70's Beach House Manicure

  "I'm gonna call this manicure House of Sand and Fog, cuz it's beachy as fuck!"

 I am RRREEEAALLLYY excited about this manicure!  A fabulous geometric look starring my favorite color palette, and featuring my debut use of skinny nail tape!

 This lovely harlequin pattern was lifted right from Chalkboard Nails, and all I did was flip it 'round and change up the colors a bit.

  I'm really into this muted, faded-70s-basement palette.  I just cannot get enough peach!  Colors used here are my beloved Savina White Lavender as the base color, accented with Sally Hansen's Commander in Chic (slate brown), and First Kiss (that's the light coral).  And, of course, lovely Revlon in Jaded, and Minted, (both of which I am LOVINGGGG!) as well as Make Mine Mango (dark coral.)  Jaded is that oh-so-totally-not-Jade-colored chartreuse, and it is pretty much the shit.  Almost neon without going whole hog, but still totally jarring and flashy.  I needed one color to take my palette out of the safety zone!  I think having one clashing color can really make the whole palette pop a bit more.  Nothing worse than a mani design that ends up being a washout!

  You can see the chartreuse at work here, totally punching up that minty green and playing off the blue tones, and brightening that darker coral, too.

  I'm really into this design and this color palette, and I'm gonna have to just come out and say it - I think this one my be my favorite.  Maybe my favorite ever.  Basically I love this mani so much I want to marry it.  MAYBE I WILL!

50/50 Nails

  Wow, slacking this week, huh?  How about another quickie about nails?  We love those.

Photographed on an LP with a picture of a leather jacket, not actual leather.  Weird!

  I love to do a little half 'n' half mani when I can't decide between two colors.  I decided to go vertical since to me horizontal halfsies looks like a french mani that didn't know when to quit.  For this I used Revlon "Jaded," which I absolutely looove!  It's a super smooth opaque that's not too streaky.  I usually need three coats, two if I'm being heavy-handed.  It's just a really great pastel and I fucking love it.  Honestly I just love all my Revlon polishes.  For a drug-store find, they are really great, and they last a while, too.  The purple is some ridiculous stuff called Island Girl, which I  naturally bought in Maui.  It's called "Waikiki Dream" in case you ever find it.  I bought this on a day-drunk afternoon, so I don't remember how much it cost, but it was cheap.  Finally, a black stripe to divide the sides!  This added a little depth to the look, and covered up my sloppy seams.  Bonus!

Here's a way clearer picture with less accurate colors.  The pale green just gets so blanched by my camera's flash!

Party Nails: Clarissa Explains it All...

  Usually I have a basic idea, or at least a color scheme, when I set out to paint a new manicure.  Other times, I have so many ideas floating around that I can't pick favorites, so I'll do what I call Party Nails!  They are great for experimenting with color combinations, designs, or techniques (or a mix of all three!) 

For this look, I decided to pit pastels against neons, and combine my two favorite awkward color trends of the season!  (Seriously, why are both so wrong and yet....feel so right?)  I also wanted to try a funky '80s triangle pattern, but wasn't sure I'd be able to execute it properly on all fingers, so I went with a multitude of patterns!  Once finished, I realized I'd totally been channeling Clarissa Darling!  I'd like to pop my ladder up to her window so I could see what she thought...

Clarissa Manicures It All

And here are the results!  I have a lot of great ideas kicking around in my head after doing this manicure!

Despite doing a pretty good job (if I do say so myself) on the left hand (leftie pride - holla at me!), I still don't know if I'm ready for full triangles.  I use nail art brushes (super cheap on Amazon) to hand-paint all my designs, and precision definitely requires practice.

Anyway, I'm totally obsessed with both the triangles and the little hearts, especially the neon orange on mint green!  The colors are fairly true to life here, but the orange is so much more neon than these photos would have you believe.  For some reason, my little digital camera just doesn't want to pick up that orange!

I also took a long time debating between white and lavender as the final base color.  I ended up going with white, but in retrospect I really wish I'd gone with the lavender.  I think it would have jibed with the other colors better.  Oh well, something to think about for next time!

(Yes, that is a little pill-o-the-week case in the background left on the bottom photo.  I got this cute flower-patterned one at Daiso Japan, and I use it to organize my fake eyelashes! It's just the thing!) 

I am obsessed with the thumbs of this manicure!!