Tutorial: Nail Art - Acid Grunge Wash

I have been asked several times how I did these nails.  I was debating on doing a tutorial on these or not, but my answer soon came to me.  There's a Rite-Aid near my place, that I usually go to with my son to get ice cream at, but this time I was looking at makeup haha.  The cashier, I didn't get her name at all, stated "You're the one with does her own nails," or something along those lines.  I was surprised that she remembered me at all!  So after that incident, I knew I had to do a tutorial on it! 

Once again these were a combination of inspirations from my dear sweet friend Emily, and Jamie from Nails Adored.

These nails are super easy to do!  I ended up discovering that there could be another way of doing this, instead of using a paint brush to apply the layer of polishes.  I shall point that out later on in the tutorial. 

First I will tell you the way I did them, by the way Nails Adored did using a nail art/paint brush to apply the nail polish colors.  Sorry but I changed a few colors, but you'll get the idea of how it is done.
Items you will need:

• Nail Polish Colors of your choice
• Nail Polish Remover
• Cotton Swabs
• Piece of paper/paper plate/card/etc. to dab polish upon it
• A container to hold your acetone

Make sure to pick your colors out before you start working on your nails.
The nail polishes I picked from left to right:

• Sinful Colors Summer Peach - a neon orange
• Milani Nail Lacquer Neon Dude Blue - a blue cream color
• Milani Nail Lacquer High Speed Fast Dry Fast Fuchsia - a fuchsia/pinkish cream
• Milani Nail Lacquer High Speed Fast Dry Black Swift - black
• Milani Nail Lacquer High Speed Fast Dry Yellow Whiz - yellow

Apply your favorite base coat upon your nails.  Allow it to dry to touch.

Apply your base color.  I applied black nail polish to my fingernails.  Allow it to dry for at least 10 minutes before continuing.

I poured some nail polish remover with a cotton pad inside a bowl.  That way I could dip my brush in it between swipes. 
You can decide from here if you want to work with one nail at a time, or all of them.  When I was doing these, I did them all at the same time.  So that way I wouldn't use up so much polish when dabbing.

Dabbed some blue, and yellow polish on a piece of old gift card.  

Took the nail art brush and dipped it into one shade, and swiped it on half of the nail.  Repeated with the other half of the nail.  Blue polish on the right, and yellow on the left.  Allowed it to dry for 5 minutes before I moved on.

After cleaning the brush up a little bit in the acetone, and patting it dry with a paper towel, I dabbed some of the neon orange onto the card, and then the brush into it.  Dabbed off any excess, and swiped it all over the nail.  You may have to dip it into the polish again to get the full nail.  Allowed it to dry before moving on.
A bright neon color will really help it give that acid grunge pop your nails need.

Cleaned the brush up a bit in acetone, and patted it dry.  I took the pink, and blue polish dabbed it onto the card as well.  Like I have done previously, dipped it into one color, and swiped half of the nail with it.  Took the other color, and swiped it on to the other half.  I then mixed the pink, and blue polish together to have a semi-blend where the two parts meet.  Allowed that to fully dry before I continued.

I then took a cotton swab, and dipped it into the acetone.  Dabbed some of it on to a paper towel.  Placed it on the nail (nail wheel), and rubbed the cotton swab upon it gently till it removed some of the polish.  Use a back and forth motion upon it.  You could rub the swab on to different areas on your nail to get the effect you want.  You could go all the way down to the base color, but be careful to not get acetone happy.  Yes I have hit bare nail before.  
After I was done with all my nails, I then placed my favorite top coat on to seal up that design.

Sorry about the blue mess on the left nail display!  I accidentally bumped the card with it.  But here's what it usually would like.  Just experiment until you get it the way you want it.

So as I was saying earlier there is another way to do this, if you do not want to deal with the dabbing the polish etc.  Instead of dabbing the nail art brush onto the little droplets of polish upon the card, you can just use the nail polish brush itself!  Make sure to wipe off the excess of the polish on the side of the bottle opening.  Do as stated above when swiping the nail polish.  
I still haven't perfected this part since I just thought about it while doing this tutorial.  But I am pretty sure someone could pull off a nice look with it as well!

I got acetone happy haha!  But this is the quick one I did with just swiping the nail polish brush on it. 

So there you have it!  My little acid grunge wash tutorial on those nails.  Simple right?  So one of those nail art block moments I have, I shall be doing something along these lines again.

If you recreate these, let me know!  I would love to see them seriously!

Thanks for checking out my first tutorial on my blog.  Hope you have a wonderful day.