I’ve only ever been able to do my own French

I’ve only ever been able to do my own French manicure from the bottom up, which is an alternate method I learned from a random nail salon gal.  I think a lot of people start with the base tone (pink or whatnot), and then paint the white across the tip. 

I think this is kind of crazytown if you’re trying to do it yourself, because there’s no way you will get that tip right on the first (10) tries, and to fix it you’d have to remove the base color you’d applied. 

So whether you’re doing a traditional French or something like my fluorescent-on-nude jam above, here’s my suggestion:

                

- Start by painting the colored (or white) tip on a bare nail.  I start with a line going left to right, then finish the line by going right to left, meeting up in the middle. Here I used a very opaque fluorescent yellow-green from The Face Shop (Korean brand).
- Dip a flat brush like in nail polish remover and gently tidy up the arc of the tip you’ve painted (so the underside of the tip, closer to your nail bed) and any mess around the nail.  This is the Studio Basics Concealer Brush.
- Then apply the main “color” of the nail.  In this case I just used clear, but you can use a sheer pink or nude to create a traditional French mani look.  I like that this also mutes the white tip a bit; I think it looks more modern this way. People might even believe you just have really clean nails. I used this top coat, Orly’s Won’t Chip.

So anyway, I’m loving this bright-on-nude and for some reason I felt like it was a perfect match for a Breton stripe : )