Before & After: Garden of orchid delights

Hello!

Today I'm taking a second stab at perfecting a look I've been working at for a while now. I'm trying to get a stained-glass sort of look with a gorgeous lily stamp from last year's MASH set. This time I decided to try it via the decal technique.

I started out with a base of the glowing-from-within Julep Faye, a medium caramel brown with a luminous golden shimmer; this is two coats:

Julep Faye, artificial light

To create my flower pattern, I stamped the image four times with Konad Black onto pre-swatched squares of topcoat that had dried atop a ziploc bag. Then I painted them in with acrylic paints; when I was done, I cut out the design. Then, I put a think coat of topcoat on each nail, positioned the decal where I wanted it, and painted over it with another layer of topcoat. Here is the result:

This is my first attempt using cut-out decals rather than covering the whole nail nail-wrap style; I got a little bit of air trapped here and there, so I'm still working on perfecting that techique, lol. Also, I think this might have looked better with a background image stamped under it...I'm going to try that next time. :)

Thanks for taking a look! Wish me better luck next time, lol!! :)

Hugs and love,
M.