Lavender Lemon Nails

OPI Can't Find My Czechbook, Kester Black French Lavender, Seed Lemon, BYS Black Striper

I saw a manicure on Pinterest recently and tracked it back to SuPa Nails (while we're on the subject of Pinterest, I hate it when people pin without links back to the source. So annoying!) Susanne is a nail art wizard and the second I saw this manicure I knew I had to have it on my nails. Can't Find My Czechbook and French Lavender were already sitting out on my desk and all of a sudden my nails were like this! Well, a good while later they looked like this. Seriously, this was super tricky and it just goes to show how talented someone like Susanne is! First I tried creating the diamonds with tape, but with four colours and not ever waiting long enough for the polish to dry it did not go well. I ended up (painstakingly) hand painting the diamonds with a nail art brush. I definitely need to practice my brush skills, so I'm sure this kind of mani will be popping up on my nails a lot over the next couple of months. 

Kester Black - Winter Garden

I love Kester Black's Winter Garden collection. As I mentioned in my previous post, I started playing around with the polishes and all of a sudden I'd swatched most of them (and I never swatch! It was quite fun!) Application was great and most of these were two coaters. I'm a dedicated three coat kind of gal, and I surprised myself by happily leaving a lot of these at only two coats. Snowdrop was the only one that gave me a bit of grief, but that's more due to the fact that it's a frosty kind of finish and all frosty polishes are notoriously tricky.

This whole collection has a lovely wintery dustiness to it.  I especially love Moss, Silver Birch, Snapdragon and Periwinkle. In the two weeks since Anna sent me the polishes I have not worn another brand of nail polish. 

You can purchase Kester Black nail polish online (shipping is to Australia and New Zealand only) and in stores. 

They are five free (no Toluene, no DBP, no Camphor, no Formaldehyde, no Formaldehyde Resin), made in Australia, cruelty free, CCF accredited (Choose Cruelty Free) and vegan!

Kester Black Black Rose

Kester Black Periwinkle

Kester Black Snapdragon

Kester Black Poppy

Kester Black Deep Violet

Kester Black Peony

Kester Black French Lavender

Kester Black Forget Me Not

Kester Black Moss

Kester Black Silver Birch

Kester Black Starflower

Kester Black Snowdrop

These polishes were provided to me for review.

Deep Violet x French Lavender Gradient

Kester Black French Lavender, Kester Black Deep Violet

I feel like I should do gradient nails more often. They're surprisingly easy if you don't mind the clean up and they always look fab! 

Anna from Kester Black sent me some of her polishes a couple of weeks ago and I couldn't resist starting with a gradient. French Lavender and Deep Violet are both from Kester Black's Winter Garden collection (which you can buy online and in store around Australia and New Zealand) and match each other perfectly. Winter Garden is full of polish gems but I'll flail over the collection as a whole shortly. It deserves its own post. I was so excited that I went from 'playing around with a few' to swatching the entire collection. I couldn't help myself! 

These polishes were sent to me for review.