This month’s cover almost never happened. When we found out that Hawaii-based Christie Lovett was going to be in the Los Angeles area for the ISSE show, we contacted her about doing a cover. “I was so excited to be offered the opportunity to do the cover for NAILS,” says Christie, who has been doing nails for five years and rents a space she calls Christie’s Nails in a small salon in Ocean View, Hawaii. “But then I realized I had training on the day of the shoot and I wouldn’t be able to do the cover.”

An educator for Young Nails for the past two years, Christie was coming to Los Angeles to do demos at the booth and attend an educator training session. A few phone calls later and the Salo brothers at Young Nails decided this was a great opportunity for Christie and they agreed to let her change the dates of her training. “I couldn’t believe Hannah talked Greg and Habib into letting me miss a day. I was so excited,” she says. “I ended up staying an extra day to catch up on the things I missed while I was at the shoot.”

A versatile artist, Christie is comfortable on big and small canvases — she loves painting murals on walls and nails. Christie’s nail art is often featured in the pages of NAILS and we wanted to showcase her talent. She came up with this beautiful lucky bamboo design over a color-fade acrylic nail. “These are very wearable nails,” says Christie. “When the client comes in for her fill, I just take off the art, remove the color at the tip, and let the client pick a new color.”

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HOW TO GET THE COVER LOOK:

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1. Prep nails and apply forms. Sculpt green color-fade tips using three shades of green. Start with the lightest shade of green — a mix of Young Nails Metallic Pearl powder and Metallic Green powder — at the free edge.

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2. Take Young Nails Metallic Green powder for the next section and feather it over the lighter color toward the tip of the nail. Leave some of the lighter green uncovered right at the free edge.

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3. Finish the color-fade tip using Metallic Green powder mixed with a small amount of Young Nails Rainbow Green. Place the dark green only at the very top of the nail.

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4. Apply Young Nails XXX Pink powder to the nail bed.

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5. Apply a thin layer of clear acrylic over the entire nail. Shape and file. With a liner brush and white acrylic paint, paint bamboo stalks and leaves on the nails. Apply Young Nails Finish and cure.

You can see more of Christie’s art on her website at www.christiesnails.com.