Topshop bargains

Headed to Topshop at the weekend, where the final dreggs of the sale still remain. Here are the nail highs…

I've been needing some nail brushes for ages. Everything I've done so far has been painted with a thin metal dotting tool, meaning accuracy has been a bit on the wobbly side. Until I order some really thin ones, these should do nicely. £3 reduced from £10. Thanks Topshop.

Despite the large pile of nail gems I've already accumulated, I thought I'd add these to the collection for just 50p.

Here's what I did with some of the darker sequins…

Pink nail polish: Chanel Le Vernis in Fracas 571

These sale items are no longer on Topshop.com, so I'd take a trip to your local store pronto.

New York Fashion Week S/S 15

Looks like my New York Fashion Week tickets got lost in the post. Oh, yours too? Guess we need a new postman. 

Fortunately, Instagram and Twitter have been around to keep us updated with the collections and beauty looks. Well folks, New York gives good nail art. 

Here's a round up of my top five nail art looks from NYFW Spring / Summer 15 (in no particular order)…

1. CND had a massive presence at New York Fashion Week this year, ticking off quite a few shows. My top pick has to be Jan Arnold's contribution to Libertine. The nails made me nostalgic, creating letters out of Hama beads! The letters were then attached to nails to spell 'Libertine!' I'm now fighting off the urge to head to my local toy shop for some beads to iron. They also used 3D skulls complete with moveable jaws. Impractical but a lot of fun.

Photo credits, all taken from the following Twitter accounts: Left: @kelseyMManning, centre: @chelipj, right: @SamanthaSweet.

2. Founding Creative Director of Colour Prevails and Former Founding Creative Director of Butter London, Nonie Creme created these blue talons embellished with pearls for Honor.  

Photo credits: Instagram @beautydotcom. 

3. Models at Opening Ceremony headed down the catwalk with moody marble nails, courtesy of Naomi Yasuda. I'll do a how-to on these soon. 

Photo credits: Naomi Nails.

4. I'm awarding points to CND once again for the incredible false nails they created for The Blonds. Every model wore a unique set, which are so detailed. 

Photo credits: CNDWorld.

5. Last but not least are the ombre nails spotted at Monique Lhuillier, created by manicurist Gina Edwards. Sponge at the ready, I'm looking forward to recreating this design. 

Photo credits: Instagram @Nailscluboficial. 

My 'minimum effort award' goes to Prabal Gurung, for nails by Sally Hansen. I don't dislike them, but I'd probably use a darker background on my own nails. 

Photo credits: @TRESemme.

Will London Fashion Week beat these? Find out next week.  

Birthday girl

Ah birthdays, so bittersweet – celebrations, presents, and chocolate for breakfast, mingled with the reality that you’re another year older.

My initial idea for ‘birthday nails’ was to go all out with cake and balloon designs, but I realised I wouldn’t have a chance to change them for a few days so opted for something slightly more subtle. The birthstone for September is sapphire, so I chose dark blue and plenty of sparkle – no birthday should be without glitter.

I wrote my age in polka dots. Can you read the digits?

Last year I attended a nail art masterclass with Sophy Robson (you can read about it at Cosmopolitan UK). One of the tips I took away with me is that glitter nail polish looks even better when layered with other glitter nail polishes – just keep adding different shapes and colours. With this in mind I layered OPI ‘Absolutely Alice’ and Topshop ‘3D’, with my no.1 glitter: YSL  ‘Feuille D’Or’. I’m really not looking forward to trying to get it off!

It’s been a me-me-me kind of week, because as well as my birthday I also said goodbye to the job I’ve had for over a year.  The beautiful and thoughtful girls I worked with couldn’t have found me a more apt leaving card…

Heavenly hot dogs: Ketchup or mustard?

“Has anyone got a meat-coloured nail polish please?”

This beauty blog has quickly morphed into a food blog – apologies to anyone I’m making hungry. Just take comfort in the fact you are not alone, our waistbands our expanding together.

Hot dogs are my favourite food. There, I confessed. I know they’re gross, and I know all the nasties in them are likely to contribute to my demise, but seeing a sign for a footlong hot dog never fails to put a smile on my face.

I’ve been talking about Bubbledogs for at least a year – it’s a Champagne Bar that only serves hot dogs. I’m not overly fussed with Champagne – give me a G&T any day, but I’m willing to make allowances when the hot dog menu is so good. For no reason in particular, it’s taken me a while to visit. With it being my birthday weekend, I put Bubbledogs top of the places I wanted to visit. I feel sorry for the girls at work, because it must be all they've heard me talk about this week.

Friday night arrived and off we trotted to 70 Charlotte Street, to be told at Bubbledogs that the wait was an hour and a half. Quelle horreur! With a charming Draft House round the corner to keep us entertained, our names went on the list – an iPad to be precise. Despite being told there was a long wait, they had us inside within 30 minutes *high five*.

Choosing which hot dog to go for was tricky, ohhh the choice! In the end, three hot dogs arrived between two of us – hey, it was a birthday celebration okay?!

Here are the chosen ones:

Sloppy Joe - Bubbledogs beef chilli, cheddar cheese & chopped onions.

Mac Daddy - Macaroni & cheese, crispy onions, and bacon bits.

Reuben - Grilled sauerkraut, russian dressing, melted Swiss cheese.

They were all delicious. Ditto the sweet potato fries.

Of course, no meal at Bubbledogs is complete without a hot dog manicure…

T.G.I. Friday’s: Burger time

Oh burgers, how do I love thee? Let me count the ways… 

I’m writing this from the comfort of my armchair, unable to move due to a burger-induced food coma. The trouble with T.G.I. Friday’s is that everything sounds so good, you convince yourself that you’re Adam Richman and more than capable of eating your way through Man v. Food sized portions. Oops.

Some meals are spontaneous, others are excitedly planned a week in advance with your best friend. This trip was the latter, giving me time to do some themed burger and fries nail art…

I chose red, white, and black, in keeping with the T.G.I Friday’s colour scheme, but I just want to point out the black matte polish. Jessica does a great black duo called Black Beauties, which contains Black Lustre (shiny) and Black Matte. It’s just £14.85 from FeelUnique.com. YSL did something similar with Duo No6 Terriblement Noir Manicure, but you’ll be hard pushed to find it anywhere other than Ebay now and it’s double the price of Jessica.  

#BurgerFace

Reading Festival 2014

Yes! August Bank Holiday weekend is upon us, and for me that means one thing: Reading Festival 2014. 

I'll keep it brief, as I have a tent that needs erecting...

Last year I painted different band logos on each finger and thought I'd do the same this year. They're not particularly neat, but you get the idea. Camping for four nights is really going to put my Seche Vite topcoat to the test!

Here's the game: Can you guess the bands? I'll leave the answers at the bottom. 

Here's 2013 too:

And I thought I'd be polite and share the line-up with you... 

The answers:

2014: From left to right: Blink-182, Queens of the Stone Age, Chvrches, Peace, Papa Roach, Paramore, Klaxons, Arctic Monkeys, Twin Atlantic, Gerard Way. 

2013: From left to right: Green Day, Chvrches, Peace, Nine Inch Nails, Earl Sweatshirt, Eminem, Frightened Rabbit, Frank Turner, Fall Out Boy, Biffy Clyro.  

A trip to Belgium…

After a recent trip to Belgium, I’ve been able to surmise a timeline of university friendships. It does lead to nail art, honest.

1. You meet lots of people.

2. You quickly find that some of these people are sh*theads. Through no fault of your own, some people will decide that they consider you a sh*thead too.

3. After sifting through the figurative sh*t, you find friends. Brilliant, all sorted right? Not quite…

4. You and your friend(s) will probably like the same person. It’s inevitable. You’ll potentially both sleep with that person during Fresher’s Fortnight. Oops.

5. The metaphorical sh*t returns to hit the fan… Gossip travels faster than the speed of light on campus.

6. Everyone gets over it and accepts that university is a rather incestuous place. You can all bond further while you sit in the sexual health clinic holding hands. #STI

7. You spend around three happy years together – give or take an odd domestic over the washing up.

8. You have to say goodbye as everyone you’ve grown so close to are now flocking back to different places across the country. Or even harder… across the world. You cry all the way home. You cry more as you unpack. You conclude that no one understands your woes, and that the best days of your life are now over.

9. Your relationships turn digital. Facebook, Instagram, Skype… not quite the same as knocking on your roommate’s door at 2am with pizza.

10. It might take a fortnight, a month, one year or TWO, but you finally get organised and see each other again. Some of your friends will move to interesting places – take advantage and VISIT.

Okay, so every uni experience is slightly different, but you’ve got the gist of it.

Where am I going with this? A uni friend, Max (who kindly provided the photos for this blog post – except the chips, the chip picture is all mine) moved to Brussels. After two years, three of us decided to get on a Megabus and visit Belgium. A three-day reunion involving Belgian frites, beer, and waffles, is a beautiful thing. One of the most beautiful things in the world.

So here’s to friendship. And Belgian chocolate.

Oh, and nails. Because this is a nail blog. And of course, the theme was Belgium…

As well as acting as a tour guide, Max is a talented Web Developer. You can take a look at his work here: MaxMakeDesign. 

*Disclaimer: Not all personal experiences.*

The Blink-182 Effect

It isn’t every day three middle-aged men with guitars encourage you to restart your beauty blog again, but that’s exactly what happened after I saw Blink-182 perform at Brixton Academy.

As you’ll notice from previous blog posts, I love a theme. So the night before the Blink gig there was only one thing for it – paint Blink-182’s Untitled album cover on my thumb. Yup, I’m one cool kid.  Within minutes of uploading a photo onto Instagram, my phone was going crazy with Blink-182 fans liking the picture, even Blink-182’s official account hit the like button, not that I’m bragging or anything…

After spending the weekend feeling like a Z-list celebrity with so many notifications, I thought I’d start blogging again for anyone wanting some nail art inspiration.

For those of you who've landed on this page thinking you were getting a music review, apologies. What I will say is that it was incredible. Blink-182 rocked my little world. I laughed, I cried, I got kicked in the head by a crowd-surfer, someone’s pee definitely splashed up my leg, I did my best Tom-DeLonge-I-Miss-You-voice as loud as I could… I’d happily talk about this gig from now until I stop breathing, but they’ll be performing again at Reading Festival so I should probably get my tent packed.

Here’s the set list for those of you interested –

The list misses off Family Reunion and a Mark Hoppus drum solo. I repeat: A Mark Hoppus drum solo. 

I’d now love to end with lyrics from ‘Family Reunion’, but I’m not pop punk enough to get my blog reported. Y’all know what I did to your mom anyway… x

Time to turn holographic

I’ve wanted holographic nail varnish for a while. I’ve tried a few but they’ve never been quite right. At work I was told about one from Urban Outfitters. So, I trundled down to Oxford Street and parted £12 for the varnish.

When I applied it I was slightly disappointed – it looked just like any other silver shade... UNTIL I saw it under the light. When artificial or natural light shines on this varnish, it creates rainbows at your fingertips.

Would I recommend it? Yes, but save it for when the sun is shining more. It’s perfect for festivals – I wore it for seven days without any chips (aside from a minor bowling incident).