During my inspiration slump recently, I went a little bit mad with power ordering new stamping plates to sort of revitalize my creativity and they've almost all arrived within the last week - which, admittedly, feels like a lot. That said, it has definitely done what I had hoped and has kickstarted some creativity and excitement on my end. The plate I used for this mani is definitely one that I've had my eye on for a while now and the design is something I've really been wanting to try. This type of abstract is really popular at the moment and I think this plate really provides an amazing amount of versatility for different mani's and designs. 

Keep reading for more!

When it came to deciding on the colors I was going to use for this mani, I knew I wanted to have a nude base and I wanted it to be opaque without looking... dense? I don't know if that's the right word. Anyway, I wanted full coverage but with a light sort of effortlessness, so I grabbed for Picture Polish Grace, which I think is a must have in anyone's collection if we're being honest. It's a very, very soft pink that leans just a hair taupe on me, and it's packed full of really delicate scattered holo that just makes it really special even though it's very subtle. I could go on and on, but... I mean just look at it!

For this mani, I applied two coats of Grace to all of my nails as my base and let them dry down before moving on to my stamping. 

For the stamping I knew that I wanted to use two shades that would not muddy with each other and that had a sort of desaturated kind of vibe to them, so I headed to my KADS stamping polish collection because they have so many great shades in that department. I ended up going for this ashy purple and this sort of smoky medium blue. I knew that they would compliment each other well and get the job done the way I was looking for. When choosing my stamping images from the plate and applying them to the nail, I really wanted to keep each nail distinctly different while also giving an overall feeling of balance and making sure that both colors were represented equally. It was a bit of a process and definitely required some careful placement, but in the end I think it really came out the way I was hoping. (And we're going to ignore the two failed attempts on my ring finger before I finally got this one...)

Once I was happy with my stamping, I sealed everything in with a nail art top coat and then followed with a glossy quick dry top coat for shine and volume. And voila!

Not even gonna lie, I'm obsessed with this mani and how it turned out - and, honestly, a little bit I already want to take it off and make another version of it using different color combinations and placement. And, honestly, I think that's really the best thing about a plate like this and this type of design. I could do a dozen different mani's using the same plate and make them all completely different. (Don't worry, the next 12 mani's aren't going to be that... I have way too many new plates to use now!

Be sure to head over to @pblnails on Instagram and follow me there for video tutorials of all of my nail art, including this one!

Thanks for reading!