How to DIY Cute Blue and Gold Tortoiseshell Nails

RoseDIY13
by RoseDIY13
6 Materials
$20
1 Hour
Easy

In this nail art tutorial, I will show you a technique for creating beautiful tortoiseshell nails, using gel polish, nail foil and glitter. It’s not hard to do, but the end-result looks very professional.


You may want to do each nail completely before starting the next one, to get the best result, but once you are done, you’ll want to show off these tortoiseshell nails as much as you can!

Tools and materials:

  • White gel polish
  • Clear watercolor gel polish
  • Deep blue gel polish
  • Reflective glitter top coat
  • Gold foil for nails
  • UV lamp
Applying first coat

1. Apply first coat

Begin your tortoiseshell nails by applying a coat of white gel polish to your nails.


Cure your nails under a UV lamp. Then apply a second coat of white gel polish and cure again.

Applying watercolor gel

2. Apply watercolor gel

Once the white polish is cured, apply a coat of clear watercolor gel to your nails. But this time, so not cure that coat of polish just yet.

Adding tortoiseshell pattern

3. Time for the tortoiseshell pattern

Use a nail dotting tool to apply deep blue gel polish in a tortoiseshell pattern to your nails. Only make the blue dots on one-half to two-thirds of your nail, vertically. 


Cure the color gel dots for 60 seconds.

Adding foil

4. Add foil

Use tweezers to add gold foil flakes along the edge of the tortoiseshell pattern.

Smoothing down foil

Use your finger to press down and smooth out the gold foil flakes.

Applying top coat

5. Add top coat

Apply a reflective glitter top coat over your tortoiseshell and gold foiled nails and cure.


Repeat the same process for all of your nails.

Tortoiseshell nails

If you want, you can change up the tortoiseshell pattern and color like I did for my index finger nail in this picture.


Here, I focused on the gold foil flakes instead of the dots.

Tortoiseshell nails

Tortoiseshell nails

This is a really striking nail art technique. You can see how the dark blue gel polish dots bloom as you work, to create an authentic tortoiseshell look.


With the white base underneath and the glitter on top, this is a really eye-catching design!


I hope you try out this tortoiseshell nail tutorial and leave a comment to let me know how it turned out for you.

Suggested materials:
  • White gel polish
  • Clear watercolor gel polish
  • Deep blue gel polish
See all materials

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Comments
Join the conversation
 2 comments
  • J J on Jan 11, 2023

    It reminds me of sea turtles. Very pretty. You have a lot of patience and talent.

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