Carrie Underwood

The dresses may have been rather safe at the Grammy Awards on Sunday night, but some stars went bold with at least one part of their look: their nails. Celebs from Carly Rae Jepsen (rocking diamond-dusted nails) to Kelly Clarkson (in a yet-to-be-named Deborah Lippman shade) sported killer polish, but we narrowed it down to four stars whose manis really stood out.

WireImage; Inset: Getty; WireImage; Inset: Getty

Rihanna: She went for a modest gown, but the singer brought her signature sexiness with ’80-inspired square-shape crazy-long talons. “She wanted to match her dress perfectly with an orange-red color, so we blended two colors to come up with the perfect look,” her manicurist Kimmie Kyees tells PEOPLE. (She used a mix of Ooo La Liscious and Red Carpet Reddy by Red Carpet Manicure LED gel polish.)

Miranda Lambert: Adding a pop of blue with mini triangles on the base of her nail beds, Lambert added a funky twist to her ladylike rounded champagne numbers. (Her manicurist, Naja Rickette, used colors from the Azature Black Diamond Collection, including blue and champagne.)

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Kevork Djansezian/Getty; John Shearer/Invision/AP (2)

We can’t say we were surprised to see that Carrie Underwood had ditched her form-fitting Roberto Cavalli number for a princess-y silver gown to perform her song “Blown Away” at the Grammys Sunday night. When glowing paisley details began to unscroll across her full skirt, however? We definitely didn’t see that coming.

“We wanted it to be artful and dramatic,” Underwood told reporters backstage. “I just like to stand still and sing sometimes, so this seemed like the best way I could do that and still create something visually attention-capturing.” On the technology behind it, she was a little more tight-lipped, saying “I guess I probably shouldn’t tell my secret, should I?” — but luckily, we’ve already got the inside info.

To perform the song that won her best solo country performance, the superstar donned a custom Theia gown designed specifically for the vivid light show. The line’s creative director Don O’Neill sourced fabric for the 4 feet 5 inches-wide skirt that had to be approved by both Underwood’s stylist, Trish Townsend, as well as the video team creating the special effects.

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• Designers,
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Miranda Lambert promised to awe us, Kellie Pickler got our attention with her head-turning look, but it was Carrie Underwood who stole the show at Thursday’s CMA Awards, wearing 12 different dresses during her time as cohost.

Arriving in a gorgeous Reem Acra gown, Underwood went on to wear 11 more dresses by designers like Alice + Olivia, Georges Chakra, Sally LaPointe, Tony Ward and more.

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Startraks

It’s a phrase Carrie Underwood is all too familiar with: ‘The higher the hair, the closer to God.’

“It makes me laugh, but it really is southern humor,” she tells PEOPLE. “We country folk, we like our big hair. I am certainly no exception.”

Though the singing star is often seen with pretty updos or cute curls, she also enjoys the occasional big (big) hair day. “I just feel like … maybe it makes the rest of me look smaller,” she jokes. “I’m not sure of my reasoning, but that’s the number-one thing I do, when someone fixes my hair, I put my fingers in it and make it look bigger.”

Underwood attributes her love of tall tresses to her native Oklahoma. “I mean for me, it was all about country women,” she says of her childhood style icons. “They like sparkles, they like big hair and they wear big hair. That was gorgeous to me and it still is.”

However, Underwood has modified her loud and proud southern look since landing in the spotlight. “I still feel like the same person, but sometimes I’ll look back at pictures of myself in college or in high school and I’ll say, ‘Oh my gosh, what was I thinking?!’” she shares. “But I’m sure 10 to 15 years from now I’ll look back to now and say, ‘Why would I wear that?’”

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