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Holiday nails

You may have noticed – or you may not – that I haven’t posted in a while.

Well, it’s because I’ve been away on holiday to France for a fortnight. I had a fabulous time. We stayed in a converted barn in the Charente Maritime. It’s an area we’ve been to before, and love it. The weather was beautiful; the gite fabulous.

I took about 25 polishes with me. I thought I’d packed them carefully, but I hadn’t counted on how my husband might chuck my precious nail polish bag in and out of the car, and I had one casualty. My bottle of OPI My Boyfriend Scales walls didn’t make it. I taped it up and now that it’s made it home safely again, I need to decant it into an empty bottle.

Broken polish bottle OPI My Boyfriend Scales Walls
My Boyfriend (No Longer) Scales Walls

I have previously worn all of the polishes I took with me. I took a range of summery colours, and quite surprised myself that most of the ones I chose were Barry M. They do make a great range of colours, and the Gellys in particular are great. I think I took my entire Gellys collection with me in fact!

I am not going to post the manicures separately, not only because I didn’t use my SLR camera, and so the photos aren’t that great, but also because the clean up isn’t as good as I usually do, and my cuticles are a little dry too. So instead I thought I’d do a quick rundown of the manicures I wore.

Polka dots

I wore NYC Lincoln Square Lavender on its own for a few days, and then added some polka dots. This is my very first polka dots manicure. I’ve been so scared of doing dots because I thought I wouldn’t make them very uniform, but for a first go I’m pretty pleased with myself.

NYC Lincoln Park Lavender with OPI My Vampire Is Buff polka dots
NYC Lincoln Park Lavender with polka dots using OPI My Vampire Is Buff
For this manicure I’ve used:
  • Colour: two coats of NYC Lincoln Square Lavender
  • Polka dots: OPI My Vampire Is Buff
  • Top coat: Sally Hansen Insta-Dri Anti-Chip

 

Striped manicure

Again, I wore a plain Barry M Mango manicure for a few days, and then spiced it up by taping off some random stripes and putting Barry M Passion Fruit over the top.

Stripes with Barry M Mango and Passion Fruit
Stripes with Barry M Mango and Passion Fruit
For this manicure I’ve used:
  • Colour: two coats of Barry M Mango (base) and Barry M Passion Fruit
  • Top coat: Sally Hansen Insta-Dri Anti-Chip

 

Gradient

After wearing Guava for a day or so I changed the manicure into a gradient, using white. I didn’t do a great job with this. I usually use a make up sponge for my gradients, as the holes are very small and uniform. But I hadn’t taken one with me on holiday, so I improvised and used a (clean and new) kitchen sponge. The holes in these sorts of sponges are very irregular, and it was difficult to do a perfect job. It looked good from a distance though and the colours were great.

Barry M Guava and China Glaze White On White gradient
Gradient using Barry M Guava and China Glaze White On White
For this manicure I’ve used:
  • Base colour: two coats of Barry M Guava
  • Gradient: sponged on with Barry M Guava and China Glaze White on White
  • Top coat: Sally Hansen Insta-Dri Anti-Chip

 

Dotted accent

At the end of our holiday, we went out for a fabulous meal in a lovely seafood restaurant. I wore a red top, so created nails to go with it.

Barry M Blood Orange with white red and orange dotted accent
Barry M Blood Orange with white, red and orange dotted accent using OPI My Boyfriend Scales Walls, Barry M Blood Orange and Barry M Mango
For this manicure I’ve used:
  • Colour: two coats of Barry M Blood Orange
  • Accent nail: two coats of OPI My Boyfriend Scales Walls; then dots using Barry M Blood Orange and Barry M Mango
  • Top coat: Sally Hansen Insta-Dri Anti-Chip

 

 

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All images are copyright to Kerruticles unless otherwise mentioned.
Barry M Guava and Marry M Passion Fruit were sent to me for review. All views expressed in this post are my own, honest and unbiased opinions.

Comments

Lou

Love all of these looks, what a great way to make your nails last longer by making small changes. In particular I like your dotty accent nail and the stripes with the Barry M polishes. 🙂

Claire Kerr

Thanks Lou. In hindsight, I really should have taken some holographic polishes and some more sparkly ones too, to take advantage of all the sunshine.

sarah

All them look perfect for a holiday! R.I.P mbstw

Claire Kerr

MBSW was taped up for the journey home and has now been safely decanted into an empty top coat bottle 🙂

sarah

Your a better person than me. I would be very OCD about it not being in the right bottle aha

Claire Kerr

It bugs me. I stuck the OPI label onto the top coat bottle, but it is still WRONG 😉