Matte nails are a huge trend right now. If you don’t know what this means, “matte” is just a fancy way of saying “not shiny.”
How do you make your nail color matte, you ask? Good question!
Some brands make matte nail polishes, so the color dries without shine on its own, but the more versatile option is to buy a matte topcoat. That way, you can use any color in your great big bin of nail polish (oh, is that just me?), and still achieve this look. Most brands have a version of this topcoat by now, and they’re about the same price as any other nail polish, so you’ll have no trouble getting supplies for this design!
There are tons of ways to use this topcoat. You could just paint on a color and add the topcoat, but I’m going to show you a neat trend within the matte topcoat trend, and it’s super easy!
What you’ll need:
- Nail polish: a base coat, a color (I used Revlon in “Revlon Red”), and a matte topcoat (I used Essie’s “Matte About You”)
- A small brush for details
How to do it:
1) Paint on your base color and let it dry completely. This is very important for using a matte topcoat! If you haven’t looked already, check out my tips for getting a great base coat.
2) Paint on your matte topcoat. Make sure it covers your entire base color evenly, and that you use a thick enough coat so it doesn’t streak. This may take practice!
You’ll also want to put it on quickly, because leaving the bottle open for too long may cause the polish inside to start drying. I know it’s fun to watch it dry on your nail, so if you want to do that, put the brush back in the bottle first.
3) Here’s my twist: dip your small brush into your base color and paint a design on top! For my design, I first painted the big V at the bottom center of my nail to the top corners. Then, I added the smaller V above it, and parts of a bigger V on the edges. It’s hard to see on my nails (my camera didn’t know what to focus on), so here’s a drawing:
And here it is on my nails:
Let it dry, and you’re done! You don’t want to put a normal topcoat on afterwards, because that’ll make your nails shiny and ruin your work.
You can use any design with this, so play around with it! You could do polka dots, stripes, a French tip, or anything else you can think of. I’ve done a leopard print design using black as my color.