Work Appropriate Glitter Half Moon Manicure

For my first week of work I had strict orders from my mother: no wild nails. I get it; it's an office job with a strong focus on client services, and even though I do work with children at least once a day, I probably should stay away from the cupcake nails and Hello Kitty accent fingers that I got used to at my old job.

As I sat there, rubbing last week's manicure off of my fingers, I tried to think of something that could pass in the workplace while still staying true to my inner nail art fiend. It's a tricky balancing act, let me tell you, but I think I figured it out.

At first I was going to do a completely glittered accent nail, but the last time I did that one of my friends complimented me on my 'clubbing nails', so I thought better about it and decided to do a bit of glitter instead. I'm not a such a fan of French manicures, so glittered nail tips were out of the question, but I had never done a half-moon manicure before, so I thought that I would give it a shot. I was still worried that the glitter might be a bit loud, so I toned it down by doing a sort of gradient jelly sandwich.

Is that weird? Let me explain.

I started off with a thin coat of OPI Glints of Glinda, a nude jelly that leans a bit on the tan side. When that was dry, I brushed on a coat of China Glaze Nova. This gorgeous glitter polish is packed with silver micro-glitter and interspersed with fine holographic pieces in a clear base (It's my absolute favourite glitter polish!). When that coat was dry I applied another layer of GoG, then another of Nova and one more coat of GoG over that. This is the most tedious part; waiting for your layers to dry. My advice is to use thin coats of polish; jellies are supposed to be sheer so don't worry about opacity when putting it on. Plus, the colour will build up through the layering process. When I put my first layer of GoG on I could hardly tell it apart from my natural nail, but by the final coat the warm, nutty colour was quite visible.

Once the "jelly sandwich" (the term used to refer to glitter polish sandwiched between layers of jelly polish) was dry, I used a small nail art brush and Sally Hansen CSM Summer Plum to freehand the curve of the half-moon. This technique is probably so much easier with the help of those binder-page reinforcement stickers, but I didn't have any :( Once the curve was painted on, I polished the rest of the nail using two coats of Summer Plum. 

To achieve the gradient look on the half-moon, I cheated a little bit. I used a very thin, cheap topcoat and I dragged the bristles of the brush down from the plum and into the exposed coat of GoG in the half-moon (ie: the opposite direction that you usually paint your nails). The watery topcoat helped to bleed the plum colour and blend it into the tan. I used very small, gentle brush strokes so that the colour-bleed wouldn't overwhelm the half-moon. When this was dry, I dabbed on a little bit of Nova for some extra sparkle and finished off with a thicker topcoat.

Out of focus shot to show the sparkle in Nova.

To keep this look work-appropriate, I only did two fingers on each hand and kept the other nails solid to tone it down.

Sparkly sparkly!

I really like the gradient half-moons. I kind of expected them to be a disaster, but they're cute and subtle!

How do you guys wear nail art to work? I've been brainstorming non-stop for ideas to turn my nail designs into something my supervisors won't furrow their brows at. Have any of you ever gotten raised eyebrows (or worse) at your polish? Or maybe you work in a place where the crazier the polish, the better!? I'd love to hear from you in the comments section, so let me know!

Hope you have a great week!

Mara