Amazing Watercolor Wash with Splattered Accents Trendy

Recently, I had the very exciting opportunity to do an interview with our local CW station here in Phoenix, CW6! I knew they would be filming an up-close view of me doing some nail art, so I knew I had to do something jazzy on my own nails, too. I adapted this look from a Neiru lesson called "Fuchsia Swirl" by Mariko Shida.

It's super easy to get this look, especially if you're working with gel. I'm sure many of you guys have seen the drag marble looks with nail polish, right? Well this is the same, but in gel, you aren't working against the evaporating solvents and drying nail polish!

After prepping and applying your base coat, start with one coat of your main base color and cure. I'm using Presto Sordino.

Apply a second coat of your base color, but don't cure just yet! Add some swipes of your additional colors, as well as some thin lines of black gel. Clean off a striper brush, and use it to drag through the wet gel. This look is more of a "long, swoopy lines" type of marble, but you can draw whatever pattern you want. Cure your marbling.

Finally, add some splattered details. I actually used Gelish Pinch of Pepper for this particular manicure, but you could hand paint on some black and white as well.

Full product list:
Gelish Foundation and Top It Off
Presto Sordino (grey)
Presto Bis (mustard)
Presto Garante (blue)
Presto Con Amore (neon yellow)
Gelish Carnaval Hangover (purple)
Gelish Pinch of Pepper (black and white glitter)
Gelish Matte Top It Off

If you're curious, you can also check out my interview with the CW! Here is the manicure I was working on for the segment (shoutout to my friend Kristi for stepping up as a last minute model).

A photo posted by Chalkboard Nails (Sarah) (@chalkboardnails) on Jun 3, 2016 at 10:08am PDT

Amazing The Collector - Golden Decals for Your Odder Side Trendy

I titled these nails "The Collector."

Doesn't it seem like an amalgamation of weird items that you'd find in some spooky antique shop, owned by a weird dude that probably does a little spellcasting on the side?

These golden Wrap Artist decals pair with the soft, pink base in a really cool way. It's a sort of girly-meets-peculiar juxtaposition that I really enjoy!

I began by applying Presto Secco as my gel polish base. It's a really pretty soft pink that I actually bought for bridal season, but that works great year round as a more "natural" look!

Then, I applied the Wrap Artist decals. These are water slide decals, which is my preferred method of application for decals. They just work better! I used decals from both the "Bone Structure" and "Oddities" sheets for this look, but you should really just go look around the Wrap Artist site, 'cause there are so many awesome options.

After blotting off any excess water, I applied my gel topcoat to seal everything in and cured. The decals are very thin - I only needed one coat of gel top to smooth everything away.

I had a few people at work questioning the weirdness of this manicure (though just as many thought it was awesome, too). A client was like, "Um, did you know you have bugs on your nails?"

Yeah, I'm aware, and I love it!

Amazing Sushi is Bae Nail Art Trendy

I love sushi and so does most of the rest of the world. It's fresh and delicious and actually gorgeous. Have you SEEN the color of raw tuna? I want to paint my LIFE in it!

Anyway, as with most things I love, I decided to try to put it on my nails. Because, naturally. I've seen a lot of gorgeous interpretations of sushi nails lately, but I did try to make mine "my own."

On my thumb, I put my bae tuna. My pointer is tamagoyaki, which honestly I chose more for it's color than anything -- I have only eaten it once! My middle finger is salmon, my ring finger is rice, and my pinkie is intended to look like avocado with sesame seeds.

Quick sidebar about the rice nail that might give you some insight into my brain: in hindsight, if I were to do this all over again, I would paint individual white grains of rice over a negative space clear nail. I think that would read more like rice and look cooler than what I attempted here. The grey patterning is hard to read.

I used gel polish for this, but won't be able to list out all of the materials I used. I did a lot of color mixing, layering, and blending, and beyond that, I wore this manicure a month or two ago and I don't remember the specifics. Oops! 😇

Are you a sushi fan? What's your favorite thing to order?