Gild the Lily


Last week, I showed a photo of the lovely flowers I received from my boyfriend. In the arrangement, there were several of a flower called Alstroemeria, which are commonly known as the Peruvian Lily, or Lily of the Incas. Since those flowers are still alive and going strong (all but the roses and one of the tiger lilies), I decided to use the Peruvian Lilies as inspiration for a nail art design. I love the way the color gradates from fuchsia to white with just a touch of yellow, then is punctuated with dashes of dark brown! I tried to represent it the best I could on my nail, using a drier brush than normal, and sort of 'flicking' from the cuticle toward the nail tip.

One of the Alstroemeria from my flowers- the inspiration!


and the nails:


I used MAC Vestral White as a base, with Finger Paints Heavenly Hydrangeas and Essence Surferama 'flicked' from the cuticle edge up, a mixture of American Apparel Trenchcoat and BB Couture Kokomo for the dash of yellow, then a mixture of American Apparel Hassid and Barielle Coco Bar for the dark brown dots/dashes. Topped it all off with 2 coats of Seche Vite top coat

WOOT! That's 3 posts in 2 days, trying to get back on track now that my hours are slightly reduced!! :)

41 comments

  1. Beautiful design and a beautiful flower!

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  2. I LOVE these nails I wish I would have looked at it before I just painted mine!

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  3. One of your best, its nice to see you use pink!

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  4. Oh, that's really pretty! Girly, but in a unique way. Great interpretation!

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  5. Pretty!! Forgive the pun, but you totally nailed it. ;)


    My boyfriend gave me a bunch of pinky-purple roses, and I was so over the moon about the color I mixed up a matching lipgloss with a little Aquaphor and some Fyrinnae samples I had laying around. Hooray for flower inspiration!

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  6. OMG this is SOOO pretty!! It looks so much like the lily!! You are SO amazing at nail art!!! :D

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  7. Beautiful look! It kinda makes me want a watermelon as well (but maybe I'm just hungry right now :). I recently went to buy the seche vite top coat and I noticed that it has a warning label on it about causing birth defects. Do you know anything about this or have an opinion on it? I know everyone loves it and swears by it but it kinda makes me nervous. Thanks!

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  8. This is gorgeous, you are so talented!

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  9. OOOOH, pretty! I love Ranunculus, alstroemeria, and snapdragons!
    I am seriously jonesing for spring...

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  10. This is really cool! Seriously stunning.

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  11. This is AMAZING and so serendipitous too. I was actually planning to do a lily manicure on my nails in loving memory of my great aunt who died last week. I was looking for ideas and I'm so happy to see this on here! How did you do the flicking?

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  12. Love it!!! One of your best!!

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  13. This is amazing hunny!

    /hugs!

    http://spellbindingnails.blogspot.com/

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  14. cute post!!!!
    love this style!
    congratulations!=P
    xoxo

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  15. Amazing!! I love lilies and the mani is out of this world! I adore your posts

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  16. plz give me the link of the blog when u designed the flag of PAKISTAN on ur ring finger.....
    Regards
    ASH

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  17. or just tell me the month or topic sentence of it.......plz plz plz plz plz......me and my mom just luv ur nail arts......

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  18. Gorgeous, really awesome. Nice choice the boyfriend made on the flowers too :P.

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  19. I love this so much! May try it out! x

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  20. Yay for Peruvian lilies!
    A peruvian follower (L)

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  21. long time reader, first time commenter - these are beautiful. really gorgeous.

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  22. This mani is really pretty! I love it!

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  23. I love it! You hit it right on! That is a beautiful piece of artwork, great idea to use the Lily.. sweet boyfriend you got there ;)

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  24. I LOVEEEEEEEEE THIS!!!!! I love how this ended up looking like some crazy, awesome abstract design! Always an inspiration lady!!

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  25. Beautiful flowers! I love this one!

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  26. I Love it! Soo creative :) as always.
    -hunny-

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  27. Gorgeous! And for you green thumbers, I hear these are pretty easy to grow at home. One of the girls at work loved them so much she had a yard full in every shade.

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  28. That is really perfect. I always find it difficult to apply any sort of nail art, so I usually buy painted nails. That is really a great sharing. thanks dear

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  29. Helloooo!
    I've just find your blog and i'm inlove with it ! OMG, you're so good at this.
    Can you please make a design with a sport called orienteering? :)
    THANKS
    ISABEL

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Go on, comment... you know you want to. ;-P