Wednesday, 13 July 2016

First Impressions! Born Pretty Clear Jelly Stamper

I've been wanting to buy this Born Pretty stamper for a very long time. I finally took the plunge about a week ago and splurged a whole £2.99 on it! I know what you're thinking...hey big spender.

I don't know about you, but my Instagram feed is full of stamping tutorials with clear jelly stampers, so I thought it was about high time I tried it out for myself. I chose this Born Pretty stamper thanks to a great recommendation by the lovely Nailasuarus.

Here's what it looks like: It comes as a two piece set complete with scraper. More pics below.
If I'm totally honest, the jelly part wasn't as clear as I was hoping for. You could definitely see through it, but it had a few tiny scratches (from the production process I'm guessing) and air bubbles in it which was a shame. But saying that, I don't think this affected it's performance in any way, as I was still very impressed with the results.


The jelly tip had a sticky texture, which meant the polish stuck to it very well, but unfortunately meant wiping it free of cotton wool fibres (after cleaning polish off) was a nightmare and virtually impossible!

The huge advantage I found with the clear stamper is that you can see exactly where you're placing the stamping design, which means avoiding that annoying 'off-centre' results I normally end up with!


I decided to use my MoYou Explorer 07 plate to test out how it transfers designs. As you can see, it transferred in some places better than others. But I'm very pleased with the overall effect!


Polishes used

I would definitely recommend this stamper set if you are wanting to try nail stamping out. It's so affordable that I don't really think you can go wrong with it!

And with free shipping, a big thumbs up to Born Pretty Store!

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Do you guys use clear stampers? Let me know what you make of them!

Wednesday, 6 July 2016

Back to basics...Dots!

Carrying on the theme of simple designs, I've gone for spots this week. I tried to go for a kind of ombré-dot effect, and I don't think I'm too far off. I'm really pleased with how they've turned out!

This really is an easy design to do...

No base colour necessary, literally all you need is a dotting tool! I used the set I got from Amazon for only £2.50. I started by doing larger dots at the tip of the nail, and made them smaller as I worked my way up the nail, almost as if they fade to nothing at the top. I don't really think it matters which order you do the colours in, but I chose the method of doing one colour at a time, starting with the darkest colour. Then I applied a top coat and that was it!

How simple is that?!

So here's what it looks like!
Disclaimer: Apologies for the awful quality picture - my iPhone let me down this week! Urghhh.



Polishes used
Dark Purple/Pink - OPI Push and Pur-pull
Dark Purple/Pink - Essie Flowerista
Light purple - Rimmel 707 Marshmallow Heaven
Light pink - Rimmel 262 Ring A Ring O'Roses
Top Coat - HK Girl (Best top coat ever!!!)