Now, I will admit that there's a thing in my brain that gets maybe a little bit too on the nose when it comes to themes and seasons and there will absolutely be a fair share of bright neons and beachy themed summer mani's coming up, but for this one I wanted something a little bit softer. Recently I've been going back in time to my childhood a lot, accessing memories I hadn't really thought about in a long time and there's something incredibly soft about my memories of childhood summers and that's where this mani lives for me. 

Keep reading for more!

I've had my eye on Saki Cosmetics for a few months now, but it wasn't until I saw this shade as their Project Artistry offering for May that I decided to give the brand a try. So, so very glad that I did and that this is the first polish that I got from them because it's so beautiful and delicate and exactly something that I want in my collection and one that I think will come out as a nail art base for some surprising occasions. For this mani, though, it had that soft touch that I was looking for and I decided to pair it with some garden images for a bit of whimsy and lazy summer reminiscence. 

For the stamping, I knew I wanted to use this sort of whispy garden image and I knew that I wanted to do some subtle reverse stamping so I grabbed some pastel créme polishes to fill in the image. I didn't want it to be too stark, so rather than going with my usual black I decided to go with a charcoal grey shade that would have enough contrast to stand out but not be too stark or heavy. Using a dotting tool as well as a really fine nail art brush, I filled in the image on my stamper and gave it a few minutes to firm up on the stamper. To transfer the image to the nail, I first applied a thin layer of sticky base coat and let that get tacky and then just transfer directly onto the nails. 

Once I was happy with my stamping, I applied a thin layer of water based top coat and then followed with a quick dry glossy top coat for shine and strength. And voila!

Honestly, guys, I'm so impressed with this polish that I'll definitely be keeping a closer eye on Saki Cosmetics. I actually recently got another polish from them from Polish Pickup so keep an eye out for that in a mani soon! And if you haven't check out Project Artistry yet, it's a Canadian indie polish collab that allows makers to go head to head every month in opposing themes. It's pretty new and still growing, but I think it definitely has potential and I love that there's a Canadian based collab out there now. Check out their Facebook group for more info!

Thanks for reading!