Union Jackie Nails!
So yesterday I managed to spill nail polish remover all over my iPhone. I spent the rest of the day trying to dry it out (pointless really since solvents dry instantaneously, and so no amount of rice made any difference), then researched my insurance plan and realised it'll cost me a minimum of £50 to get it fixed. ANYWAY, it's still completely usable and the only issue is the screen, which now has a lovely patchy effect across it. It's not really noticeable unless I'm loading up a blank page, so I reckon I'll just have to live with it. My sparkly gold case was not so lucky - overnight the acid went to work bubbling and disintegrating the plastic, so I'm crossing my fingers that this won't happen to my phone as well!
This morning I reopened my nail art box, and decided to try a design that I've been thinking about for a while. It's a girly take on the Union Jack, swapping red and blue for pink and purple, and adding a little gem. All of this was done freehand as I want to get as much practise with straight lines as possible, so apologies for the messiness! I think they look quite cute, but they're not an all-time favourite. Maybe if I'd kept my nails square it would have looked better... Anyway, here's how I did it!
The equipment:
Natural Collection 'White'
Models Own 'Pastel Pink'
Fearne 'Cotton Candy'
Pink gems
Models Own 3-in-1 clear coat
A fine nail art brush
I started out with white bases, using 2 coats to achieve a good finish. I didn't realise that this Natural Collection varnish is actually a nail tip whitener... I got it from Boots as they have a 3 for 2 on cosmetics at the moment, so I couldn't really resist. It seems to work okay, but it's nothing to write home about!
Once dry, I started adding crosses using my fine brush and the pale pink. As I said before, this was all done freehand, so the lines aren't perfect. I think I did pretty well though!
When my pink St. George's cross was dry, I added the outlines of triangles using purple. These were really tricky to do, and I had to make sure that my paint brush was carefully cleaned prior to application. I also cut away any stray bristles which could have caused trouble!
I filled in the triangles, leaving enough white gaps to finish adding the St. Patrick's saltire (yes, I am a geek who researched exactly which part of the United Kingdom each section of the flag relates to!)
Once complete, I added a pale pink gem to the centre of each flag, and then finished with a top coat. The Models Own clear coat always seem to neaten out any messy bits, and creates a lovely finish. As I said before, this would probably look better with squared off nails, but I'm still pretty pleased with it. I'm probably the least patriotic person in the world, but I've seen so many Union Jack/flag nail designs, I had to add a Little Tip Off twist. Maybe I'll try this again with striping tape, to ensure straight lines and symmetry, or mix it up a bit with different flags for each finger nail!
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