Golden Snowflakes over Darkest Shadow

This is an impromptu mani that I wore last Thursday and Friday, following my 'Red and Gold Heart Mani'. I fell a bit behind with my posts, so I'm only putting it up now.

Golden Snowflakes over Darkest Shadow

The base colour I used for this manicure was Orly 'Darkest Shadow' from their fall 2014 Smoky collection. This was one of the polishes that I picked up in my Black Friday haul for only a dollar. The stamping polish was my go-to gold, Sally Hansen Color Foil 'Liquid Gold'. The stamping plate I used for the full nail designs was Moyou London Festive Collection plate 06, and the snowflake decals were from Moyou London Festive Collection plate 02.

Here's the story behind my colour choice for this manicure. I was in the mood to use some of my wintry/holiday plates, but at the time, I wasn't completely ready to go full Christmas just yet. I usually don't get into the holiday spirit until it's about 2 or 3 weeks before Christmas.  So I chose to use my Moyou London sweater-themed plate, but instead of using the typical grey, white, and blue for a winter sweater, or red and green for a Christmas sweater, I decided to try something a little different.

Polishes Used

The first polish I decided on was 'Darkest Shadow', which I chose because I wanted to try out one of my new polishes. Then, I picked 'Liquid Gold' to stamp with because it was a contrasting colour that would look nice with the first polish. It's funny how much of an impact the colour choice has, because the end result doesn't feel wintry, Christmas-y, or even Sweater-y! I'm not even sure what it reminds me of... perhaps it looks a little like the type of pattern you would see on a fancy ornament? Or maybe ninja stars floating through the night?

I'm kind of indifferent to the end result. I don't hate it, but I'm not in love with it either. It's fun experimenting, but sometimes you walk away from an experiment with knowledge not to try something again! I think that these plates really do need appropriate colour schemes to bring out the best in the designs - ie you can't avoid winter/Christmas/sweater colour schemes. I think that instead of 'Darkest Shadow' with its deep red fleck in a black base, if I had just used a deep red polish, that would even be an improvement. It would make it more reminiscent of an ornament, and then the designs would make sense in the context of that colour scheme.

One good thing that came of this is that now I'm in the mood for Christmas nails!!!  I think I just may do only Holiday designs from here on out. I'm so excited!