO many! I'm sure some people like to have their nails just one color, but others need some options (like myself). So, I'm going to go through some different options for jazzing up our nails!


1. Nail Art Pens/ Polishes

 
So, these are pretty simple to understand. They come in a variety of colors and are made for detailing.

On the top are the Sally Hansen nail art pens that came out a few years ago. They're pretty interesting. After you use them, you need to do a top coat of they will actually wash off, which is super strange. They run about $6-7 and you can find them anywhere.

On the bottom, are LA Colors nail art polishes. You can see that the brushes are thin and pointed and they come in a variety of colors. There are lots of brands that have these kinds of polishes, they're also widely available. I actually haven't seen the LA Colors in stores, but I saw another brand and each one was $2.99


2. Nail Stickers

Also super simple to use, nail stickers are a great quick fix when adding to nails. There's no drying time or really any effort at all. You can find tons of these everywhere and pretty much any kind you want. These are really easy and are great for kids (and adults!).

I really love these, I might have to find them lol








3. Rhinestones

 Ahh, rhinestones. I do love sparkly things.

You can get rhinestones 2 ways: stick-on or not stick-on. The sticky backed ones come in sticker form, while the other ones come just like you see here
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They come in all different shapes and sizes and colors and are relatively easy. Obviously, ones with sticky backs are like stickers and therefore easy to adhere.







4. Stamping

Probably my favorite way to decorate my nails. This picture is of a Konad stamping set, but other companies do make these types of plates, people tend to call them "fauxnad" plates. Such simpler to use than it seems, it just takes a little practice. When buying Konad specifically, you can usually get bundles that include some polishes, plates and the stamper and scraper. I do recommend getting the Konad polishes because they dry on contact, but any polish will work. Because they dry so fast, you do have to work faster when using them.

You can get Konad on various websites. I use http://www.ocnailart.com/.

One alternative to Konad that is an awesome deal comes from Bundlemonster. It's 21 plates for $17. Yeah, awesome!



5. Nail Polish Strips

This is the newest thing when it comes to decorating nails. They are nail polish strips, no polish necessary. It completely simplifies the way you do nails. I'm not sure how the application is or anything, but I think it's a good idea, especially for people who don't have time to do their nails all the time. You can see that there are TONS of options here, some of them can be achieved with Konad, while others are definitely original.

When going with these I would suggest getting something original, like the butterflies, flowers or lace (my favorite!). Getting a plain color or even glitter wouldn't be worth it in my mind. They're $7-8 and I think you get one use out of each pack.


Until next time,
The Wicked