Colour Block Nails

My friend when for a manicure one day and came back with some really pretty nails! I even asked her to send me a picture of her nails so I could try to recreate them!



She took the picture with her iphone so please excuse the quality of the picture! From what I can tell, I think the manicurist might have used a very sheer pink (OPI Bubble Bath), a light purple (OPI Do You Lilac It?) and a darker purple (OPI Siberian Nights / William Tell Me About OPI?) for the base colours, before dotting on white dots along the different colour lines. My friend also did a 3D flower that I'm assuming the manicurist hand-drew with some white acrylic paint. I cant recreate the flower but I can definitely try to do the colour blocking! (Just thought you might like to know, she paid $50 for this mani and I don't know how she does it but her manicure ALWAYS lasts forever. I saw her last week and she was into her second week of the manicure with minimal tip wear and no chips at all! And it's just regular OPI polish, so I'm wondering how long a gel mani will last on her nails!)

So, I started off with a light pink base.



I used 2 coats of Essie Not Just A Pretty Face for this but perhaps I should have used one coat so it'd look more sheer!



My friend was telling me about Zoe Raymond's Tiffany Blue colour block nail so I decided to whip out China Glaze For Audrey (the closest thing to that precious robin-egg blue shade ever!!!) and Flyin' High, which I've long considered to be For Audrey's darker sister! One thing good about this mani is that you don't really have to be super clean with your lines as the white dots will cover up most of the jagged strokes, so there's no need to use manicure strips! Now, my lines are far from clean but...



With the white dots, they magically look really nice and clean! I then proceeded to paint a layer of SV on top to even things out!



I tried to recreate my friend's purple combination with a layer of Essie Not Just a Pretty Face, TFS PP408 and OPI Siberian Nights on my index. I must admit, I should have done the lines just a little bit cleaner, or do larger white dots! I also wish I had longer nails so I can start the purples lower down my nail!
For my middle finger, I wanted to do a real colour block, with 3 full on colous and in straight lines so going with the military colours trend, I used OPI A-Taupe Space Needle, Elianto Black and China Glaze Westside Warrior.

For my ring finger, I didn't do a pink base cuz I was a bit too lazy. I used Colour Club Take Me To Your Chateau and OPI Road House Blues for the blue strips! Oh, and I used scotch tape for the straight lines, in case you were wondering how I managed to get the lines so straight!

For my pinkie, obviously I went free hand again. I wanted something green, so I started with a light sea form green using Essie Absolutely Shore. Then I used OPI Stranger Tides, a beautiful sage green, followed by China Glaze Westside Warrior. I love how the green progresses and how it's not the minty green that you'd expect. As a result, it does look very Fall and is totally appropriate if you're leaving in a region that has the 4 seasons (unlike us Singaporeans who only experience the sun and the rain, so lucky you)!

I showed my mum this mani idea and she liked it so much she made me paint her nails with the purple pattern on my index finger for her birthday! My mum hasn't painted her finger nails since forever (really, like at least a good 4-5 years) so I'm taking it that she really liked the design to have asked for it!

So, colour black nails, yay or nay? And remember you can easily recreate this look at home so don't go out and pay a manicurist for something you can do yourself!