I’ve been on a holographic binge lately, so for these nails I had to try something new! I would say 99% of the time, my own nails are done with regular polish. While I love all the benefits of gel, I change my nails so often that I just don’t need to keep them on for a couple of weeks. But with that said, many clients of mine do wear gel so I need to keep my gel art game in tip top shape!
A few months ago, Skyline Beauty Supply had a flash deal on the Young Nails Mission Control gel art set so I bought it to try. You can’t really do complex nail art with just any gel…unless you want to flash cure every 10 seconds. The gel that comes in a bottle is thinner, meant to self level a little bit to look smooth on the nail, so when you paint details it’ll spread out. That’s where art gel comes in! Many brands have some variation of this (Presto, OPI, etc.), and it is literally life changing when doing nail art. For these nails I didn’t need to cure until I switched colors…how crazy is that?
So in my adventures testing out this product, I wanted to do the most complicated design I could come up with. If you’ve never checked out @ihavethisthingwithfloors, you really should. It’s a great source of inspiration for nail art (like this picture here)!
I first painted 2 coats of Presto Gel #113, a medium grey. I went through a phase where I preferred using potted gels, and bought a whole bunch. While they are great for a salon setting, they are so difficult to use when mobile! I have to set them down to paint. Luckily Nail Labo carries every color in a jar or bottle. A jar is great for nail art though! Definitely has its pros and cons.
For the design I used Fizz and Overdrive. You can always tell a polish or gel’s quality by their black and white, while they’re such simple colors they can be hard to get right! For art these are my most often used colors, so I was thrilled when these were completely opaque.
Once I finished the 2 art nails, I got lazy and thought…let’s just do an accent nail! I filmed a video of the process, and it somehow became one of my most viewed videos on instagram. Nail art transfer foil has been around for a few years now, but instead of using it with the foil glue, when you apply it with gel it looks way more amazing. Check out my video below for a basic overview, but I do plan on making a tutorial of it!
Once all nails were finished, I applied a gel top coat and called it a day! I’m going on day 2 of these nails, but I’m already itching to take them off and do some more nail art…ha!
https://www.instagram.com/p/Bdi8xHpDBz8/?taken-by=chelseaqueen
