Nails Archives - Irish Beauty Blog Beautynook

Chrome Nails Do It Yourself

It’s been a long long time since I’ve spoken nails here on Beautynook. I believe my last post was here years ago chatting about smelly Revlon nail polishes! I’m too embarrassed to click on it. But if you want to have a look and cringe at my even worse photos, go right ahead 🙂 I’m breaking the fast and coming at you with a post about doing chrome nails. At home, yourself. No salon is required here…or UV lamp, don’t worry 🙂

To create your own chrome nails, you will need: A nail polish colour of your choice, a clear top coat of you choice. You can use your finger, but it can get a bit messy, so may I suggest you rescue a sponge applicator in an eyeshadow palette you might have lying around. Then, the main thing you need is the chrome powder.

I know loads of high street brands are jumping on board with these now, so you don’t have to get the specific one I am using. But it is from Essence and it is super affordable. And Essence is readily available here in Ireland, so it might be a good one to look out for. The one I have is called Metal Shock Nail Powder in ‘Mirror, mirror on the nail’.

I would suggest creating your chrome nails on a wipe clean surface, or on something you don’t mind getting sparkly. The powder is super fine and it can get messy.

Start with clean nails. I applied a clear base coat, just in case the polish stains mine. Completely optional though.

With your polish colour of choice, apply a layer to one hand. I did a couple of nails at a time, just so I could show the process, but doing all five in one go is fine.

Let the polish dry for a few minutes. Essence suggest 60 seconds. I find that a bit too soon personally. You end up moving the polish and making a mess. I left mine for about 3 or 4 minutes.

Dip you eyeshadow sponge lightly into the powder and then begin the process of gently rubbing it onto the nails, one at a time. Don’t press too hard, remember the polish underneath is still tacky.

As you rub the powder in, the magic happens. You get the chrome nails effect!

It works in the same way as if you were doing it on gel nails, you’re just not curing anything so it might not last as long. But, you get a very similar result right?

Finish the nails off with a clear top coat. To lock everything in place, but to also help with the shine. Essence do a polish specifically for this purpose, but you could just use one you already have.

You will have a bit of overspill of powder around the nail bed. Just let them dry and you can clean everything up with a cotton bud and some nail polish remover.

And there you have my do it yourself chrome nails! Cheap, easy and pretty effective, if I do say so myself 🙂

xxx

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January 12, 2018/by Gem

Bargain Buying, Hair, Makeup, Nails, Skincare

Kris Kindle For Beauty Lovers

I had made the decision not to do Christmas gift ideas here on Beautynook this year. It hasn’t stopped me for sharing things on social media though. But, when I share product here, I want to be able to stand by it and share because I know I love it. I’m not in a position as the blogger I am that I get sent a whole load of press samples and I don’t have the cash to buy everything I would want to share. Maybe next year 🙂 I did have a bit of Christmas fomo though not going to lie, so I’ve done some research and compiled a list of Kris Kindle treats for the beauty lovers in your life, or yourself. These are not too pricey goodies that I would genuinely be happy to get off someone for Kris Kindle or as a stocking filler.

I am kind of going back on my word I know, don’t judge me. I thought Kris Kindle/ stocking fillers was a good middle ground though. Not too pricey and I can still talk Christmas beauty. So John, if you’re reading, take note 🙂

My first choices are from one of my favourite shopping destinations Spacenk. On a side note, European orders need to be made on the website by the 14th of December in order to make delivery by Christmas.

The Eve Lom Kiss Mix is a really well known and effective lip balm in the beauty world. It hydrates and leaves behind a lovely sheen on the lips too.

For Christmas this year, it comes in a really cute disco ball for £16.

Super cute and super practical. You can get it in store or directly from the website here.

Next up we have the Merry & Bright Christmas Cracker from Oskia.

The Oskia Renaissance Cleansing Gel is probably one of my favourite facial cleansers….ever! It is pricey though. This cracker is a really good middle ground. You get a pretty packaged gift with a really luxury product inside. The normal 100ml sized bottle is 30 quid, where as you get this 40ml bottle for £18.50. Not cheap, but a little does go a long way with this product. It is listed on the website here.

Emma Hardie who are also knows for their facial cleanser have a really cute Kris kindle appropriate gift set too.

For £25 you get a 50ml or their cult cleansing balm, a cleansing cloth and a 15ml of the Age Support moisturiser. All in a little toiletry bag. You can click here to see it on the Spacenk website.

My next choice is a variation of something I actually got myself for Christmas this year. This is just more stocking filler appropriate. It is the Aromatherapy Associates ‘My Treat’.

They have different ones to suit all budgets and requirements though. This is their Revive Morning Bath & Shower Oil, again already in really pretty festive packaging. This will set you back £10 which I don’t think is too bad at all. You can get it on the website here.

My last choice from Spacenk is the Glow On The Go set from Becca.

It contains a mini but still substantial ‘Moonstone’ Shimmering Skin Perfector in pressed and liquid formula. I think any makeup fan would be delighted to open this on Christmas, me included. This is £20 from the website here.

Next up I have a few choices from Irish owned website Cloud10beauty.

The Cocoa Brown Golden Goddess Collection is a great reasonably priced stocking filler.

For €14.95 you get three shimmering dry body oils including their brand new one ‘Ice Goddess’.

Shimmering skin for the party season for whoever is lucky enough to be gifted it. You can pick this up from the Cloud10beauty website here.

The Pixi Glow Tonic is such a great addition to your skin care, so this Best Of Bright Kit, would be a great Kris Kindle for you or a beauty lover in your life :).

For €25.95 you get a 30ml of their glow tonic, 13ml of the Glow Mud Mask and a 13ml or the Glow Mud Cleanser. All full of glycolic loveliness.

This set is available from the website here.

My last choice from Cloud10beauty is the Real Techniques Your Picks Berlin.

This is a limited edition brush set containing their best selling brushes voted for by the fans. You get their buffing brush, contour brush, stippling brush, deluxe crease brush and the base shadow brush, I use all of these on a daily basis (except for the stippling brush). So, I thought this was a good addition to my list. It costs €29.95 from the website here.

My last website choice is Boots. You can of course go in store too. Now Boots have a huge amount of gift ideas. I just picked four things to add to my list otherwise this blogpost would go on forever 🙂

The first one is a bit pricey and probably over the average Kris Kindle budget. I thought I would add it in in case you have a little bit more to spend though.

This is the Marc Jacobs Daisy Rollerball Gift Set, We do not have enough roller ball fragrances on sale in Ireland. They are so handy and brilliant if you just want to try a perfume or just don’t want to commit to a full size bottle. This contains 3 10ml rollerballs with three different Daisy fragrances. Original Daisy, Daisy Drea and Daisy Eau so Fres. A bit steeper than the rest at €64 here. But I thought it was lovely so wanted to include it :).

Sleek Makeup are killing it this year with their gift sets. All of them are lovely. I thought the Palette Gift Set was particularly nice though so wanted to share.

This contains their Vintage Romance Palette, two True Colour lipsticks in Liqueur (on the left), Vamp (on the right), blush in Antique Blush and a makeup bag all for €28.99 here.

I thought this Molton Brown hand Cream Gift Set was really lovely.

It’s already gift wrapped and you really cannot go wrong with Molton Brown. This is €30 from the Boots website here.

I had to add in Soap & Glory here somewhere. They just do Christmas so right. There are an abundance of sets to choose from including makeup. I went with the Clean Get Away gift set for €15.

I just thought it was affordable, small and compact, so would fit in a stocking and would be easy to bring into work on Kris Kindle day 🙂 It contains travel minis of their The Righteous Butter, Clean On Me Shower Gel, Calm One, Calm All bubble bath and a mini Hand Food.

And that is my Kris Kindle for beauty lovers done! Well I could go on and on and on, but I have to stop somewhere 🙂

Hope it’s helpful and Merry Christmas!!

xxx

December 7, 2016/by Gem

Nails

Rimmel Super Gel Top Coat

If you follow me on Snapchat (my username is Beautynook if you don’t, shameless plug), you’ll know I’ve been testing out the new Rimmel Super Gel Top Coat pretty vigorously.

I’ve used it about 5 times on top of different branded nail polish and base coats and I pretty much had the same outcome with them all. Boots describe it as “Rimmels first ever 2- step Super Gel nail polish for superior colour and shine that lasts for up to 14 days. Easy to apply, it dries like a regular nail polish, no UV lamps needed.”

It has the standard Rimmel nail polish packaging, which I am a fan of.

I love that the brush is quite large,flat and rounded at the tip. For me, this makes application easier.

Just to show you the process quickly:

Here’s my bare nails.

Here’s the base coat applied.

Two layers of nail polish.

I let the nail polish dry for a few minutes before applying the Rimmel Super Gel Top Coat.

You can see, it definitely adds a lovely glass like shine to your nails and really finishes them off. It’s easy enough to apply and doesn’t drag or move the nail polish underneath. It also dries reasonably quickly, which is a plus too! I painted my nails in the evening time, so the next morning, they were still looking good!

My Nails The Next Day After Application.

My Nails On Technically The Third Day.

After the second full day of wear, you can see (especially on my pinkie finger), bubbles have started to form.

By the third full day, this had happened.

The nail polish on my little finger had completely come loose and just peeled off. Not ideal!

Overall, and after testing out the Rimmel Super Gel Top Coat on numerous occasions, I really can’t say it lasts as well as gel UV nail polish. I got pretty much 3/4 days before it started to crack and I was at the stage where I could just peel it off my nails (I do really enjoy doing that though) :). For me, I will use it because I have it, but I won’t be repurchasing it any time soon.

You can get the Rimmel Super Gel Top Coat from Boots in store or online here. It will set you back €7.99 so definitely not the cheapest version on the market at the minute.

June 1, 2016/by Gem

Nails

Top Spring Nail Polish Colours

I am a nailpolishaholic. If you follow me on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram you will know I like to post obnoxious pictures of my painted nails on a regular basis…I do apologise 🙂

So I trifled through my collection to talk about the nail polish colours that represent Spring in a nail polish bottle for me. By all means you can switch and change brands and shades, these are just what I own.I am a firm believer that if you have and use a good base coat and top coat, you can use any brand of coloured polish and it should last pretty well on your talons!

I have very recently downsized my collection in order to fit them onto my new acrylic wall rack. So I threw out all the polishes I was hoarding in boxes and only kept the ones I know I would actually use:

So onto my picks for Spring:

Firstly I had to pick a hot pink. A hot pink is essential in Spring for me, it looks fab on your fingernails and your toenails and goes with everything, and helps accentuate a tan whether it be natural or from a bottle 🙂

I chose a BarryM colour. These polishes are so readily available in Boots and Superdrug, they are cheap and they have such a wide range of colours. I love them.

Barry M in Limited Edition 029

Next up I chose Peach. Peach is a colour that screams warmer weather to me. It’s the colour of icepops and sweets 🙂 It’s a good colour to have for those, who do not want to go crazy with their nail colour as it can look quite subtle and clean on the nails. I chose another Barry M polish, shock horror, this was a cult buy for last summer within the blogosphere!

Barry M Peach Melba 318

Next I chose… another Barry M pastel tone! I’m sorry but they’re lovely 🙂 I have a good cross section of brands in my collection but Barry M are really good and the pastels are lovely and creamy. Two coats and you’re good to go! So I chose a pastel lilac tone.

I love this colour and lilac is very on trend at the minute. Again, if you are afraid of colour, even use something like this on your accent nail for a touch of something different.

Barry M 308 Barry I/C

I have a sky blue shade chosen for my next spring nail polish. I think this sort of shade looks great on all skin tones and looks really interesting on long and short nails alike. It can really jazz up a look without going too over board.

This is an Essie shade, I love Essie polish from the point of view that their colour selection is amazing and the polishes themselves are easy to apply and do not need much working with. However, I will say they don’t last aswell as some other brands of polishes and they cost a small fortune here in Ireland, if other brands do the same shade for cheaper I say get it!

Essie Mint Candy Apple

Lastly, I chose a shade that is not for the faint hearted. This shade of nearly apple green sums up Spring in a colour to me. If you’re someone like me who loves bright colours on their nails, rock the hell out of it, if not this would be a great accent colour on the ring finger or whichever finger you choose to be brave with:

This particular polish is a Revlon polish. Revlon do a great formula of polishes, I have a few of them and they are some of my firm favourites. I can’t wait to give their new perfumed range a go 🙂

Revlon 510 Sassy

So there you have it, my spring nail wardrobe. I am rarely without nail polish, I don’t feel put together without it. Whether it is to compliment your look with a similar hue to your clothes or makeup or for it to contrast it, it all looks good in my book 🙂

Thanks letting me ramble on,

Gemma

xxx

April 21, 2014/by Gem

xxx

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