Category: Sally Hansen

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Patterned Watercolour Nails Inspired by @thesammersaurus

So I’ve been feeling a little stuck, inspiration wise, & when I feel lost for ideas I love browsing through the feeds of my favourite nail artists to see what catches my eye. I was scrolling through @thesammersaurus‘s instagram feed & came across a gorgeous geometric design from 3ish years ago. I’ve been a massive fan of Sammy’s for a long time–she was one of the first nail art blogs I discovered–& I love how she comes up with awesome, creative designs & rocks those shorter nails!  It gives hope to those out there who don’t have crazy long nails. So when I discovered this gorgeous design I loved, I popped over to her blog & found all the details of her design to make painting my recreation way easier! 

For the manicure, the products used were:

  • Base Coat: Cutex Brittle Nail Fix
  • Top Coat: Cutex Quick Dry Top Coat
  • Essie Go Ginza 
  • Essie Play Date
  • Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Royal Hue
  • Sally Hansen Hard As Nails Hard To Get
  • OPI My Favourite Ornament 
  • Xroma Polish & Vinyls X Stencil (I cut off the bottom) 
  • The Base Coat Triangle Pattern Stencil
  • Latex Free Make Up Sponge 

Thanks to my vast collection of vinyls, I was able to cheat & skip having to place striping tape/skinny vinyls individually for a relatively easy to do manicure! (Thank god for that!) I also used a make up sponge instead of the Saran Wrap technique for my colour blending on the accent nails. But even though I didn’t follow her exactly, I feel like this recreation turned out Pretty on point. Just please ignore the shrinkage on my middle finger nail. 😂


Do you have a favourite nail art you love to turn to for nail art inspiration? Where is your favourite place to get nail art inspiration from? Let me know in the comments below! 💜

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Easy Pink Gradient Dotticure

Gradient dotticures never get old to me. They’re such a quick, easy option for nail art & sometimes I’m all about the quick & easy manicures! While I used to be able to stay up all night creating complex & time consuming design, I just don’t always have that option anymore (& when I do the next day is always rough!)

 For anyone who is just getting into nail art, I’m always quick to suggest trying out dotticures because you don’t really need any tools since a bobby pin works easily, & they’re hard to mess up! Back in the early days of my nail art journey, I probably wore a gradient dotticure twice a week if not more. There is just so many ways to do it! 

For this manicure, the polishes I used were:

  • Base Coat: Cutex Brittle Nail Fix
  • Top Coat: Cutex Quick Dry Top Coat
  • Essie Splash of Grenedine
  • Essence Black is Back
  • Sally Hansen Hard As Nails Hard to Get
  • Essie No Place Like Chrome
  • Small Dotting Tool or Bobby Pin

Quick & easy. I’ve been looking back at super old manicures from my early nail art days & thinking about doing a whole beginner nail art series featuring some of my early nail art designs & some tips for starting out!

What do you think of this dotticure? Do you love a good gradient dotticure too? Let me know in the comments below! 

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Graphic Lines Over Watercolour 

I teased these geometric freehand nails this weekend, which you may have seen on Instagram, so I’m excited to finally share the whole look! I just needed to do some really poppy Summer nails to counter act the fact I’m craving Fall colours so bad. I also feel like I haven’t been practicing my freehand lines enough, so I wanted to play around with my black striper. This design isn’t perfect but I do quite enjoy how they turned out. 

The polishes used for this design are:

  • Base Coat: Cutex Brittle Nail Fix
  • Top Coat: Cutex Quick Dry Top Coat
  • Sally Hansen Hard As Nails Hard to Get
  • Color Club Evolution 
  • Sally Hansen Miracle Gel Wet My Thistle
  • ACO by Ardene Road to No Where 
  • Essie Cute As A Button
  • China Glaze Sun Upon my Skin
  • Art Club Nail Art Striper in Black
  • Latex Free Make Up sponge 

Bright & colourful & fun was what I was going through with these nails & I feel like I was pretty successful. Of all my nails, my thumb was my absolutely favourite (& I feel like it turned out the best of all 10 nails). I think it had something to do with my striper polish. The more I use it though, the more I’m realizing I need to try out aryclic paint. I know I keep saying that, but the more I use my stripers, the more frustrated I get with how easily they thicken up. So hopefully the next time I show off a freehand line design, I’ll be sharing my expirences with acrylic paint! 


What do you think of this design? Have you ever used acrylic paint for nail designs? Let me know your thoughts in the comments below! 

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Feeling Blue… Stripes 💙

Happy Friday! It’s been so long since I played around with my stripers, which used to be one of my favourite nail art tools, so I figured why not pull them out for some fun stripes. This used to be my go-to design whenever I had nubbins, & it makes somewhat medium  length nails look even longer! (& who doesn’t want their nails to look longer?)

For this manicure I used:

  • Base Coat: L’Oréal All in One
  • Top Coat: Essie Speed Setter
  • Sally Hansen Miracle Gel Beatnik 
  • Kiss Products Nail Art Striper in Black
  • Kiss Products Nails Art Striper in White
  • Jordana Cosmetics Pop Art Nail Design in Blue Abstract

After spending the majority of June not wearing any blue nails, I must say it was nice to pull out again. I purchased Sally Hansen Beatnik on clearance at Shoppers while on my no-blue-nails crusade (I know, I have a sickness), so I was excited to finally get it wear it. & it really is such a pretty colour. That’s why I thought just some simple striping would really compliment the colour & I was right! 

What are you wearing on your nails right now? Let me know in the comments below! 

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Born Pretty Store Review — BORN PRETTY Stamping Polish Plate Set Flower Leaf Tree Image Template item #39933. 


Hey lovelies! I know… I disappeared a bit. A lot has been going on since getting home from vacation. But that’s okay! Because today I have another review of one of the items I received for review from Born Pretty Store–the flower leaf image stamping plate set item #39933. 

As I’ve said with all my reviews, I still consider myself a stamping newbie but I definitely feel like I’ve gotten better with all this practice. For today’s nails I played around with the BORN PRETTY Stamping Polish Plate Set Flower Leaf Tree Image Template item #39933 which comes with two stamping plates (a large square plate, & a smaller round floral plate) plus two stamping polishes. 

For this design I used:

As I’ve written before, I find their is a learning curve that comes along with stamping. Or maybe just natural talent. Either way I think this is a great set for beginners because it has so many image options & comes with stamping polishes. Now personally I’m not a fan of the stamping polishes, not because they don’t stamp (they do!) but I just haven’t found a way to use them that doesn’t make a huge mess! If anyone has any tips, please please share because I love the end result. But if you’re just trying out stamping I think this set would be a good introduction for you. 

Personally I liked the larger square stamping plate over the smaller round plate. I tried reverse stamping a rose, but it didn’t turn out exactly how I hoped. That plate took a few more tries to get things right, but I did eventually accomplish my goal (even if it wasn’t the prettiest). The smaller plate definitely worked better for me when I was just stamping the image straight onto my nails, & not taking time to be fancy. 


All in all, I would definitely recommend this set to anyone itching to try out stamping, but would warn practice does make perfect. Don’t be frustrated if it takes a bit of time to get things looking perfect because the end result is worth it. 

If you’re interested in ordering this stamping set (or something else) from Born Pretty Store feel free to use my discount code COFFK31 to save 10% off any regular price items! I’ve been ordering from them for years, & I love the wide variety of products you can find for all your nail polish addict needs!