From Me to You (with lots of love)

I don't know if you think it's cool to know where the things you buy come from, but I kind of think it is. DIY Nails is anything but a faceless brand and I pride myself on being really interactive with followers, customers and anyone who shows at least the slightest bit of interest in what I do, even if it does take me a while to reply sometimes (sorry!).

Your ready to wear, hand painted false nails come from a lovely little Scottish town called Stirling. It's roughly half-way between Glasgow and Edinburgh and is where the film Braveheart was set! William Wallace is from here don't y'know? We have a castle, a bridge, a monument and a Mcdonalds and a Topshop. I wish I was joking but I can genuinely hear bagpipes outside right now, the perks of living in the town centre on a Saturday! Here are some touristy pictures:

In the future I would definitely love a little office or a studio, but for the time being I'm working from my bedroom! With the magical art of furniture placement and my resourcing skills, I have managed to create a mini studio flat in one room, complete with living room, wardrobe/dressing area, DIY Nails HQ and sleeping area. Here is a photo of my wee work area:

My Frenchie Karl cushion is pretty awesome

When I'm not working elsewhere, I'm sitting here either trawling the internet for nail supplies and inspiration, writing my blog, fiddling about on my websites, replying to e-mails, buying things from eBay and reblogging like crazy on tumblr. I also like to spend a lot of time on Facebook talking to my BFF Emma.

This is a picture of Emma AND the castle

When I get Custom Nail Orders or make nails for photo shoots and fashion shows I just sit at my desk and paint them when needs be. But when it's time to stock up the shop, get started with some new styles or paint up wholesale orders for stockists - I make sure I have one whole day off to start with. I usually have my lovely nail-fairy/assistant Becki booked in for the day. She is the only person I really trust to paint your nails as is as much of a perfectionist as I am.

This is Becki and a horse. I actually stole this off her Facebook.

We tend to sit from 12pm-9pm with a wee break where we take the dog for a walk (I mix up Becki and Betty's names on a regular basis) and eat spaghetti hoops and waffles and later on we eat pizza. If I'm by myself,  I'll start at 8am and keep working until 10pm. So obviously I love the days when I have company! I usually aim for around 50-60 sets in that day. We sit on my couch and use every flat surface available to perch something on, the TV is just out of shot but it usually has Keeping Up With the Kardashians or Harry Potter on repeat.

See if you can spot Betty in there

The next day I usually have work so I get up early to topcoat each set and check all the nails. When I come home I pop them off their wee sticks one-by-one. file the tips and count them into their plastic packaging! I then print off all the inserts, cut them up (badly) and whack them in. I take photos, pop them all in a big box and update my shop. PHEWWWW! This bit of the process usually take around 4 hours. After that, I print off orders as they come, package up the styles and pop them off to my local Post Office in WH Smith. But not until I've stuck a cute sticker on the front of the packet so you know it's coming from me!

So that's it. I hope I haven't ruined the image you had in your head (Hello Kitty and friends painting nails in a magical pink garden that smells of sweets, duh). xxx

KISSES

A "brief" history

Before DIY Nails was born

I painted leopard print on my nails for around 6 months, in every colour-way imaginable! All thanks to my friend Beth who showed me how to do it and bought me my first nail pen.

August 2010 - My first ever attempt at nail art! These are still two of my favourite colours but I did use a liquid eyeliner instead of a nail pen. Resourceful huh!

How my tumblr started

I spent a lot of time on tumblr looking at nails on WAH Nails, Sosoflynails and Pretty Nail Swag and loads of other sites but I wanted my own little platform to share amazing designs I found as well as my own nail art. I wanted to create a little place where people could go to find inspiration, learn how to do simple designs and have an opportunity to share their own nails and learn from tutorials, and in Febuary 2011 I did just that!

Here's a few of my early pictures (on me and my friends)!

How I started doing people's nails

I had so much fun doing my friend's nails and thought the best way to do other people's would be at vintage fairs as there were a lot in Glasgow and they were really popular! Thankfully, "Granny Would Be Proud" took me in May 2011 - at the time no-one did this at vintage fairs and I am very proud to be the first person! (To my knowledge). From then on I set up every so often at different fairs like Afternoon Twee and Gin in Teacups! They really let me meet some amazing people and make lots of new friends. Here are some photos.

Kerri from We Are the Robots - My first ever customer! She got moustaches and it still a customer today!

DIY Nails <3's FRANK

I was so lucky to be introduced to the lovely Julia who owns Frank Boutique in my hometown. She asked me to set up at one of her famous fashion shows (where I ended up doing loads of drunk boys nails...) We decided it would be so fun if I came in to do nails in her boutique every Saturday and that's where I've been since the 8th of October 2011! I love working in Frank, you'll find me there every Saturday 12-4 and my falsies are available to buy there during the week too.

My first day!

Collaborations

I've been pretty lucky to work with loads of amazing talent in Glasgow, here are just a few I've worked with over the last few months!

In The Company of Wolves (ITCOW)

I owe a lot of thanks to Claire, Emma and In The Company Of Wolves for asking me to do the nails for their 70's Horror Movie themed fashion show. I painted a set of nails for each model (16 in total!) as well as a special set to promote the event and received an amazing reaction to them! They also used my nails in their Fashion Film, which you can see here.

ISOLATED HEROES

My absolute favourite designer! I met Samantha McEwen through the ITCOW event and we really hit it off thanks to our mutual love of each other's work. Sam is just the biggest bundle of crazy, colourful and creative energy! She really inspires me and I love designing nails based around her collections because they are always insane! I'll be posting a lot more about Sam so keep your eyes peeled!

Amanda Hendrick

How lucky was I to open a message from the gorgeous Amanda Hendrick? She was going to the Scottish Style Awards and wanted a 3D Hello Kitty set of falsies for the event. Obviously she ended up winning "Most Stylish Female" and after posting my nails on her tumblr my following got even bigger! After that we decided it would be really cute for Amanda to design some sets and we could sell them on my Bigcartel site along with my other designs! The nails were a massive hit! Thank you Amanda!

Amanda's nails for the Scottish Style Awards

LA LA LAND

The lovely Sarah, who owns LA LA LAND was the first person to enquire about wholesaling my nails! I launched at the shop's first birthday and had so much fun :) Thanks to Sarah a few other boutiques had the same idea and now stock my false nails too! 

How "Nail Mail" began

There are a lot of people selling false nails on the internet and numbers have increased in the past few months but I like to think I offer a different kind of service! I never intended to start out selling them but when my friend from Uni was going to Ibiza and asked me if I could paint her a few sets for her I thought it would be pretty cool to sell them to other people too.

Moustaches for Tasha! One of the 5 sets for Ibiza.

My Etsy Shop

I sold false nails on my stalls at vintage fairs while doing nails but then decided to set up a wee Etsy shop! The shop did quite well but I was only painting to order AND making handmade packaging -  it was taking up all my time and I was working two other jobs so I had to shut the shop due to the demand!

My first packaging - all handmade!

Bigcartel

My friends over at Abandon Ship Apparel introduced me to Bigcartel and I've never looked back! I set up a new site just in time for Christmas and SOLD OUT OF EVERYTHING! It was unreal! I was so busy up until Christmas. It was so crazy and I actually had to shut the shop again! I'm still so, so thankful for everyone who ordered nails from me, you guys are crazy!

NAIL MAIL!

www.nailmailme.com

So I re-branded, re-opened and just recently got myself a .com! I made 18 orders in the first 3 hours of being open, absolutely mental. My Nail Mail site offers nails from £8 to £12 with custom nails ranging from £15-£20! I'm always adding new styles to my shop and now even sell phone covers. 

I don't know what's in store for the future really, I have one wee exciting project up my sleeve which should hopefully be released in the next few weeks and I'm working  on a few shoots/shows but other than that I just want to keep painting nails an working with amazing people! And if you made it all the way to the end of this "brief" history then treat yourself to a little free p&p (That's like £2+ off every order!) at my online shop with this code: ILOVEDIY