Essence Summer Nail Art Blogger Challenge

Hey everyone! I’m sorry I’ve been away for a couple of weeks. I’ve been having a bit of a rough time of things lately, but I’m hoping if I pour my attention into little projects like blogging more often and improving my site, it’ll help distract me! Hope you’re all doing well.

At the end of August (yup… sorry Essence!) I was kindly sent a goody bag of Essence products to create a nail art look with, as an entry to the Essence Summer Nail Art Blogger Challenge. I think this may be a farewell wave to the summer… as it’s now midway through September and increasingly rainy and cold in England!

Anyway, here’s the look I came up with 🙂

Here’s what they sent me to use for the challenge:

I’m actually a big fan of the stickers, especially the little feathers! They’re very cute 🙂 And they lie nice and flat to the nail. The only thing I found was that because they are very thin, they do fold over on themselves and get stuck together quite easily, but this is easily fixed by using a pair of tweezers. I used my fingertips, hence the problems I had! These are £1.30 for a pack of around 50 stickers (I think! They are hard to count lol).

The dotting tool also worked well, although I tend to like one end to be a little on the thicker side than these ones, so that I can alternate between larger and small dots 🙂 This one is £1.99.

I have to say I wasn’t wowed by the nail file particularly (I may have been ruined by the Leighton Denny Crystal File… I am so in love with that thing and everything else pales in comparison!). The grit wears away pretty quickly and I couldn’t smell any of the scent it’s supposed to have! But it retails for only £1.00 so I would say you get what you pay for.

08 Like Love Birds Nail Candies 6 in 1 Beautifying Nail Polish

The name of this is a bit of a mouthful! The colour is a very soft baby pink with delicate silvery shimmer. It’s quite sheer but builds to almost opaque in 3 coats. You may need a fourth or fifth coat for total opacity though – the slight sheerness doesn’t bother me personally for this colour. You can use it for a french manicure quite effectively too. It dries quickly to a lovely shine. I wasn’t wearing topcoat in this swatch.

The 6 in 1 claim is that it has the following benefits: hardening, protecting, ridge filling, fast drying, fruit scent and high gloss finish. I can’t comment on the hardening and protecting, but I would say it fulfils the other four claims.

This is £1.80 (I think… I can’t find it online!).

03 Glitz & Glam Glitter Jewels Effect

This is a clear-based polish, filled with a green/gold/blue shifting shimmer and pink metallic hexagonal glitter in two sizes. This is one I’ve picked up and put down many times in Wilkos funnily enough, as I thought I wouldn’t get much wear from it. But I actually really like it! The photo shows 3 coats… I don’t think it’s one that ever gets fully opaque but it works really well as a topper. I wore it over a very dark grey the other day which brought out the green/blue shift really well – I loved it! It’s super reflective. Dries slightly dull though so a topcoat is needed. This is £2.00.

27 Don’t Be Shy! The Gel

This is a slightly insipid chartreuse creme… one for the ladies who love ugly colours I feel! For me it’s just too yellow for me to like it, lol. It does however have a fantastic formula – it was virtually opaque at one coat, dries quick to a lovely plump and glossy finish, and I would say it does resemble a gel. So I think I will be going back for more cremes from the Essence “The Gel” line! (Perhaps just not a colour like this one!). This is £1.60.

For all the nails I used Like Love Birds as the base. For my index nail I dabbed Glitz & Glam on the tip in a gradient fashion, and added the white flower sticker. On my middle nail, I dotted Glitz & Glam on using the dotting tool, and added the stickers. On my ring finger, I dotted on Don’t Be Shy around two thirds of my nail, and then above that Glitz & Glam, then filled the empty space with stickers. On my pinkie finger I striped on Don’t Be Shy and Glitz & Glam on the outer half of my nail, and added stickers to the empty space and overlapping slightly. All finished with OPI topcoat to make it all even. 🙂

All of the Essence products in this post are available at Wilko – instore or online.

What do you think of these Essence products? I hope I did them justice in the nail art… I found the colours slightly challenging to put together effectively but I think it worked out okay 🙂 For me these are all great value products with good quality (with the possible exception of the nail file) and I’d definitely recommend them… Essence always surprise me by being great quality despite the very low price point!