So, to mark our return here’s a tribute to my favourite kids’ TV show (and also to the orignal comics by Tove Jannson, a very inspirational woman). I loved the Moomins when I was little and I still do.

The Moomin Papa nail was seriously cracked and has been repaired using teabag paper and glue. I don’t think you can really tell so for details on how to do this, see below.

Click pics for HD.

The usual techniques have been used: base colour of eggshell blue, Barry M loose eye shadow powder sprinkled on top of this, then the basic shapes and colours to build the characters and their clothes, then a layer of Seche Vite to dry, then black line details with a liquid eyeliner, finally another layer of Seche Vite and some 3D butterflies from the nail section in Poundland.

The design process!

Much more pleased with this hand; I like the way the characters are interacting with each other.

Snufkin and the Hemulen. You can see one of the butterfly 3Ds here. I do realise one nail is a lot shorter. Reminder that we’re working with REAL nails here. This thumb died before I came across the useful trick below.

REPAIRING CRACKED NAILS

The middle finger on the RIGHT hand sustained a serious crack. I decided not to let this get in the way of my nail art comeback and used this teabag trick to strengthen the nail.

Instead of nail glue I used superglue, and I didn’t bother with a base coat so I am not sure how easy it will be to change my nail polish! But life’s too short of base coats god damn it.

Although the tutorial below is 8 minutes long (it’s not me) once you watch it once you feel like you know what to do and it is easier and less fiddly than I imagined it might be.

This is because I cannot have long nails at the moment for work reasons.

I will try to continue posting street style, etc and responding to nail inquiries, however I will not be posting pictures of my own nails until I am able to grow them again.

HOPEFULLY THIS WILL BE SOON!
In the meantime please enjoy the first teaser of a new video project between me and some friends, BEST CITY FASHION!

Big Love,

Best City Nails.

And with a POWDER GRADIENT contrast nail.

Here we opted not to cover the crystals with a top coat and therefore many of the were lost in the battles of everyday life, as you can see below.

6.8/10

We are quite into these but it is not the extravaganza we had dreamed of. Dreaming bigger for the future. You know. Soon photography standards will return to normal as well, you will all be relieved to know.

The main difficulty here is whether to top coat over the crystals. If you do, they stay on for weeks but they loose their sparkly-ness as the top coat smooths over all the facets. If you just glue the crystals to a finished nail and leave it at that, they might stay on for two or three days.  YOUR CALL.

Above, crystals without top coat.

Above, with top coat over crystals.

The difference is far more pronounced than it appears in these shitty phone photos. Apologies for this also; temporarily lack decent photography solutions!

6.2/10

You know you’ve seen more exciting nails on this blog. It is what it is.

Today I have finally got round to two designs I have been thinking of for a while.

One is this rope/plait/chain type thing, which I have done on top of a Barry M ‘Instant Nail Effects’ cracked-effect colour.

The other is the Eye of Horus, an important symbol which I have borrowed from Egyptian myth. Eyes, triangles and motifs like this are zeitgeisty in nail art at the moment thanks to Sophy Robson. Also, Madonna at the Super Bowl and Rihanna at Hackney Weekend have both added an Ancient World flavour to their much-talked-about performances.

I have enhanced the eyes with nail art jewels from Poundland.

8/10

The second 8 in a row. These work well. Into the chains, but they probably would stand out more with a less messy background. Alternating black and white might be nice. It was also hard to draw the black outlines and detail on the chains after covering the wet gold paint with glitter, but these are the challenges we face in life.

You can see these nails in motion below:

We tried out a milky-way inspired look, at the request of a reader (hai girl!)

CLICK FOR HD

Step #1

Begin with an even coat of black on each nail.

Step #2

Apply a second black coat (we are using Rimmel 60 Seconds), and nail by nail, apply a large patch of very dark blue or purple Barry M powder (Black Purple, Barry M used here), or similar. Then, within the confines of the patch, sprinkle a smaller amount of a lighter colour (Barry M’s Denim). You are trying to achieve the look of an area of light merging to darkness…but working backwards.

To apply powder, dip a makeup brush in the powder, tap off excess powder and then, holding the brush above the nail, tap the handle so the powder falls. You can then blow on the nail to spread it out. See this old post for more detail.

Step #3

Once you have black paint, and two darkisk-powders laid out, apply a clear top coat. This is not the final stage, this is just to wet the nail for more work.

Step #4

Apply fine glitter (Barry M, Light Blue) and coarse, regular-style glitter in silver artfully over the top of the clear top coat. Try and concentrate in one area (the same patch that you first began with) so that it looks like a galaxy rather than an even spread. Once you have the glitter, add groups of larger stars with a white striping brush. Some can be just dots, but add bigger circles with flickers/rays coming out too.

AS YOU CAN SEE on ours, we positioned the centre and direction of the ‘galaxy’ slightly differently on each nail.

Step #5

Finish with a top coat like Seche Vite.

CLICK FOR HD

I include pictures with and without flash to try and demonstrate these nails more accurately. They were very sparkly.

8/10

A healthy score. We really enjoyed these, and they were very quick to do compared to our highly-illustrated looks more recently. This all probably took only 20 minutes or so. We hope you’re encouraged to try them out! The instructions may sound complicated but it is pretty easy, really.

Also the pointier tip shape is a lot of fun, and adds an edge to the simpler design.

But this frightful sight from Allegra Mostyn-Owen – an artist and Oxford graduate most notable for her 6-year marriage to London mayor Boris Johnson – has caught our attention in the pages of the Brave Boris Promotional Pamphlet, often referred to as the Evening Standard (article here).

Ms Mostyn-Owen appeared in an interview to explain how great and funny Boris Johnson is (cheers, but we all know he’s really funny…for many people this is considered his sole redeeming feature). She also explained how into Muslims she is, and how she knows loads about Muslims, and so Boris probably loves them as well. And how she and Boris had loads of fun at university sending notes to each other and drinking wine.

ALRIGHT ALLEGRA, well we’re ALL very anti-Islamaphobia and we ALL had fun at university drinking wine….doesn’t mean we need to go around proving our fun-loving and down-to-earth credentials with a maroon manicure and a chipped, black contrast nail. WHAT THE FUCK?!

What an aggressive, classless colour combination. I mean what is this? Apart from the family jewels, this could be the hand of a scruffy rebellious teenager, swigging cider and smoking weed in the park, listening to ska punk. Which is fine, in its place.

And these sorry-looking short nails are being done no favours dressed in such dark colours. Less Avril Lavigne and more Hilary Devey, pls.

The ‘I’m an artist and I am relaxed in my own home’ is fine if executed well, but chipped nails are no friend of this blog.

HERE IS THE DIVINE DEVEY DEMONSTRATING HOW TO DO AN INTERVIEW AND NAIL-ART PHOTO SHOOT IN YOUR HOME:

CAPISCE?! Devey’s subtle pose couldn’t be further from Allegra’s ‘LOOK AT ME! Look how A) rich B) ethnic-friendly and C) nail-art-retarded I am! ALL ON ONE CASUAL-YET-VERY-OBVIOUSLY-POSITIONED HAND!’

We have to give these an epic…

0/10

I mean, what’s to like? Miley’s nails got two marks for at least not being chipped – we can’t even afford such generosity here.

Sorry Allegra; newly-appointed Evening Standard Queen of the East London Muslims you may be (lol), but a nail queen you are not.

This week we’re serving up some serious maritime realness!

Standard skull with crossed sword and bone, the desert island and sunset (a classic 90s nail motif) a ship, circled in rope over a parchmenty effect (white dappled with yellow powder) an anchor, and some merpeople!

So far the sunset proving by far the most popular (when fingers placed together it forms a whole island, like two pieces of a jigsaw – the merpeople compliment each other in a similar way).

I am proudest of the ship, though, as I thought that one could go very badly.

Skull and crossbones is black painted over a white background, oddly, just because I thought this would be easier.

[click on above image for mind-blowing HD]

9.8/10

You love it, we love it.

 Goin this way, that way, forward and backwards, over the deep blue sea,

A bottle of rum to fill my tum and THAT’S THE LIFE FOR ME! 

We had to get a picture of these dream talons, which a friend did for her.

Chan always has nails done so I asked her about phones and she said:

“I used to have a Blackberry but my nails were actually completely ruining the keys, so I have just changed to an iPhone and I hate it. I absolutely hate it! I’m like [mimes trying to use a touch screen with a really flat finger.]“

Well we all know about that, but who needs to be able to use a phone when your glittery, Chanel nails looks so sickening?!

Just when you think you are running out of ideas of ways to pimp your directional nails: pressed flowers. We had this idea wondering the city streets and marvelling at all the spring blossom (most of which is gone now), but blossom from trees is, in the main, way too large to be pressed onto a nail.

Forget-me-nots, however are perfect! Directional! Editorial!

Step #1

Pick some of the flowers (respectfully!), then separate the flower itself as much as possible from the stem and bud so that it presses as flat as possible (this is much easier on the larger flowers, but we still used a couple of small ones for variety).

Step #2

Then find as big a book as you can and put the flowers between some sheets of kitchen paper in the book, and leave to one side with added weight on top if you like. A couple of days was fine for me.

Step #3

When the flowers are dry and flat, apply two coats of your background colour to the nail, wait a minute or so for it to dry slightly. Then use tweezers to place the flowers on the nail – take care not to dent the surface of the nail polish, and if you do perhaps it can be covered with a flower?

Step #4

Finally, to keep the flowers from escaping. apply a thick coat or two of a good top coat like Seche Vite.

Important Note!

Some of the flowers did gradually go brownish over time, but I would say they only became unacceptably brown around the time I needed to do my nails again anyway (i.e. at least a week) so I wouldn’t let this put you off.

The other nails are inspired by stained glass windows. The colour blocks are kind of like the glass, the and black lines are like the lead/resin-type-stuff that holds it together.

Also, we experimented further with eyes, after a successful - if slightly creepy – eye-based design in the past.

We guess the eye juxtaposed with the stained glass, and the actual flowers of God’s creation is kind of human wonderment at perception of the divine or something.

7.1/10

We like this and will probably be re-using all these techniques in new combinations in the future. The stained glass window nails could have been a little neater, however.