Abstract Nail Art Challenge Day 2: Tape

Today is the second day in the Abstract Nail Art Challenge and the theme for today is Tape! There are seriously 5 billion possibilities that tape can help with in creating a manicure. I thought about using striping tape to create some teeny lines, but I had this manicure written down in my nail notebook so I thought this was a chance to give it a whirl! 

I started with 2 coats of Revlon's Midnight Affair which is a shimmery dark navy blue, its vampy and I love it! Then I added a coat of Color Club top coat and waited for it to dry. Then I taped off triangles at the base of each nail using regular scotch tape, added another coat of Midnight Affair and sprinkled Silver Microbeads over the area. Then I removed the tape and pressed the beads into my nail with an orange stick. For an accent nail I did a whole nail of Silver beads over Midnight Affair. 

Excuse the dent in my thumb nail, I was a little ambitious in getting to add the beads and didn't wait long enough for it to dry! I did love this look though! I'm finding lots of ways to use microbeads and play with variations on the Caviar look! 

This was so easy and fun to do. I really enjoyed wearing it, even though I only wore it for a day before I picked off half the beads lol. This is just one of the many options that tape can help create. I have been having a lot of fun with tape since I started blogging! My one recommendation is that you cut your pieces of tape before you paint your nails so that the tape doesn't ruin your mani! 

Remember to stop by The Lacquerologist, BeautyGnome and Manicurator to see what these gorgeous ladies have done! 

Gradient Caviar Nails

Morning loves!


Today I have my own take on the Caviar manicure. When I first saw Ciates original Caviar mani I thought Wow that looks so cool! But with a over 20 price tag for the set it was just not something I could contemplate buying. There had to be a cheaper solution to get the same look! My mind drifted back to the last time I was in Michaels and saw some microbeads, I wondered if they would look similar. So I picked up a package of 6 colours, originally $11.99, but the lady at the cash register gave me  50% off coupon because I told her I don't get the flyer delivered. The next day I saw that Jen from The Polishaholic had done Caviar nails with the same microbeads! The next few days they were popping up all over the internet, so I thought how could I make this a litte different? A gradient of microbeads! This was my final result!

I was really pleased with the result of this! To get this look I first painted my nails with 2 coats of Orly's Luxe, which is a gold foil polish and let that dry. A while later I taped off my tips and painted some more of Luxe onto my tip. Then I grabbed my first colour of microbeads, Champange and poured them over the tips. I poured the beads into a small tupperware container to catch them. Then I taped off the bottoms of my nails and painted another swipe of Luxe inbetween the beads and where the tape was. I then poured Copper microbeads onto that section of my nail. Lastly I painted Luxe onto the remaining unbeaded nail and poured Antique Copper microbeads onto that part. Finally I pressed all the beads into the polish and shook off any that were loose and sitting on top of each other.

I love this! It's a little different than the other Caviar nails out there and I think looks really cool! I did them for last Saturday night as I was going out with some friends and they all commented that if I had these nails on the Red Carpet they would be blowing up! I laughed but was secretly like yeessss! :D

For the life of these nails, they are probably best for just one night. Mine started to lose colour the next day and many had falled off. I was a little rough on them though, I played frisbee for an hour and then straightened my hair and had a night out where I wasn't paying close attention to my nails. So the fact they still looked half decent the next day I was impressed with!

Do you love or hate the Caviar nails trend? Have you tried it yet? What do you think of my gradient caviars?

Sincerely Stephanie