Trying out nail patches

The Born Pretty nail art store sent me some of these nail patch sheets to try out. I've been wanting to try this kind of product for a while, but I've been wimping out due to lack of patience - you know how I roll by now, right? I'm too afraid to screw up. I know how to paint my nails with polish, but everything other than that scares me to pieces. So, this was an excellent opportunity to try, and also provide you with an honest opinion of the difficulty level for a beginner.

The following photo may be the single most unflattering one in the entire history of this blog, but it shows my first attempt. Right after opening the envelope I just had to try one, and I found that it went somewhat well with my existing manicure, the Kleancolor Chunky Holo Black I've shown you before.

As rarely seen: my thumb! I have mentioned it before: the reason why I don't like showing it, is that it's terribly ridged and bumpy, probably due to long ago damage to the matrix. This is the first thing I like to point out: these nail patches probably aren't meant for those of us suffering from ridged nails, or overly curved ones either, as they do not only tend to show off the ridges pretty well, but also, no matter how good you stretch the sticker while applying it, it will give you slight wrinkles and loose edges. For a girl (or guy) with flat, straight nails, I bet these work like a charm.

Here it is in slight more closeup (sorry about the excess topcoat on my cuticle):

I love the pattern though. Luckily, I got to select the one I wanted, and this is so much me in a strange way - flowers in some kind of old school coloring, it's like a weird wallpaper from the 60's. It's called 93 - the Asians are just as inventive as us Europeans when it comes to naming nail products.

My lack of patience kept me from trying to do all my nails with this stuff, but I fell in love with my thumbnail and kept staring at it, and it soon became obvious I had to try the stickers for a pedicure too. Warning - foot ahead!

I did the exact same combination as I found it worked out for me, and yes, my foot has been a bit desaturated for your convenience - not the pattern though. This photo was shot after two days of wear, partly inside good ol' rubbery Chuck Taylors, and it still sticks. As I write this, another two days have passed, and it looks the same as in the photo. I have been twice in hot baths, took endless amounts of hot showers, and I have been walking quite the lengths inside my Chuck Taylors.

If you're daring enough to magnify any of these photos to look closely, you'll be able to see the fitting problems. If you suffer from the following combination: perfectionism and uneven nails, you might be irked about this, but as long as you're not bringing your hands or feet about 2 inches from your eyes, you will find it looks good mostly. Personally I had zero patience for doing any extra cutting to fit the stickers perfectly (I know I would just have screwed up anyway and ended up with no sticker left), but if you're skilled with the scissors and have that perfectionist thing going for you, you could achieve better results than I did.

I also want to mention I did apply topcoat to my stickers, to have the loose edges stick a bit better, and possibly get rid of some of the wrinkles. It made some difference for that, but I can't tell how it affects the overall wear. I know you're supposed to be able to go without a topcoating on these, but if you have nails like mine, maybe you should try it out too.

Overall, I think I'd like to use these as accent details in the future as well, but also, I do want to challenge myself and try an entire manicure with these. The future will tell.

Swedish word of the day:
klistermärke -noun sticker
I have never been a collector.