Flickanail Inspired Water Flowers

Hey everyone! I hope you've all had a lovely weekend, I can't believe once again that Monday has crept upon us. Two days is never enough, but luckily next weekend is a bank holiday so we get 3 whole days, and then 2 weeks later I'm going on holiday for a week I can't wait. I've done lots of gel designs this weekend, both on myself and on other people, but the nail art I'm showing you today is purely trusty old nail polish. 

For a long time I've been in awe of a number of Japanese nail artists. My twinsie nails with Very Emily were a homage to this, as we both have great respect for Japanese nail art, but I wanted to try my hand at something further. I was inspired by this design by Flickanail, but once again my need for everything to be neat meant that the design didn't turn out as I hoped, despite my best efforts to just go with the flow. When looking at the design alone I really love it, but in comparison it looks nothing alike. I think that I didn't add enough flowers because I was wary of going overboard.

However, I'm not going to give up, there are tonnes of Japanese designs that I want to try my hand at, and I have a feeling that for a lot of them I might be better off working in gel. I'm also tempted to sign up for Neiru tutorials. Have any of you tried these? Are they worth paying for? I really want to improve my skill and learn something new too, so let me know if they are worth doing.

For the nails I used a base of OPI - The I's Have It. Then I created a gradient with Barry M - Huckleberry, and Barry M - Cyan Blue on top of that. For the stalks I used Deborah Lippmann - Spring Buds, and the leaves are China Glaze - Gaga For Green. 

For the roses I used Barry M - Rose Hip and Barry M - Sprint Finish, which I did by painting Rose Hip, and then putting a tiny drop of Sprint Finish and adding acetone to make it spread, this was more successful on some nails than others but it's definitely a technique I want to try again. 

Then I used Avon - Platinum Topcoat to give it some shimmer, but that unfortunately got lost in the photos. Then I finished with Seche Vite to seal in the design. 

You can see the shimmer a bit more in the close up below, but it's definitely not as prominent as in the original design! 

What do you think? Let me know in the comments!

Alice