Wednesday, August 8, 2012

Jewel Tone Abstract Brush Strokes - OPI Germany Nail Art

I am very excited to share these nails with you guys... I can't believe how well they turned out!

I was browsing Gorgeois recently and came across this fantastic manicure. I immediately freaked out and started hyperventilating due to its extreme awesomeness. When I calmed down a little, I saved the link and vowed to try it out as soon as possible.

As soon as possible ended up being last night! I grabbed some of the new OPI Germany collection and set to it.


I started out by looking at the manicure on Gorgeois and wondering if I would even be able to get close to its awesome faceting and geometry. Fortunately, I fared better than I expected! This technique is surprisingly easy for such a dramatic and beautiful end result.


I painted my nails with a base of OPI My Very First Knockwurst, which was a pinkish nude (before I completely covered it with the other colors). It's a pretty color with an A+ formula, and I needed two coats for opacity. I'll show you guys this one again later since you can't see it at all here.

Then, using the brushes that came with the polish, I started adding in random swipes of color! Like Gorgeois says, you just want to try to keep an eye out for balance and depth.

  • OPI Deutsche You Want Me Baby is the shimmery burnt orange! It has really nice coverage, and is quite a beautiful shade. Very glowy.  
  • OPI Danke-shiny Red is the... shiny red. It's pretty similar to Deutsche You Want Me in finish. I used this in an American flag manicure on a friend and it really only needed one coat for coverage.
  • OPI Suzi & The 7 Dusseldorfs is a purple shimmer. 
  • OPI Unfor-Greta-bly Blue is a rich blue shimmer! Seeing a pattern here? This color in particular was important to the color balance of my manicure, and helped break up all of the warm tones.
  • OPI Ger-manicure by OPI is a brownish red shimmer. This one was the least opaque of the bunch but still not bad. This one is TO DIE FOR. Since it was on the sheerer side, I layered it on last. This allowed some of the other colors to still show through a bit!


I really love all of these colors. They are rich and pigmented, have a fantastic formula, and are super shimmery without being too frosty or showing strokes.

Also... I know people get opinionated about the OPI ProWide brush, and I'm about to do just that! I completely love it. It really works nicely with my nail shape and makes painting fast and easy. It seemed to work pretty well for this nail art, too. I could either use the flat end for wide strokes, or turn it on its side and use the edge for skinnier strokes!


The OPI Germany Collection officially launches today! You can find it at many professional salons, including Beauty Brands, Beauty First, Chatters, Dillard’s, JCPenney, Pure Beauty, Regis, Trade Secret, and ULTA, for $8.50 suggested retail per lacquer.

Also, don't forget to check out Gorgeois... that blog deserves some serious lovin'!

The products in this post were sent to me by the manufacturer or their PR for review.
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59 comments

  1. Que chula. La verdad que los esmaltes de OPI son una pasada pero aquí son muy caros.
    Besos

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  2. Gorgeous!! I want to try out this technique now!

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  3. this is soooo pretty! and i love how all the colors look together. this is a perfect way to swatch lots of colors at once and look gorgeous!

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  4. Oh my gosh!!! What a STUNNING mani!

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  5. Amazing! I understand the awesomness!

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  6. I cannot believe how well this turned out! I must say, Gorgeois' was pretty cool, but you, my friend, TOTALLY NAILED IT! I am speechless. These are SO gorgeous! Well done! I am very VERY impressed!

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  7. Pure AWESOMENESS!!! I have got to try this as well!! amazing!!

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  8. Wow.. This is pure awesomeness! This is art.

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  9. WOw! LOVE IT! I like your version better than the original!

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  10. It's a gorgeous color combination, well done!

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  11. Love Love Love that design! And thanks for sharing Gorgeois, it's a great blog as well.

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  12. Amazing!! I have to try this!!

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  13. This is indeed awesomeness. It's on my list of things to try!

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  14. what a genius art, very creative

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  15. Woah, that turned out so well, love it!

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  16. Wow, that turned out really beautifully!! Those colors are absolutely stunning together. And thank you for the shout out! :D

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  17. This is sooo pretty!! Amazing job, have to try this when I get my pretties :)

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  18. wow! That looks so cool and sounds very easy to recreate!

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  19. This is so beautiful Sarah, great job!

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  20. HOMAGAH! I love this technique!!! Beautifully done!!

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  21. :O the jewel tones! The colours! I am in love! But seriously, your colour choices are spot on, the nails just glow.

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  22. Ooooh it looks like there should be a gorgeous silk scarf made with this pattern!

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  23. Ok agree with Deborah's comment above. A scarf with those color's would be amazeballs lol. Now unto the mani. It is GORGEOUS! The technique seems so simple also. I wanna go out and buy all those nail polish color's just to try this mani, but that's alotta moola for a college student lol. Another amazing mani! Keep the beautiful mani's coming! :D

    Stacey :)

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  24. WOW! This is incredible thanks so much or sharing! Itching to give it a try now, but will most probably make a complete hash of it lol! Off to follow the other lovely lady too, love finding fab new nail blogs to follow!

    Aysh xoxo

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  25. This was cool,the spots are so good made so that it looks stamped or something. This actually reminded me of a military pattern but in other colors :D

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  26. I'm not trying to spam you! I got my first award today and they wanted me to nominate 15 others so you were one of the ones I chose! I nominated you for the versatile blogger award, check out my post on it here: http://mognails.blogspot.com/2012/08/award.html

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  27. can you please do a tutorial on this! I tried looking at Gorgeois's blog and have no idea how exactly this look would be achieved!!? AMAZING!

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  28. Gorgeous!! I love jewel tones and this is perfectly beautiful!! I'm going to try this super-duper soon! :-)

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  29. Ok, so I haven't read through the comments, but when I saw this mani, I immediately viewed it as a blank canvas for some stamping. I must try it!

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  30. I really love this design.. very cool. The colors are all pretty. I'm definitely going to have to try this design out sometime.

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  31. I remember seeing that manicure on Gorgeois' blog a while back, and I too hyperventilated at its awesomeness! You did a wonderful job with your version of the manicure. ^_^

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  32. Beautiful! At first I thought it was some sort of nail foil! Very nicely done :)

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  33. Wow, I really like it ! It's an amazing mani, and the colors are very weel together :)

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  34. seu trabalho é maravilhoso!! linda essa art nail!! amei!!

    http://maquiandobymel.blogspot.com.br

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  35. This is stunning! I love the original, but I think I like your painterly jewel-toned version even more. I have to try this!

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  36. This is sooo beautiful! Can't stop looking at the pictures..

    neglerier.blogspot.com

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  37. These are so pretty, I love jewel tones and I'm craving so much of the OPI Germany collection for fall now! I also love the OPI brush, it's my favorite brush of any brand for sure.

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  38. WOW, i will definitely try this at some point, for something so simple it looks so effective!

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  39. Amazingly beautiful! Looking forward to actually being able to get my hands on this new OPI series!

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  40. What a great idea! I love the bright colors, so pretty!

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  41. Very Pretty...Reminds me of Stained Glass Lamp :) I like it!

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  42. um seriously? I love this so much...great job!

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  43. This is so amazing it's blowing my mind!

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  44. Beyond stunning.... I've never seen this technique and it's fabulous! The colors look great with the technique.

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  45. Ok - have read this 400 times now and I still don't understand how painting swipes of colors ends up looking like this! I would have a muddy mess trying to slap down the shades. What does keep 'em from going muddy with them mixing? They are blending like watercolors on silk. I guess I need to read this another 400 times to see if I ever do 'get' it.

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    1. I went one color at a time -- meaning that I did orange on all 10 of my nails, then I went back and did blue on all 10 nails, etc. That allowed each color to dry enough in between. Maybe that helps explain it better?

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  46. *THUNK* WOWZERS! OMG this is so freaking gorgeous! Now I KNOW I have to get the whole Germany set....

    I can't wait to try this since my freehand work is shaky at best. GORGEOUS!!!!

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  47. Sensacional todas as suas unhas querida!!! PARABÉNS!!! VIREI FÃ DEMAIS. ;)

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  48. OMG THIS IS GORGEOUS! If i didn't know it was all painted by yourself, i would've thought it was one of those nail appliques! :O

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  49. the manicure looks so so beautiful but what about these stupid names of the polishes? OMG

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  50. Sorry to say, but this is better than the original. WOW.
    It could be because I'm into darker colors. I don't like neons much, and shimmer is my favorite finish.

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  51. Such gorgeous fall colors. Love it.

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  52. Such gorgeous nails...This post inspired my christmas mani(:

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  53. Absolutely adore this, and much prefer your colour choices to those in the original tutoriial you mentioned. Thanks for sharing this.

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