Comparing Contrasts

As I mentioned at the end if my last post, I did a Latin-related manicure in mid-July and it was so helpful in class that I left it on for nearly two weeks and tolerated much more chipping from it than I would have from a manicure that was not also an infographic. 

You guys are probably not that interested in Latin grammar, so I won't explain the whole thing here. Let it suffice to say it involved each nail bearing one (or, for the thumbs, two) Roman numerals, which were not that hard to do with the skinny brushes I have in black and white. 

For the background I chose a taupe which I bought with the intention of using as a French manicure base. It made a great base for this too and I am looking forward to using it as a canvas for more designs in the future. 

 

Here you can see that I did some of the Roman numerals in white and some in black. They both looked good on the beige base but I was especially inspired by the visual contrast between the nude and the black numbers that looked almost like wild animal scratch marks from a 60's movie with a jungle vixen. The name of the base polish bears me out on this one - it's called Fashion Safari (from New York Color). 

This week, I switched to a contrast between my finger and toe polishes. I have been trying to figure out how to wear this extreme orange Reign in Spain Birchbox sent me recently. It's not easy because it really looks ghastly against my pale skin. It might make an all right accent color (haven't tried that yet) and it came out rather well on the toes with a layer of purple-toned sparkles in top. 

The conventional wisdom to make toes' and fingers' colors seem logical together without being too matchy-matchy is to choose colors across the color wheel from each other. (A concept you probably remember from sixth grade art class.) That's what I did this week, choosing an unadorned purple for my fingers. 

On the topic of toes, do you guys have a favorite length for your toenails? I think I cut mine too short this time, but I hate how they look like talons when they get too long! What do you think?

Two Recent Looks: Mermaid and Chevron

This is what I have been up to recently: 

- Going to pretty churches. 

- Reading a lot of Latin. 

- Going to Milwaukee's Summerfest music festival with my roommate and her friends, who were really into saying they were mermaids? (Kids these days!) Anyway, my nails that night happened to be somewhat appropriate:

Although one of them was wearing a deeper blue that was more wine-dark than sea foam. 

- Working out regularly. Yay for sore muscles!

- Trying out a chevron look on my nails. This has been a crowd-pleaser in the streets of Milwaukee. 

This look was, surprisingly, easier to achieve on my right hand than my left. I'm looking forward to getting more adept with the thinner brushes I used for this and have a Latin nail project (only me, right?) that will use them in the pipeline for next week. 

Til then, swim hard, mermaids ;)