Happy Independence Day India!

Wishing all the readers of Our External World a very Happy Independence Day!

Happy Independence Day India!

I did this basic nail art in the colors of our flag. Polishes used are all from Maybellne Color Show range.

Hope our country finds independence from greed, poverty and hatred!

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AGEsmart Facial At F Salon, Rajouri Garden

F Salon is situated in Vishal Enclave, Rajouri Garden. The place happens to be very close to home and I took my mom for trying out their AGESmart facial.

About F Salon
F Salon provides a wide array of beauty and style packages. They offer services that cater to your skin, hair, and nails. The main services they boast about are their Majirel hair color, stylish hair cuts, and facials to give your skin a new look.

The salon is nicely spaced out with different areas for different services. They keep offering you bottled water and tea. The products used in all categories are of good brands.

AGEsmart Facial At F Salon, Rajouri Garden

AGESmart Facial

I was invited to try out their AGESmart facial but since this caters to mature skin I took my mom to try it out. The facial was done in a separate room where my mom was first given a robe to change into. Her hair was nicely tied back and she was asked to relax as the facial began. A number of products were used beginning with a facial cleanup. This was followed by a scrub, facial massage and finally the face pack. This whole procedure took around 60 minutes. After the facial my mom looked very relaxed and she was quite happy with the service.

Water Decal Butterfly And BPS Clear Jelly Stamper Nail Art

When I first saw a clear jelly stamper I knew this would be another milestone in the way I stamped. When I first got my hands on it, I was thrilled, and the reasons are quite obvious.

Water Decal Butterfly And BPS Clear Jelly Stamper Nail Art

A clear jelly stamper allows you to clearly see where you are placing the stamp pattern on your nail. And what this essentially means is that you have full control when you are doing double stamping, infact now you can go ahead and stamp multiple designs one over the other placing them carefully to create the pattern you so desire.

The clear jelly stamper I have is from born pretty store and comes with two scrapers.

BPS Clear Jelly Stamper

The Chrome Nail Trend - How To Use Chrome Powder Without Gel Polish

Shiny, mirror like nails are a huge trend these days, To achieve the look you need to use what is called a chrome powder and a gel polish.

The Chrome Nail Trend - How To Use Chrome Powder Without Gel Polish

I am not too fond of gel polishes (though I love the final look!). I just find them tedious to do. While searching for how to use gel polish to create the chrome nail effect I came across www.oceansofbeauty.com which sells Chrome Powder and special top coat that allows you to do chrome nails without using a UV lamp. The products are from Sparkle & Co.

Sparkle and Co. Luxe Nails Chrome Nail Kit

They have a complete kit which comes nicely packed in a black mesh bag. Inside the bag you get

Sparkle and Co. Chrome Nail Kit

5 applicator sponge+brush duo
Sparkle & Co. Chrome Powder
Sparkle & Co. Top Pure
Sparkle & Co. Seal
5 nail tips
Instruction Card


The whole process of creating chrome nails is quite simple.
First you need to apply your preferred shade of regular polish. I chose to use black. Once the polish dried I applied an even coat of the Top Pure top coat. Then sit back and let it dry completely - it took slightly longer to dry as compared to my normal top coats. The texture of Top Pure is almost like a gel polish top coat but you don't need to cure it under a UV light or LED lamp.

Casino Nail Art

If you follow me on social media you must have already seen these. I thought I'll post my Casino Nail Art here on the blog as well.

As part of my Twin Nails challenge at Those Nails Though Facebook group, I got paired with Jill Cowton. The theme was Las Vegas and when its Vegas you cannot leave behind the casinos!

Here is what we came up with. We decided to capture different elements of a casino on each nail. Going with our inspirational image we added some dice, playing cards, and a roulette.

The complete nail art was done free hand using polish, some acrylic paints and a fine brush. I hope you like what I did with my nails.

HPB Presents Strawberry Nail Art

This month's HPB linkup them is fruits. Finally I thought I should do Strawberry Nail Art.

I have wanted to try this nail art since a long time but always kept putting it off. It is easy do to and all you need are the following:

1. Red nail polish (I used Be Mine from the FACES Love Struck Collection)
2. Green nail polish (from Oriflame)
3. Dotting tool

The process is simple. Coat your nail with red polish completely and let it dry. Then add a heavy coat of red polish. 

When it is almost dry take a dotting tool and simple press on gently all over the polishes to create little holes. The base red polish will ensure that the places you press on with the dotting tool appear like little grooves on the strawberry fruit.

If the little dents are not very visible you can dip your dotting tool in a brown or green polish and then use it for the dotting action. It adds a bit of depth as well.

FACES Love Struck and Cocktail Collection Review & Swatches

FACES has launched two sets of nail polishes as complementary collections - Love Struck & Cocktail.

These collections contain 3 polishes of 6ml each. Each collection is created so that you can create easy nail art your self using the colors in the collection.

Price: Rs 399 (available online)  

FACES Love Struck Nail Lacquer Collection

The love struck collection has the perfect colors for Valentine's day nail art. There are two cream polishes and one crelly.

Love Struck Collection

The colors in the Love Struck collection are

1. First Date - this is a beautiful deep pink shade. It has a high gloss finish and goes opaque in two coats. 

2. Day Dream - this is pale pink crelly with hexagonal red glitter and tiny white glitter. With three coats you can use it on its own. You can also use it as a topper over other polishes with a single coat.

3. Be Mine - This is a bright red with a pink undertone, reminds me of strawberries.

FACES Love Struck Collection Swatches

FACES Love Struck Collection

I did a water marble nail art using the three polishes. Using a crelly for water marble can be quite tricky but thankfully the final result was fine.

Water Marble Nail Art

HPB Presents Sugar Spun Neutrals And Neons

Hi friends! Here is a quick and simple nail art to brighten up your week!

It finally rained and even though the weather is still hot, the rain was a welcome breather! The theme for Hobby Polish Bloggers for them month of May is Neutrals and Neons. And the technique challenge at Those Nails Though was sugar spun nails.

As always I decided to club two tasks into one and came up with Neon Sugar Spun Nails.

If you want to find out about Sugar Spun Nail Art technique then you should check out my post Girly Girl Nail Art Challenge

And here you go, the nail art I did this time.

HPB Presents Sugar Spun Neutrals And Neons

I have one more pic which was taken indoors. I love this neon green by Madam Glam. Its just so in-your-face neon!

The pink is Elephantine Pink by O.P.I.

Cannes 2016 - Sonam Kapoor's Saree Inspired Nail Art

This year when Sonam Kapoor made her first appearance at a press conference in Cannes she decided to wear a saree by Rimzim Dadu.

Rimzim Dadu is a designer who showcased a lot of new textures and materials at the Amazon India Fashion Week this year.

The saree that Sonam donned was quite interesting in terms of texture.

Cannes 2016 - Sonam Kapoor's RimZim Dadu Saree

A stark black flowy fabric teamed with a shiny blue pallu that almost looked as if it was metallic due to the way the different tones of blue where interplayed.

When I saw this pic of Sonam Kapoor it just inspired me to do nail art keeping the same color scheme in mind.

How To Do 3D Donut Nail Art

Hi everyone! This month's twin nail challenge (check the earlier ones I took part in at the end of this post) at Those Nails Though Facebook group was themed desserts. AND, I was paired with the super talented free hand nail artist Anita from StyleThoseNails.

Anu, as I lovingly call her, is amazing with her nails. She does some breathtaking free hand nail art (check out her instagram channel @stylethosenails). This time she wanted to try out 3D nail art and suggested we pick donuts as our nail art. I was sure she would do something amazing and sheepishly agreed to take up the challenge myself.

This is what I came up with.

How To Do 3D Donut Nail Art

And here is a look at both of our versions.

How To Do 3D Donut Nail Art

Anu used breakfast loops to create the donuts on her nails and has a full video on her channel. I, on the other hand, could not think of what came in loops and would fit my nails. I looked around, even dug into the nut bolt collection lying around the house but in vain. Finally an idea struck - I thought how about I create little loop structures with something myself. I have this little bottle of fabric glue that I decided to try out. I drew tiny loops on my nail art mat and left it to dry over night. Next day the loops actually dried out and I was able to lift them off. So finally I had something that would fit my nails and looked like loops. 

Diagonal Gradient Nail Art

 Hi guys! Today I have another nail art post for you all. This time its for a dual challenge.

I had to do a diagonal gradient technique challenge for #tnttech (part of the Those Nails Though group on Facebook) as well as the #tnttwinnails challenge. So since I'm super lazy I decided to combine both the challenges in one nail art.

As part of the Twin Nails Challenge I got paired with Krystal Moore (@queenofnails83 on instagram) She is one of the admins at Those Nails Though and is the one responsible for inspiring me to get back to nail art with her fun challenges!

 The technique challenge was to do a diagonal gradient. And the twin nail challenge was to replicate a nail art done by your partner. So here is the nail art that I did this week.

Diagonal Gradient Nail Art

The base was created using sponging with 3 different polishes. To create a diagonal gradient all you have to do is sponge the nail in a diagonal manner instead of horizontally. I used two color show polishes and one local polish in teal.

Twin Nails Challenge - Dragon Fruit Nail Art

After what seems like ages I finally have some nail art on the blog. I'm part of a nail art enthusiastic group on Facebook called Those Nails Though. This group came up with a twin nails challenge and the theme was fruits.

I was paired up with Xochitl Ayala who is famous on Instagram as gurlynailz - Xochitl does amazing nail art. I love her immaculately well kept nails and her eye-catching nail art. Do visit her on instagram to see her amazing nails.

So Xochitl showed me a few pictures that we could use as inspiration - and a picture of the Dragon Fruit caught my attention. Such bright colors that I instantly agreed to it. We decided on a rough sketch of how we will do the mani and left the rest to our imagination.

So the first picture is my attempt at this mani. I have captured the cut portion of the fruit on all nails except the accent finger where I wanted to add the bright green touch. I created little dry marbled decals to give a sort of 3D effect but they just stuck to my nails so there is no 3D effect anymore but I like how it looks merged into the base color.

Take a look!

Twin Nails Challenge - Dragon Fruit Nail Art

The polishes I used are:

Maybelline  ColorShow Hooked On Pink

Maybelline ColorShow Sunshine Yellow

Madam Glam Neon

A local black and white polish

Now Xochitl did the same basic design but a more neater version and I just love her long nails! You can tell that she is a seasoned nail artist!

Twin Nails Challenge - Dragon Fruit Nail Art

Overall I had fun doing this challenge. I have made so many friends from across the globe where we have connected due to nail art. And Xochitl is a really nice girl I've come to know through this #tnttwinnails challenge.

Bri Polishes - Gold Rush, Silver Sand, Blush - Swatches

Pink and glitter work so well together, totally girly and blingy!

I have three polishes from Love Bri Products to share with you girls. They are Gold Rush, Silver Sand, and Blush. I enjoy using these polishes because they are 5 free.

Bri Polishes - Gold Rush, Silver Sand, Blush - Swatches

Gold Rush and Silver Sand are glitter polishes while Blush is a cream polish.

Bri Polishes - Gold Rush, Silver Sand, Blush - Swatches

The glitter polishes are full of tiny glitter in a clear base. You need at least 3 coats if you want to cover your nail. With a single coat you can use them both as glitter toppers over any polish of your choice.

Uber Chic Stamping Plate Collection 5 - Swatches and Review

It seems like ages ago when I actually used the collection 5 stamping plates from Uber Chic (remember when I did the review on the Uber Chic Uber Mat?) Well due to a lot of reasons blogging had to take a back seat and there is a huge long list of pending posts. 

I hope I can keep posting regularly now and share all the different products I want to tell you about (lot's of makeup reviews are pending too!)

Uber Chic Stamping Plate Collection 5 - Swatches and Review

Uber Chic Stamping Plates Collection 5 consists of 3 stamping plates each of which has 22 large patterns along with 6-7 smaller patterns. There are a few designs which are what I call 'landscape' designs that give you a lot of creative freedom.

Below are the sample stamps of all three plates. I tried to cover as many designs as possible. I have yet again used a local black polish for stamping and in some designs I tried the Oriflame The One polishes (colored patterns that you see)

UberChic Beauty Far East Stamping Plate - Reviewed, Stamped

Hello friends, here is a review of a nail stamping plate I have used in almost all my recent stamping posts that I have shared on instagram. Finally here are the details about the Uber Chic Beauty Stamping Plate Far East.

As the name suggests this plate has designs that represent the eastern countries of China and Japan. From dragons to fans this plate covers a lot of images. There are 14 XL designs, 14 smaller designs and one big rectangular area. There is also one big dragon that is about 2 XL areas put together.

UberChic Beauty Far East Stamping Plate - Reviewed, Stamped

Here's a look at all the designs stamped with a local black polish. Some images did not stamp completely because I had the air conditioning on while stamping. The temperature was soaring when I stamped these and I just couldn't bare the heat.

UberChic Beauty Far East Stamping Plate - Reviewed, Stamped

I stamped using the same polish over Elephantine Pink from OPI. This is one design. The designs are quite big for my nails so I was able to break a single image into two different patterns.

Uber Mat by Uber Chic Beauty - Create Your Own Nail Decals/Stickers - Bumble Bees

A few days back I received my Uber Mat from Uber Chic Beauty. I did a tutorial on Reverse Stamping Nail Art in March and how I wish this Uber Mat was available at that time!

Let me tell you what the Uber Mat is first. Uber Mat is well a mat BUT its no ordinary mat. This is a specially designed mat for nail art enthusiasts. Uber Mat is a large 16 inch by 12 inch mat made of a silicone type rubbery super flexible material - actually I have no clue what its made of but its is extremely flexible.

Uber Mat by Uber Chic Beauty - Create Your Own Nail Decals/Stickers

The mat has marking for 10 fingers, 5 each of an oval and square nail shape. The mat is meant to ease your life if you are fond of creating stamping decals also called nail stickers. Normal reverse stamping requires one stamper head per nail decal which means either you buy lots of stamper heads OR you work with your Uber Mat - I counted and I believe I can easily fit 50 XL stamper sized decals on this mat.

Now I know a lot of you might think that working with zip lock plastic bags can also serve the same purpose - well it can but hold on till I tell you rest of the uses of this Uber Mat.

1. You can create stamping decals

2. The mat is acetone and polish safe - this means that you can even use it to test out all possible nail art ideas for which you would otherwise require practise wheels.

3. It is large enough to act as a base mat for all your nail art - no more worrying about extra newspapers or other things to protect your table or work surface.

4. The surface is smooth and the mat is non slippery, plus it won't fly away like your normal zip lock bags

5. You can fold it and store it away

6. It can easily be cleaned with a regular polish remover or acetone (I have used pure acetone and it worked fine)

7. This is the most important - I personally struggle with removing my decal from the stamper in a single piece - but the flexibility of the Uber Mat comes in handy here - I simply bend the mat under the decal and it simply lifts off (check the image in my nail decal picture)

8. The Uber Mat has predefined nail images that act as guides - when you are creating your decal you can see how you want to place the final image over your nail. If you have tiny nails like mine you can also mark your own nail over the mat as a guideline for the decal. This is very useful for people who have tiny nails like mine - it helps you see how the decal would look like on your nail.

I am sure if you use it once all other methods of creating decals are going to seem worthless. 

It is priced at $14.99 and is available at http://uberchicbeauty.com/

I created the below nail art using Uber Chic stamping plates from collection 5 (I will review them soon) and the accent nail has a nail art sticker or reverse stamping decal that I created with my Uber Mat.

HPB Presents Neon Star Attack

Before I show you what I did for this months HPB link up, let me confess that I do not use neon on my nails at all. Only to show you swatches if ever. The reason is it makes my hands look extremely dark (and you'll see that in the pics)

But, this months theme was Neon. And so I picked out the most neon looking polish I have - Madam Glam Mint Cocktail.

I did a simple mani for this months theme, simply did some stamping using Uber Chic Stamping Plate 02 from Collection 2. The polish I used for stamping is from Oriflame called Purple In Paris

HPB Presents Neon Star Attack

Orange Pink Gradient Golden Nail Art

Hello my nail art buddies! Here is a quick short post on a nail art I did long back. Yes I think I did it sometime like in April and completely forgot to post here.

Orange Pink Gradient Golden Nail Art

I used a total of 4 polishes for this nail art.

The polishes I used are 

1. L'Oreal Paris Color Riche Lush Tangerine (303) - the main orange color that you see

2. L'Oreal Paris Color Riche So Chic Pink (208) - the pink dots used over the gold stamping

3. Maybelline Color Show Bold Gold - for the stamping

4. El Corazon Aquarelle Tints 06 (pink)

UberChic Stamping Plates Collection 3 and Marc Jacobs Perfume Inspired Nail Art

UberChic Stamping Plates Collection 3 and Marc Jacobs Perfume Inspired Nail Art

Daisy Dream by Marc Jacobs is one of my favorite perfume. And I absolutely adore that bottle! Inspired by a perfume bottle I did my nail art this time.

The nail art was super easy to do thanks to my new plates from UberChic - this is the collection 03 and I love the designs. Each plate has 24 big designs and around 10 to 12 small patterns & text.

HPB Presents May Flowers - Nail Art Using BornPrettyStore Matte Top Coat

This month for the Hobby Polish Bloggers linkup we are doing the theme May Flowers. Originally I wanted to do an out and out floral design but I will be doing that a lot for summers so I decided to keep it a little simple this time.

I recently got a few products from BornPrettyStore.com and decided to put them to use.

HPB Presents May Flowers - Using BornPrettyStore Matte Top Coat

If you plan on buying anything from bornprettystore.com you can use the coupon code HPG10 to get yourself 10% off

I used BornPrettyStore.com Matte Top Coat, LYN nail polish Eves Apple, Oriflame The One Nail Polish Ballerina Rose, and a little rose strip from the nail stickers from BPS.