OPI and China Glaze.
I have some Red Carpet gels and an LED light. I like the lighter colors, but the darker ones don’t go on clean. I don’t get the life out of a gel polish that I do at home like a salon job, but they last longer than the OPI. I particularly like the gels for the “damn, I need to start all over and grow these things out” stage because it adds a LOT of strength to the nail.
Thank you all, ladies, for your recommendations. I am definitely going to give Opi a try.
Just to pass along a (hopefully) helpful tip to you girls, at the end of last week I tried an inexpensive brand called Sinful Colors that I found at Walmart. So far so good: I applied it on Thursday morning and today - Monday evening - it’s still unchipped.
I’m a little late, but I’ll jump in with another vote for OPI and Essie. Haven’t tried China Glaze. I rarely polish my fingernails but both OPI and Essie last forever on my toes.
I have a lot of the Sinful Colors stuff–it’s like two bucks at Walgreens, and it comes in a lot of great colors. The problem I most often have with it is that it’s thin and it takes several coats to really get the color to pop. I tend to use it mostly on my toes in the winter so I can be lazy and just paint another coat on when things start to look ragged rather than start all over. 
I’ve purchased Orly and China Glaze and they were awful. Both brands dried to a matte finish and didn’t go on evenly. My nails actually looked like they had dried chalk on them. What did I do wrong?
Did you use a base coat? That might have something to do with it, but I’m not sure. I do have a couple Orly colors that seem to dry matte-ish, but a nice shiny topcoat usually takes care of it.
I am one of those people that tries to do things before my nails are fully dry–sometimes touching stuff too soon can rough up the paint and make it look matte. I’m especially guilty of going to bed too soon.
For the unevenness … I would just suggest shaking thoroughly before opening the bottle, and make sure you’re not glopping it onto your nails. Some brushes are kind of designed to spread too thick, and that can make it look bumpy and sloppy. Good luck!
[quote=“Draelin, post:26, topic:672714”]
For the unevenness … I would just suggest shaking thoroughly before opening the bottle
Doesn’t shaking it cause bubbles? I hate it when the bubbles show up a few hours after I apply polish.
I’ve never had that happen, but I suppose it’s possible.
Have you checked out this woman’s nail art site? She makes great how-to videos.
Some of her stuff is very fancy, but some of it is pretty easy to do even for a super novice like me.
Draelin, thanks for your reply. Yes, I did use a base coat and I shook the bottles thoroughly. I applied two more coats of color to try and fix the unevenness. I let them dry thoroughly. Then when I tried to apply a top coat – hoping for some shininess – the color seemed to “grab onto” the top coat and cause more unevenness. I’ve been doing my own nails since I was a teenager and I’ve never experienced anything like this. I’m still baffled… I guess I’ll have to give OPI a try. I’m extremely disappointed because the colors were gorgeous but I now have 2 bottles of polish that I can’t use. Money down the drain.
I’m totally baffled, too! I don’t know why this would happen at all. This is usually where I take all the polish off, cry for a few minutes because I’ve been thwarted, then try something else. 
You need a good-quality topcoat. Sinful colors has a tendency to dry matte (depending on the shade). I have used seche vite over sinful colors for a pretty shiny finish many **many **times with no problem. You put it on while the nail polish is still wet. And you need to use a big dollop, not touching the nail directly with the brush but allowing it to glide the liquid around. Youtube tutorials will be helpful, look up “seche vite.”
Now I know what I’m doing tonight. Thanks! I have to get better at stripes and blending, because there’s only so much you can do with dots and straight lines. This Buzzfeed post has some great ideas and links to videos that I’ve been having a fun time with.
Did you purchase them recently? I am seeing a recent trend toward matte finish in nail polishes. I got one in my Julep Maven box this month and I didn’t realize it was supposed to look like that until I read the label more closely. Is it possible that you purchased a matte finish polish without realizing it? Even OPI has come out with a matte finish top coat so your normally shiny polish can look matte.
Oooh. My roommate gets a monthly box from Cult, but I’m all over this.
I’m frightening myself. I am normally not this girly. I swear.
This is funny, because I am not this girly normally either. It’s just since finally growing my nails out and stopping biting them, I am having so much fun polishing them and stuff.
Use the code: FREEBOX and your first box is free, except you pay shipping.
Thanks for the Buzzfeed link. Bookmarked it!
I spent most of my life with nails that wouldn’t grow. I didn’t bite them, they just never got very long. Sometime around my 35th birthday they started growing like frickin’ weeds, and now I can go from broken-to-the-quick to pretty-and-paintable in about three weeks.
There’s one towards the bottom that uses a fan brush to do horizontal stripes in various colors. I must stress the need for a fan brush–but it actually comes out the way it’s pictured, even if you’re a beginner. Love that one.
Any tips for polishing your right hand? (If you’re right-handed, I mean.) Other than just practice? My left hand always looks stellar and my right, gunky and polish down in the crack next to the finger. :mad:
Brace the hand you’re holding the brush in against something–the table, your other hand, whatever. It cuts down on the shakiness and keeps you a little more stable. And practice.
But rather than worry about polish getting in the cracks and on the cuticles and stuff, just go nuts and paint your whole damn finger–when it’s dry, there are various ways to go back and take the polish off everything that isn’t your nail. Q-tips, manicure pens, and most especially a toothpick with a tiny bit of cotton wrapped around it and soaked in remover–that’s how you get in the cracks. I happened to notice that flailing in the direction of my toes and then scrubbing well in the shower the next day took off everything that missed the nail. So I tried soaking my hands in hot water once my nails were dry and just kind of peeling the extra off. Worked like a charm, although I don’t know how advisable it is for keeping your manicure a long time.
I always paint my right nails first. For me, it’s easier to focus and do the job right if I get it out of the way early. Generally speaking, I’m more apt to rush the second hand because I’m getting bored, and it looks worse.