Disney Princess Nails: Aurora

Once upon a dream…  These nails are inspired by the princess Aurora from the movie Sleeping Beauty (1959).  Each month I will bring you a new set of nails based on a Disney princess, in the order of their release.

You’ll need:

Base coat

Top coat (I prefer Seche Vite)

Tape

Striper brush

Dotting tool

Deep purple, dark green, light green, black, light pink, light blue, 1-2 darker blues, brown, white, red, gold and/or yellow, and nude nail polishes  (I used: Sally Hansen Lacquer Shine Nail Color in 05 Flair; Sally Hansen Hard as Nails Xtreme Wear in 40 Emerald City; Sally Hansen Hard as Nails Xtreme Wear in 02 Green With Envy; Sally Hansen Hard as Nails in 880 Black Heart; OPI Nail Lacquer in Princesses Rule!; Dior in Porcelaine 204; Pure Ice in Kissy Kiss; OPI Nail Lacquer in Can’t Find My Czechbook; OPI Nail Lacquer in You Don’t Know Jacques! Suede; Sally Hansen Hard as Nails in 110 Hard to Get; Sally Hansen Hard as Nails in 470 Unbreakable Heart; Love My Nails in Gold Dust; Pure Ice in Excuse Me; and OPI Nail Lacquer in My Vampire is Buff)

Start with a clear base coat.  Paint your pinky, index finger and thumb with two coats of the light pink.  Use a piece of tape to cover about the top half of your nail on your ring finger.  (Stick the piece of tape on the back of your hand once, then peel off and apply to your nail.  This will help prevent the tape from pulling too much of your base coat off when you remove it.)  Paint the bottom half of the ring finger nail dark green.  While that dries just a little, use the dry brush technique (or any other ombré technique) on your middle finger with a light or medium blue.  (This should represent the sky.)  Carefully peel the tape off your ring finger nail and paint the top half with a deep purple.

In honor of the upcoming release of Maleficent next month, let’s start with the nail inspired by our villain.  With your striper brush dipped in black, create the shape of Maleficent’s headpiece (horns? Hmm…) on the purple portion of your ring finger nail and fill it in completely.  Then use the striper brush dipped in your light green polish to make squiggly lines coming up from the dark green half of the nail to the headpiece.  (These can cross over into the purple half.)  Use the striper brush to add a little black polish to the bottom half for some more definition of these Maleficent-esque flames.

On your pinky, use the dotting tool to create the fairies.  Make a small, round dot in light blue; a longer, thinner shape in dark green; and a dot that’s somewhere in between the other two sizes in red.  Use your striper brush to add a small triangle to the top of each fairy, in the corresponding color.  Then dip just the tip of your striper brush in black to outline the hat and body of each fairy, and to add wings.

On your middle finger, use the striper brush to create a brown tree trunk on the left side of your nail (slightly curved toward the middle of your nail at the bottom, with the top ending about halfway into the blue sky created earlier).  Then add a small tree branch about halfway up and make the dark green tree leaves at the top of the trunk (with curvy edges that reach to about the middle of your nail).  Dip the striper brush in white to make some clouds at the top of the right side of your nail.  Use your dotting tool to make two light blue dots on the tree branch, one larger one touching the branch with a smaller one off-center on top.  Next, add some details.  I used gold to create a small beak and outlined the bird in a slightly darker blue.  With black polish on my striper brush I added a wing and an eye for the bird, outlined the beak and made some musical notes just under the clouds.

Keeping the index finger nail simple, just use your striper brush dipped in brown polish (or gold, if yours shows up well) to write “Once upon a dream”.  (I turned mine sideways for more room.)  

Finally, let’s add Aurora to the look.  On your thumb, use your striper brush dipped in yellow to create a small domed shape off to the left side at the bottom.  (This will be the back of her head.)  Dip the brush in gold to add squiggly lines to the hair (for her curls) and make her crown on top.  With a blue polish on your striper brush (I used my more medium shade, but any shade you’ve chosen for the look is fine!), create a small, slightly curved shape near the bottom of your nail, going upward.  Dip the brush in your nude polish and create a small hand with the index finger pointed out toward the top of the nail.  Use the striper brush and your light green polish to create the shape of the spindle.  (I did a circle with two small legs at the bottom and an outstretched arm where the needle will go.)  Then dip the brush in black and go back over the green shape, leaving a little green polish showing on each side of the black lines.  (I made sort of a black dot a little over halfway up the arm of the spindle, so the needle is more pronounced.  The black polish shows the actual spindle, while the light green color mimics the evil magic glow that draws Aurora to prick herself.)  For a little more definition, outline Aurora’s hand with brown polish.

Top each nail off with a clear coat and you’re done!  This look puts more focus on the movie rather than just details pertaining to the princess.  Each nails tells a small piece of the story of Sleeping Beauty!

~ Alyssa