Tutorial Tuesday: French Manicure

I've been very busy this week so I chose something simple and practical for this week's Tutorial Tuesday..  
French Manicure!
This French mani will be done in almost the exact same manner as the Half-Moon Mani and will require the use of paper reinforcement stickers.

You can purchase these at any office supply store, and I've even seen them at dollar stores.

How To Choose Colors For This Design:

Any colors your little heart desires!
Just make sure the tip color is opaque enough to cover the base nail color!

Suggested Materials:

ANY brand is fine, listed below are the ones used for this particular mani

- Base coat - Seche Clear

- Fast dry top coat - Seche Vite

- Nail color - LeChat UV gel "Midnight Pearl" with Young Nails "Funkadelic" glitter
- Tip color - Spoiled "Visually Slimming"

- A clean, small paintbrush or cotton swabs, for cleaning the cuticles afterwards (optional)

- Nail polish remover (optional)

Before You Begin Painting Your Design:

These steps are optional, but definitely recommended!

- Put down some paper towels in your work area, in case of any spills.

- Be sure to remove any old nail polish.

- Gently file nails into desired shape and remove any ridges with a buffer.

- Push back cuticles with a cuticle pusher or orange wood stick and trim if desired.

- Apply a base coat to protect from potential staining from color polish; wait for it to dry completely.

Step 1:

Take a circle sticker and stick it to the palm of your hand.  Remove it, and re-stick it 4 or 5 times.  

This is to reduce the stickiness of the tape and makes it much easier to peel off of your nails later on.

 Step 2:

Apply 2 coats of the base color and allow to dry.

You can use any brand of fast-drying top coat to speed up this process.

Don't worry too much about being super neat, you can remove excess polish from your cuticles later.

**It is VERY important to allow all polish to dry before applying the tape over it, otherwise the polish will get stuck to the tape and come off**

Step 3:

Gently  apply the circle stickers.  

Place the top half of the circle near the free edge of the nail, the bottom half of the circle should be over the rest of your nail. (You can click the photo to enlarge & see it better.)

I aimed for approximately 1/6th of my nail. 

You can do more or less, depending on how big you want your French tips to be!

The nail naturally curves, so the sticker might need to be adjusted a bit near the free edge.

*Try to avoid any bubbles near the edges of the tape because the top color could get into the bubble and you'll have to start all over!*

 Step 4:

Beginning at the outermost edge of the circle sticker, paint 1 or 2 coats of the French tip color over the base nail color.

It's better to paint a tiny bit over the sticker this way your edge will be clean.  

You can click the photo to enlarge & see a little better.

 Step 5:

Gently  peel the sticker off once the tip color is mostly dry.

Be very careful not to rip it off too quickly, or the polish could come right off.

Also, be careful if the polish is still very wet on the top of the sticker, it could get onto your base color.

Use a new sticker for each nail, since there will be wet polish on the used ones.

Step 6: 

(Forgot to take a pic sorry!)

If necessary, clean up cuticles using polish remover & a brush.

Top it all off with your favorite top coat.

And there ya go!

Simple & easy French Mani :)

For all past Tutorials click here