Ebay is crammed full of super cheap options for you to get your hands on. Nail Art wheels are a must for anyone, as it allows you to practice design on a wheel of false nails, that way you save your nails from a lot of unnecessary potential damage from applying nail polish on and off again. Wheels allow you to display all your best designs in one place so when impressing friends with what you've learnt, you can show them options before painting their nails! Its a cost effective way of designing too, as it saves you all those cotton pads and nail polish remover. You can get hundreds for a couple of quid. They do often come from Hong Kong though so you will have to be patient in waiting for your delivery. But for all the pennies you save, it really is worth while.
For any budding nail art artist, dotting tools are the way forward. They are easy to use and allows you to do many simple but impressive looking designs. You can pick them up from eBay or do as I did and go to your local arts and crafts shop, and pick up some embossing tools. You can pick them up relatively cheaply and you will probably get better quality than the cheapest found online. Basically just a wooden handled tool with a metal ball on the end, allows you to dot the polish onto the nail to create design. Either leave the dots alone, and let them stand by themselves or use multiple dots connected together to create lines and designs. Its a good place to start and nothing looks cuter than perfectly executed than a spotted mani!
Design made with dotting tools!
Nail art pens are the next step if you're feeling adventurous. Again pick them up from eBay for pennies each. I would reccommend to save money if you already have a relatively varied collection of colours in your nail polish collection, start off with just a black and white nail art pen. You wont be spending alot and also they go with every colour in your collection so you know any design you do will go with the base colour! Go for a pen that has a striper brush - basically a very narrow long brush that allows for thin stripe like strokes, and also a metal nibbed needle point pen, it will be like writing with a needle point pen but with polish! You can't go wrong with these pens, but just be wary to wipe down the edge of the bottle when using the brush as I have found that you can get dried polish there that makes it near impossible to then open your bottle, not what you want when in the middle of a mani!
For those of you who are daring and excited by sparkles. You can accessorize any mani with little gems and crystals to accentuate your design. Find bags and tubs full of various pearls, crystals, and acrylic shapes on eBay to add to your nail art design. From butterflies to pieces of fruit, you can find any 3D shape you desire to brighten up your look. Some are harder to apply. For simple flat backed crystals and pearls a quick bit of clear polish on the back will seal the gem onto the nail, but for acrylic shapes of fruit for example you'll need some nail glue. You can pick up some decent stuff cheaply from Body Care and other beauty outlets. Make sure you have some pretty heavy duty nail polish remover as if you want to remove the gems at all you'll need to fill the lid of your nail polish remover bottle with liquid and dunk your nail in, let it soak for about 20 seconds and you can peel off the gem. Make sure you wash your hands well after removing all the desired polish as you don't want all that alcohol and chemicals to sit upon your skin.
So there you have a few tips to getting started. Have fun shopping, make sure if you're buying any glue or polish remover that you are purchasing it from a store you recognise, I wouldnt reccommend getting brands you've never heard of from eBay as its going on your skin and nails you want it to be from somewhere you trust.
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