The Nail Art Sourcebook Review

Before I say anything else, can I let you in on a little secret? I've been meaning to review this book for you for over a year! I was given it for Christmas the year before last, and I've had these photos sitting in a folder since last August waiting to be used. I am a bad, bad blogger!

Ah well, better late than never, right?

The Nail Art Sourcebook by Pansy Alexander-Potter and Mineko Sugita is, unsurprisingly, a book filled with nail art designs, Over 500, to be more precise. 

The book includes a wide variety of different themes, including floral, glitter, jewelled and even bridal; and each one has been split in to chapters to make browsing easier. While the 255 page book is laden with nail art images, this book doesn't include tutorials to go with them; working out how to recreate them is down to the reader. It's a book full of pictures to gain inspiration from, which is probably best suited to nail art pros or any nail art fan who isn't afraid to dive in and give new designs a shot with their creativity. The images could also be taken to a nail technician who could do the design for you.

The following are some of my favourite designs from the book.

As you can see from this 'small' selection, there is a variety of nail art in different colours, patterns, prints, and styles in the Nail Art Sourcebook. While they're not all to my personal taste- for instance, I'm not a fan of the jewelled look- I think there's something in this book for every nail art fan. There are florals, animal prints, love hearts, stars, tartan, polka dots, 3D designs, glitter, and even holiday themed ideas for Christmas. And that's just for starters! There is just so much inspiration in this sourcebook.

Some of the nail art is modelled on hands of different skin tones, and those photos are beautifully shot and wonderfully clear. Other ideas are presented as single artificial nails. with 2 to 4 of them displayed on a single A5 page. The variety of images makes the book interesting to browse through, and I always feel inspired from flicking through it.

The book also provides helpful information on caring for your nails, and explains how to use various tools such as stencils, striping tape, and nail transfers to help the reader learn how to create any nail look.

It retails at £14.99, which I think is a little steep for what is essentially a coffee table book, but if you consider how many images are provided in it, it doesn't seem so bad. It's currently available through Amazon here.

I think it's a great little book, but if you're looking for a book to show you how to recreate designs step-by-step, then this isn't the book for you. You may prefer DIY Nail Art instead.

DIY Nail Art Book Review

Hey guys,

I've got a nail art book to review for you today. I bought this book in the new year, and I can't believe it's taken me all these months to write about it.

The book is called DIY Nail Art by Catherine Rodgers, who, according to the blurb, is the creator of a 'popular' nail art Youtube channel called Totally Cool Nails. I'd never heard of the channel before purchasing this book, but perhaps some of you are familiar with it. She's a self-taught nail art designer, who lives in Dawsonville, Georgia.

DIY Nail Art is a nail art tutorial book and is filled with 75 creative nail art designs, each with a step by step tutorial to help you through every step of the design so you can recreate them at home.

It also provides advice for preparing and taking care of your nails, along with tips and techniques, which tools to use, and instructions on how to use the book. It's a softback book with 159 pages.

The tutorials are so easy to follow. Firstly, you're provided with a colour photo of the nail art design, so you know what you're trying to create; crucial for success, I'd say! Each tutorial is printed on white pages, which makes everything easy to see, and read. And, there's also a colour photo for each stage of the design, complete with concise and clear instructions. 

It's refreshing to follow clear instructions, instead of ones which make you feel like you're trying to decipher a foreign language from another world. I wish all instructions were this easy!

Most of the tutorials take up a double page spread, like the one shown above...

... while others are on a single page, like the Zig Zag nail tutorial above.

The book features a great selection of fashionable, colourful designs to recreate, including classics like polka dots, stripes, animal prints, and florals; fashionable galaxy print; cute animals like ladybirds and penguins; fruits; and even designs for holidays like Christmas and Halloween. 

Here are some of my favourites: (Apologies for the quality of the photos, they proved hard to capture well without a scanner).

There are such a great mix of designs to try, and I just want to keep coming back to this book to try another look or try one again. I've had a go at several, and the ladybird design is definitely my favourite so far. I'm most looking forward to trying the tiger print and zebra print nails next.

While I like to attempt nail art, I'm a complete novice, and I have to say this book is easy enough for a beginner to follow, and the designs are achievable for anyone who has a bit of patience and a steady hand. If you're a nail art pro, you'll probably have tried your hand at many similar designs- a lot are similar to what can be found on Pinterest- but there are sure to be a few in here you've not seen before.

This book has something for every taste and occasion and would no doubt appeal to nail art fans from tweens, to teens and twenty-somethings and beyond. I do think some of the designs are quite 'young', but they're bound to appeal to the young at heart, too!

It retails for £10.99, but I bought it on Amazon for around £6 or £7. It's currently £7.69, and can also be bought for the Kindle. It's very well priced for the amount of tutorials it's filled with, and I recommend it for any nail art enthusiast, whether you're a beginner or a bit more experienced! You won't be disappointed.

I certainly wasn't!