Hey There Polished People!!
Guess what?!! Today is the absolute last, final, day to end all days of the challenge!! Yayyyy! I have definitely enjoyed it, but at the same time I’m looking forward to posting what I want, when I want and not feeling any pressure. I feel like the challenge really brought some good manis out of me and I have to say… I think today’s another one! When I saw Cynthia’s tape mani on day 13, I really liked the idea of a gradient over tape. Cynthia’s was more spongey than mine ended up but I still really liked the blues that she used, and I liked how the tape removed to leave the bottom color, kind of adding another element of continuity to the nail. Here are her nails (click here to go to her actual blog post):
Cynthia’s Tape Mani
Taking her idea, here are the nails I came up with. 🙂
My Taped Off Gradient Nails
Side By Side Comparison
How To Get My Version Of These Nails:
- Base coat.
- Paint your nails with ~3 coats of Essence I Like Bad Boys.
- Apply a coat of Seche Vite and allow your nails to dry completely.
- Apply striping tape to your nails. You can get all “Criss Cross’ll make you JUMP… JUMP” like Cynthia or you can zig zag your way along like I did.
- Using a makeup sponge and Essence I Like Bad Boys and ChG Blue Bells Ring to make a gradient over the striping tape.
- When the gradients are how you’d like them to be, remove the tape and apply a final coat of Seche Vite.
- Try not to stare at your nails. Yes, this is a dare. 😉
I thought Cynthia’s nails were cool when I saw them and I also love my version of her nails! I just like the tape showing the bottom color under the gradient. And I LOVE the two polishes I used. Cynthia used a glitter, where as I used a foil, so mine is a little more subtly shifting from one color to the next, but her’s is cool cuz it’s so spongey… This was just a good idea on her part, and I’m glad I got a chance to redo it. I want to give a big thanks to Cynthia for sticking it out through the whole challenge, and for coming up with ideas that I want to copy. Thanks to you all for reading all our posts and sticking it out with us! Let me know what you think about our pretty blue nails in the comments below!! As always, thanks for reading and till next time- Happy Polishing!
Polish Me, Please! 
I have to recreate this mani! Gorgeous! ♥
You should!! It wasn’t too hard and I love how it looks. Something about the tape and the gradient… 🙂
I can’t decide which I like more. I think they’re both so cool! And I love all the blues!!!!!
What I love most about yours is also the bottom tape line showing through!
I get a little sponge happy with my gradients so they become mostly the top color, oops! I think they’re both pretty in their own similar but slightly different ways. 🙂
Cute! You are on an Essence kick! I love their colors & viscosity of the polishes and how it flows over your nails. Too bad the bottles are so darn little, I’ve used up my Feme Fatal polish & I’m currently sporting Chic Reloaded (work appropriate) mani and I think it’s gonna be empty soon. Thanks for the tutorial.
I am on an essence kick!!! I’ve acquired like 7 in the recent month and I just love the colors. And like you said- the quality all around is great. The bottles are small, but I’ll trade a small bottle for them only being 2 bucks. I kinda like that I can try a bunch of colors for like next to nothing. I guess when I find one I know I like I should double up 🙂 That flame fatal is like my second favorite red right now. 🙂
Oooh this is beautiful! I can’t believe it’s already over…I’m glad you stuck with it!
Thank you!!! Oh I know- didn’t it seem like it was going to drag on forever? We started out doing every third day which was slllowwwww and now with every other day posting its gone by at a more manageable pace. 🙂
Aww…and it comes full-circle in the end! Great job, ladies!
I like that your take on Cynthia’s mani was personalized. I see no problem with a direct copy, but I like that there are subtle differences.
Now I have The Circle of Life in my head…which is really the circle of nail polish…which is really the circle of enabling! 😉
The circle of liiiiiiiiiiife and it moves us allllll!!!! It’s the cirreeeeclllle, the circle of liiiife! You’re welcome for that. :p
Speaking of the circle of enabling, it’s funny you should say that cuz my post that’s scheduled for Monday or Tuesday will sound quite familiar to you. 😉 Just wait.
I am so going to sing the circle of nail polish right now. I might even make a youtube video about it. 😛 I think Nicole’s version came out a million times prettier because mine is just has such messy sponging. I wonder if I will EVER be able to do some nice sponging and a gradient. Sadness. Anyway, I love the colors you use and how subtle it is. WE ARE THE CHAMPIONS!!!!!!!!!!!
Dang you ladies, you’re making me get all these songs in my head!! Weeeee are the champions, my fre-hend! And weeeeeeee’ll keep on FIGHTing tilltheend. Weeee are the CHAMPions, WE are the champions, no tiyyym for looozers cuz we are the chammmmmpions— of the WORLD!
Yours looked great too but let me just say, your recreation of my ninja turtle nails are so amazing they boggle the mind! Nice work. 🙂