Flocking Good Nail Art

The inspiration for this weeks Llama Nails technique challenge is flocking.  I only have one color of flocking powder, black, and have only used it once (just a few dots vertically on my tips) so I was looking forward to this.  Here is what I came up with.

I draw inspiration for manicures from everywhere.  Fashion is one of my favorites and I have even been known ask coworkers if I could snap a pic of their shirt/skirt/outfit.  The other day, however, I found a gold mine of inspiration.  I stopped by Bed Bath and Beyond to see if they had nail polish in their beauty section, as I have heard that those do exist.  Unfortunately, this is not true at my local BB&B.  Since I was there and had a little time to kill, I figured I would look around.  Did you know that there are some GREAT pattern inspirations to be found in bedding, curtains and pillows?  Yep, snapped a bunch of pics, and this mani was inspired by this pillow.

Yup, think I nailed it!  This was actually very easy, but a little time consuming and VERY messy.

I started with a base of two coats Cult Nails Tempest.  Next I stamped with moYou London Pro 14 and Finger Paints Black Expressionism.  I could have free handed the flowers, but I am not very good at randomness and was afraid that my flowers would end up lined up all neatly (tee hee).  The nice thing about this image is that it is outlined flowers, so you can fill them each individually with whatever color you want.  I, of course, wanted them all black.

Next, one by one, I filled the flowers, using various sizes of dotting tools, with more Black Expressionism and sprinkled with the flocking powder.  I found the way to do this, with the least amount of mess, is work across the nails, one flower at a time.  I started with the largest flower, dot, pile the flocking powder only on that one flower, then move on to the next tip and do the same.  Once I had the large flowers on each tip done, I would go back and pat down the flocking powder gently, just to secure it a little, then tap my nails against a piece of paper to collect the extra powder and pour it back into the jar.  I don't press down right after applying the flocking powder, because the polish is still wet and has a tendency to "squish" out of the shape you dotted it in.  Letting it set while you do the other fingers allows it to set a bit and hold its shape better.  Then I worked across the nails with the next smallest flower, etc. until I had all of them done.  I found this made clean up soooo much easier than having to cover your whole nail in flocking powder.  However, I still had had little bits of powder all over my nail/fingers.  When everything was dry, I washed my hands and then gave them a little dry with a blow dryer to fluff them back up.  Finally I dotted the centers with China Glaze Loves A Beach.  Some of them I had to dot a couple of times because the polish just soaked into the flocking, leaving black showing

It might sound difficult, but it was really easy and I totally LOVE the end result (as indicated by my mood stone).

I don't know why I am crushin' on this so hard.  This has to be my favorite mani since my moonrise mani.  Makes me want to get flocking powder in every color of the rainbow!  Just one more pic.

Tell me what you think?  Fuzzy nails for you?  Would you spend the extra time and clean up for this result?  Want the pillow for your bed now?  As always, thanks for looking and commenting!