Pastel textured negative space nail art featuring Born Pretty Store studs

*** This post contains items which were sent for review and affiliate links. ***

Hey y'all!

If you read my birthday haul post, you may recall me spending a Marks&Spencer gift certificate on, what else, nail supplies! Part of that haul was a set of 4 pastel textured polishes from the M&S Limited Collection. Then, Born Pretty Store sent me some really cute colored nail art studs in spring-toned green, purple, and blue, and this nail art just sort of fell into place!

Let me start by talking about these polishes from M&S.  I have to say that I was actually a bit disappointed with them.  I was hoping for a nicely opaque effect, but I think these would have taken at least 3 coats on their own to escape VNL, so I had to sort of backtrack and try a different course.  I ended up using way more polish than originally intended.

L-R: Polish Ltd Pale Blue, Rimmel Too Cool To Tango, Polish Ltd Green, Essie Mojito Madness, Polish Ltd Peach, Revlon Peach Smoothie, Polish Ltd Lilac, Revlon Gum Drop, Sinful Colors Snow Me White

So, yeah.  Ultimately I wound up starting with a thin coat of Snow Me White, to make my pastels a little brighter.  My next coat was a matching cream for each of the textured polishes.  I don't currently have a pastel green, so I mixed a few drops of white into the green to make a suitable shade.  Even after all of that, I still had to apply two coats of each of the textured polishes to make it look right. 

All of those coats of polish would've been okay, had I not set out to dabble a bit more with negative space on my accent nails.  I recently picked up some new crafting scissors that have different patterns than the standard zigzag, but unfortunately I think the effect of that pattern gets lost because I had to build so much polish to get there. :(

 
Luckily for me, I was able to use these pretty studs to kind of hide the badness.  I played around with all the different shapes in the wheel to create this little pattern for which I have no name.  I varied the stud colors between my ring finger and my thumb to add a little flair. 

This colorful wheel has over 300 pieces in it, in an array of 12 different studs, consisting of four different styles of each of the three color choices: large squares, small squares, small rounds, and petal shapes in pale green, sky blue, and lavender.

In retrospect, I probably should have backed up again on those accent nails and just played it straight with the peach polish, but as I'd already started over once (and Mr. Faff was fussy for me to come watch Big Bang Theory, How I Met Your Mother, and Castle) I just soldiered on through.  I don't think it looks BAD, per se, but it could look better.

In this case, I definitely think the studs saved the nail art!  Born Pretty Store has a fantastic selection of studs, rhinestones, and other nail art supplies, and they ship free worldwide.  They are constantly adding items to their new arrivals so be sure to check it out.  Plus, when you order, you can use discount code FXX31 to receive 10% off regularly priced items.  Once this code has been used 10 times, Born Pretty Store will sponsor a giveaway on my blog!


I hope you enjoyed this pretty little springtime look, and have a fantastic weekend!

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