CHRISTMAS NAIL ART: Rich Red & Gold Holiday Plaid Nails

by - December 18, 2021


If there's one nail design that I think can scream Christmas or just the holiday season in general without having to be too on the nose with holiday specific elements, it's a red, black and gold plaid mani. I always tend to do some kind of plaid nails at this time of year and the past three years they've been pretty samey so I decided this year that I needed to try something a little bit different. I mean... still plaid and still holiday, but just... different. What more can I say about this pretty simple mani? I mean, I bunch but let's move on to how I did it.

Keep reading!


So for my base, instead of going with my usual créme route with a matte finish in the end, I decided to grab for a rich, flakie base with a lot of dimension of some lit from within twinkle. Snozzberry from Cirque Colors is a favorite red in my collection, but one that I really only reach for at the holidays. This polish is a rich burgundy red jelly packed with iridescent flakes. The base definitely leans towards a more berry red, but I feel like the iridescent flakes skew a little bit warmer, which I think really brings out a holiday vibe in this polish. I don't know, maybe it's just me.... 

For this mani, I applied two coats of Snozzberry to all of my nails. If you're going to be wearing this polish alone, I would recommend three coats for opacity and a really beautiful depth, but if you're adding nail art like me, you'll probably be safe with two coats.


For literally years now, I've mostly been defaulting to the same old stamping plate for my plaid nail art designs, but I've been wanting to expand and for this mani I decided to grab the Uberchic Beauty Pretty In Plaid 2 plate and use two of the layering images on this plate for a more bold design. I started with the more dense base image in black to really ground the design and then added the finer image in metallic gold to really pop and add that festive vibe to the look. I alternated the direction that I placed the images in order to break up the design a bit and I think it really helped to give a cohesive but intricate look to the design overall.

Once I was happy with my stamping, I sealed it in with a nail art top coat and then followed with a generous layer of glossy top coat to amp up that shine and help pop the base color. And voila!


All Products Used
Cirque Colors - Snozzberry
Whats Up Nails - Neither Noir
Whats Up Nails - Go For Gild
Apipila Smudge Free Top Coat
Cuticula Limitless Quick Dry Top Coat
Pueen Latex Tape Liquid Peel Off Cuticle Guard
Uberchic Beauty Pretty In Plaid 2 Stamping Plate
Whats Up Nails Magnified Clear Stamper


I will admit that I personally liked these in person more than I do in the photos, which I think is because the depth combined with all of the shine ends up blowing it out a little bit, but I still think it showed up pretty well. This is such a classic holiday mani design and I think pretty much anyone could wear it and it would look good. Highly recommend trying out a plaid design for the holidays!

Keep checking back here on the blog for more holiday themed nail art designs every day in December up until Christmas Eve. Also, be sure to head over to @pblnails on Instagram and follow me there for video tutorials on all of my nail art designs!

Thanks for reading!

You May Also Like

0 comments