Getting Topshop's SS12 Hieroglyphic Nails

Sorry for the lack of updates. I've been snowed under and then now it's Fashion Week and... yeah. Anyway, here's a piece I wrote for Grazia Daily on Sophy Robson's hieroglyphic nails that she did for Topshop's Spring/Summer 2011 show. More updates soon, I promise!

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Those who know me know that I'm a fan of many things and one of those things in particular is nails. I love pretty colours, wacky designs and amazing artwork - all of which Sophy Robson does so well. I've been eagerly awaiting all of her London Fashion Week updates and yesterday's Topshop hieroglyphic nails caught my eye. The bright colours! The simple but super impressive designs! I had to have them on my nails - now!

Apologies to Toppers for not using their polishes but I didn't have any of the right colours to hand (no pun intended). Instead I used Revlon's "Gold Coin" for the gold (middle finger and thumb), OPI's "Monsooner or Later" for the red (index and pinky) and OPI's "Teal The Cows Come Home" for the blue (ring finger). I also used WAH nails/Model's Own nail art pen in black, Andrea Fulerton's Stripe and Sparkle in Kathleen (aka white) and Andrea Fulerton's Stripe and Sparkle in Gloria (blue) to do the detailing.

After painting two coats of colour I then did the designs by freehand using nail art pens to draw eyes onto my nails. Two curves, a couple of lines, a dot of blue and a dot of black somehow made a passable eye. A horizontal stripe of "Gold Coin" and two thin-ish black lines completed the index whilst a thick white line, two black vertical lines and some zigzags finished off my pinky. The triangle on the ring finger was easy enough to do freehand and I'm rather impressed with my clean lines, if I do say so myself! A good coating of Seche Vite and I'm done, I've got the Egyptian look! What do you think? On the left is a pic from Sophy Robson's Twitter and on the right is my attempts at getting Egyptian nails...

Sophy Robson for Sephora

Do I talk about Sophy Robson too much on my blog? Probably. But I just can't get enough of her nails and seeing her shoot with Sephora just made me DIE! My favourite of the bunch has to be the purple half moon mani:

What can I say, I guess I'm just a sucker for half moon manis and most especially, giant rhinestones!!

I had some free time last week to do my nails so opted to try out this look. I didn't have any gorgeous gold crystals but I did make a trip to Poundland for some of their nail art kits (which turned out to be buy one get one free!!!) so I used the silver gems in that. And the result?

Not too bad. This is after a week's wear and you can see that it's wearing off at the ends - eep! What you can't see is some of the gems have fallen off but otherwise it's all in pretty good nick! I started off by using Barry M's Limited Edition pastel purple (the one they did for Boots with the gold lid) before painting on the darker purple - Revlon's "Passionfruit" (scented and oh-so-nice) on top, leaving the half moon. I did this freehand and it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. I then added a bit of Seche Vite and the gems on top before sealing with another layer of Seche Vite.

I'd love to get my hands on those bigass gold gems that Sophy used so I guess I'll keep my eyes peeled on eBay for them. The whole shoot that Sophy did for Sephora is just pure and total NAIL PORN so you should all definitely take a look!

Antonio Berardi V-Gaps

Ahh, Sophy Robson, how I worship at your feet! I remember seeing these nails earlier this year when Sophy blogged about them on her site. Ladies and gentlemen, here is the v-gap as seen at Antonio Berardi AW11.

Love how this look is both classic and new at the same time. Swoon!

The show nails created by Sophy were petrol blue. Unfortunately I am seriously lacking in the blue department so after some hmming and ahhing I eventually settled on a matte polish. I picked Revlon's "Ruby Ribbon" which is part of their matte suedes range although if I'm honest the colour is more red brown and the final effect reminds me more of leather than suede - definitely a handy one for Loewe leather look nails!

As you can sort of make out here there is still a slight sheen to the polish so in my opinion it's not a true matte but still gorgeous all the same.

This was definitely trickier than I had anticipated. I reckon this could have been made simpler by using a square piece of tape, placing it at a diamond angle at the bottom of the nail and then painting vertically upwards leaving that all-important gap in the middle, of course. If I were going to do this look again (and I totally would) this is how I would do it so note to self: stock up on some tape.

Vogue Nippon Loewe Nail Stickers

One of my favourite moments of SS11 were the nails that Sophy Robson created for Loewe:

So when I heard that Vogue Nippon's April issue had some Loewe nail stickers free inside I rushed down to nearest newsagents asap! Unfortunately the mag was £16 and I couldn't justify the pricetag for a mag I couldn't even read (and those glorious nail stickers). So plan b: I gave my aunt a call in Taiwan and within ten days had received the lovely nail stickers in the post:

Purty purty!

I was a bit surprise to find it's an actual sticker and by that I mean it's a gigantic sticky block. I was kind of expecting some sort of rub-on transfer or stickers the size of nails (a bit like Sally Hansen or Nail Rock) but nope, it's a gigantic sticker. Besides the fact that I'm too lazy to cut it to size I'm also a little anal when it comes to stickers. When I was younger I used to collect stickers (and still do with seventeen days to go until my twenty-third birthday..) but am still very reluctant to actually use them. The butterflies at the top are individual stickers so I may use those at some point but I just hate the idea of breaking it up!

I'll let you know if I get over my anal-ness or manage to get my hands on some more...

Marc by Marc Jacobs SS11 v2.0

I did these nails after three attempts at doing some more runway nails. I couldn't do any of the previous prints any justice on my nails and was getting increasingly frustrated when I thought I'd do this as it's relatively simple.

I used Butter London's "Pearly Queen" as the base colour, then layered on dots with the end of a hair pin (works quite well if you don't have any tools like me!) The black and white were Barry M and the red was OPI's "Monsooner or Later". Easy peasy.

These nails were actually retweeted by Marc Jacobs and Sophy Robson (my nail idol)!

Sophy Robson's Giles Nails

I had a go at doing Sophy Robson's Giles' nails (with different colours) a while ago. They were super easy - no special tools needed - and got me lot of attention! They were even a hit with boys!