The Lacquer Legion: Reinvention

Today's post is my contribution to the very first posting of The Lacquer Legion!  The Lacquer Legion is a new monthly nail art challenge group hosted by Sarah, Rebecca, Leslie, and Sammy, and everyone can participate!  You can read more into detail in Sarah's post here. 

This month's theme is reinvention - to be interpreted in any way.  I was a little pressed for time and ideas but still wanted to participate, so I reinvented my second most popular nail art ever (but probably my favourite,) the half-moon gradient.  You can see my original post here. 

For those of you who are curious, my most popular post ever is my reciprocal gradient nail art, which has since spread across the internet and been re-created so many times!  

I chose to reinvent this look simply by changing up the colours to a combination I wish I'd tried ages ago, because I love it!  I started with two perfect coats of LaCC 1966, and a coat of LaCC 2013 top coat to speed things up.  Once that was all dry, I used hole reinforcers to mark off my half-moons, then sponged a gradient with 1966 and piCture pOlish Honey Dew.  It's all topped off with two coats of Seche Vite to smooth everything out.  

I'm so in love with how this turned out; I can't believe I waited over a year to re-create this look!!  I honestly can't decide if I like this or the original colour palette better... What do you think?  :)  

If you take part in this month's The Lacquer Legion challenge, remember to post to social media with the hashtag #LLreinvention  :)  I'll be sure to check out everyone's manis!

Femme Fatale Cosmetics: Spindleweb & Winter Hyacinth

Hi all!  Apologies for the lack of posting over the past week; I always think I'm going to have more free time than I actually do at these things, and by the time I get back from a long day of dance all I want to do is sleep!  Nevertheless, I've had a pretty productive weekend in terms of blogging stuff, so there should be a couple more posts coming up soon.  

Today I've got two super awesome polishes to show you from the Australian indie brand Femme Fatale Cosmetics!  I received four polishes to review, but I took so many photos that I decided to split them up into two posts.  These were my first polishes from Femme Fatale, and I was pretty impressed.  Click the jump to read more on what I thought!  :)

Teal Spotted

I will not say good morning, since I neither feel good this morning, mean it is a morning to be good on, mean it is a good morning whether you want it or not, nor all of them at once.  (x)  I do, however, have some cool nail art I did last week to share with you. 

I started with a base of OPI My Boyfriend Scales Walls, and followed this tutorial by CutePolish on YouTube with Orly Le Chateau to create the spotted look. 

Topped it with one coat of Seche Vite.  This look was pretty easy to achieve once I figured out which of my perfumes worked best to create the spots.  The most difficult part was cleaning up, Le Chateau stains like crazy!! 

How do you like this look?  I think it's a great alternative for those of us who can't get our hands on OPI Spotted (though I'll take a look for it when I go to Europe in March), and there's infinite colour choices when you do it this way!  

I've got another post scheduled for tonight with something very exciting, so look out for that later!  :)

Indie January: A England Saint George

Day 3 of Indie January; today I'm showing you A England Saint George, a stunning teal polish with a subtle holographic effect.

The photos show two coats of polish, but if you don't have a very visible nail line you could easily get away with one.  The formula was a tad thick for my liking, but a couple drops of thinner made it much better.  Also, this one stains your cuticles like crazy, be careful not to flood!  

I wore this with one coat of Seche Vite for three days without any chips, it's that amazing!!  I got a pair of dark teal corduroy pants for Christmas (which I've been wanting forever!) and they matched this polish perfectly!  :)

A England polishes are available through Llarowe and the A England website, and you can keep up with the brand on Facebook.  

Do you like the subtle holographic look?  Do you own any A England polishes that you love?  And lastly, does your wallet now hate me?  ;)

Disclaimer: The products in this post were sent to me for review. 

Exotic Encounters of the Lacquered Kind

Now that we're past that awesome post title, I just got my first polish from the China Glaze on Safari Collection (I'm a little behind, I know.)  China Glaze isn't easily available to me, but occasionally I'll walk into Winners and find a ridiculous amount of China Glaze and OPI on sale for half-price, and they're usually the more recent collections!  

Of the China Glaze they had, Exotic Encounters was the only one that I knew I needed.  Had my mom not been watching my every move (she knows it's dangerous when I find nail polish on sale) I probably would have walked out with the entire collection plus a couple OPIs. 

I decided to stamp over two easy coats of Exotic Encounters with an animal print pattern from BM-313 and Essie Good As Gold.   The colour choices ended up looking slightly turtle-ish to me, but I really like it!

Also, I'd like to let you know that I entered one of my manicures in a contest to win the entire Zoya Gloss Collection at Fab Fatale.  Zoya isn't easily available to me where I live, and I'd really appreciate if you could help me.  It only takes a minute to go here and click the "Vote" button underneath the manicure you see at the end of the post. (Essie Merino Cool and BM-315)

All the help is much appreciated, and I promise if I win I'll have a ton of awesome jelly sandwiches to share with you!  Have a good day!