For this design, I started with a sponged gradient. I chose five pastel polishes that looked soft and pretty together. I created my sponged gradient onto this nail (and another, which you'll see in my next post) and let it dry. It's important to let this totally dry, because if the polish is at all wet, the striping tape will make quite a mess.
Once the nail was dry, I started cutting pieces of striping tape to apply to the nail. I tried to keep the tape fairly evenly spaced to create a diagonal across the nail. This was harder than I expected, but I still think it's something that can be done if you really want to. You could also leave wider spaces between the tape to end up with something like my last design. The tape is going to be a mask for our next layer of polish, so the more open space you leave between the tape, the less of the gradient you'll see once you're finished.
Once all the tape was in place, I applied a fairly thick coat of white polish to make sure it was opaque. Then while the polish was still wet I peeled the striping tape off. You can see toward the middle of the nail where I tried to pull two pieces of tape off at once and actually lifted some of the white polish right off the nail. Oops!
I then let everything dry for a few minutes, then added a coat of Pro FX. Unfortunately, my bottle had gotten a bit thick and I tried thinning it down right before applying it. Talk about a bubble fest! If you need to thin your topcoat, do it a few hours before you need to use it!
That's all there is to creating this look! If you find the written instructions confusing and would like to see a video on how to do this, leave me a comment. I could probably be persuaded to show you how to do this on YouTube. :D
Also, be sure to come back tomorrow to see how I dressed this patterned nail up! I'm super happy with how this came out, and I can't wait to share it with you!
Some polishes were provided by the brand for consideration.
See my disclosure statement for more information.
