When it comes to cartoon nail art, I couldn’t resist having a stab at Winnie the Pooh, that willy nilly silly old bear. A personal childhood favourite, my Winnie the Pooh anthology still has pride of place on my bookshelf and to this day, my family and I still play Poohsticks wherever and whenever we can on a walk. There’s such simple enjoyment to be found in racing a few bits of twig under a bridge.

Who is your favourite Winnie the Pooh character? I think I’m tied between the lovable bear himself, or the more pessimistic Eeyore.

Winnie the Pooh Cartoon Nail Art: Thoughts On The Design

2D cartoon nail art is by far one of my preferred styles of nail art, simply because the source material is perfectly made for a very small canvas and limited range of colours. Creating depth through shadows and shading is very difficult to do with nail polish, but 2D cartoon nail art removes that particular complication.

As well as Winnie the Pooh, the Hundred Acre Wood is home to a host of other wonderful characters. If I’d had more fingers, I’d have loved to paint the likes of Owl, Rabbit and Kanga. In the end it was Pooh, Roo, Eeyore, Tigger and Piglet who made the cut. Each has a different primary colour to their illustration, ensuring that this remained a bold and bright design. Furthermore, each of these 5 character’s have very distinct personalities which come across in their facial expression. Contrast the rather dour, sad eyes of Eeyore with Tigger’s eager excitement.

As you can see, I made the decision to outline each character using a black polish, except from Piglet. I was concerned that the colour would seem too harsh alongside the pale pink body colour. In retrospect though, I wished I’d stuck with the black as Piglet doesn’t seem to quite fit with the rest of the group.

Unfortunately I was a little too eager to top coat this design and the colour ended up running. One of these days I will learn that you should always give black-heavy designs a longer time to dry!

Winnie the Pooh Cartoon Nail Art: Polishes Used

• Seventeen Pale Green
• Seventeen Pink
• NYC Lexington Yellow
• Kiko 238
• Kiko 336
• Maybelline Blackout
• Nails Inc. St John’s Wood Gardens
• Sally Hansen Presto Pink
• Rimmel No Need to Blush
• Jessica Custom Nail Colour (Grey)
• Jessica Custom Nail Colour (Taupe)
• MUA Whitewash
• Collection Orange Zest

I’ll leave you with a few of my favourite Winnie the Pooh quotes:

“You are braver than you believe, stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think.”

“How lucky I am to have something that makes saying goodbye so hard.”

“Don’t underestimate the value of Doing Nothing, of just going along, listening to all the things you can’t hear, and not bothering.”

“Rivers know this: there is no hurry. We shall get there some day.”

“If you live to be a hundred, I want to live to be a hundred minus one day so I never have to live without you.”

“You can’t stay in your corner of the Forest waiting for others to come to you. You have to go to them sometimes.”

“Weeds are flowers, too, once you get to know them.”

If you would like to see a full tutorial of this design, please comment below.