Nail Art Extravaganza

Though I’ve been using nail polish for what feels like my whole life, I only became interested in nail art in the past couple of years. Prior to that, my go-to nail look was Wet n Wild’s 99-cent black color—a persistent holdover from my angsty high school days, long behind me. I knew that some people grew their nails to Wolverine proportions and painted all sorts of elaborate scenes on them. For some reason, though, it never occurred to me that there could be nail art looks between that and painting all your nails just one color. (That’s right—I didn’t realize you could use TWO colors at once! An accent nail, you say? Insert mind-blown emoji.)

Perhaps my lack of nail art knowledge makes sense, for I’m a life-long nail-biter. I attended a friend’s Mary Kay party in middle school, anticipating an evening of facials and skincare tips, but at the last minute, it became a nail polish night. Cringing, I tried not to draw attention to my hands as I swabbed my nails with polish remover. But the other girls were like lions all over a limping gazelle: “YOUR NAILS ARE SO SHORT!!!11” Cool, thank you! I am aware!

I tend to chomp when my brain goes into overtime trying to problem solve, i.e., when I’m anxious, i.e., all the time. Nail-biting is pretty low on the list of self-destructive physical manifestations of generalized anxiety, though, so I count myself lucky.

Besides, my short nails don’t stop me from collecting a rainbow of nail polishes. I can spend way too long on the ZOYA website, mulling over which colors might improve my life most dramatically. My honeybunch even hooked me up with a little display shelf for me to gaze upon their colorful majesty with great fondness.

THE RADIANCE as of December 2020 (There are more now.)

What’s an artist to do with so much damn nail polish? Turn one’s fingernails into art, of course. Instagram’s my jam; I find a lot of nail art inspiration there, so some looks on this post may be familiar as I tried to echo them.

And when I say “nail art,” I’m not talking The Last Supper recreated in OPI across all ten fingers. I lean toward quick, very easy, very achievable designs—mostly interesting color combinations. Simple but compelling! That’s my aim, gang.

Let’s get into all the photos now. The colors I used are all ZOYA unless stated otherwise and are identified in the captions. You’ll note that a bunch of the images feature Max while we’re on a walkie or lounging around the house. He helps me model and keep it spicy.

P.S. If you read the title of this post in RuPaul’s voice, then you and I both have been watching too much Drag Race. Shangela forever. Halleloo!