I confess I’ve never been able to polish my nails successfully. I tend to get polish all over my cuticles, ruin my nails and swear off polish forever ( or at least until I find a great color I can’t live without). I appeal to the lady dopers – what brand of polish do you use that gives you at least a few days wear (does price matter), whether the polish formula itself, the brush, shape of the bottle, etc. helps you achieve nail nirvana. Also, what techniques do you use: thin or thick coats, keeping nail polish cold, etc.
Please tell me your secrets, my life won’t be complete until my nails stay nice and polished for at least 5 days.
I’ve come to the conclusion that no one can polish their own nails to look and last like a manicurist. Save your money on the polish and find a manicurist you like is my advice. A really good manicure can look good for a couple of weeks even if you are rough on it.
Well, you can if you take a cosmotology course or you can get really close to it.
The only thing I could say is practice practice practice. It took me a long time to even be able to paint my right hand without getting polish everywhere, precisely because I am right handed.
My best tips:
[ul][li]When painting nails start in the middle and then do the sides of the nail.[/li][li]Keep a q-tip or an orange stick with the tip wrapped in cotton and a bottle of polish remover to immediately remove any mistakes. (Dip in the remover and run carefully around the cuticles where you messed up.)[/li][li]Paint your thumb, then go to your pinky and work your way in.[/li][li]Paint your nails when your hands are their least shaky.[/li][li]Work slowly, never paint your nails when your in a hurry.[/ul][/li]
A clear top coat can help to protect your nails for a little longer as well.
I have been buying Maybelline Forever Strong +Iron and I love it. I can wear it a week with no chipping or wear on the tips showing. Best nail polish I’ve tried lately, I cannot say enough good about it. I know a lot of people like OPI, but it is more expensive and I can’t get it at Target. I apply thin coats, and it seems to dry fast. I usually put on two coats, and I skip base and top coats. I put a fresh coat on over the weekend. I usually go two weeks between total strips; after two weeks my nails are too long to type, so I strip the polish off, file them down to a little above my fingertips, and repolish.
My nails used to be very poor - they would break, split and crack terribly. I started taking a multi-vitamin daily when I started low-carb and my nails have been growing long and strong. They don’t break or split, and I have to buy the heavy-duty filing boards (not the little emery boards) to file them down. Vitamins really do work for healthy nails.
I’ve given up trying to keep my fingernails polished, just for special ocassions these days. Trouble is, even the best polish can’t stand up to how much I do with my hands. OPI and Essie polishes worked best for me, but now I’m tempted to try the polish Boscibo mentioned.
Oh, practice practice practice when it comes to polishing. And I don’t worry about going outside the lines. Once it’s dry, I just take a shower and then use a little lotion to help rub off the excess polish. This works for small bits of paint-- you can’t dip your fingers in the polish and then peel off the excess, darn it.
I find Opi is better than the Maybelline Forever Strong +Iron, I just bought some last week to try. Painted my nails on Thursday night and already the tips of my nails are peeking through, Opi lasts at least a day or so more before it does that. YMMV.
I love polished nails. I used to do it myself and I never got to the point where I didn’t get it on my cuticles. I would just pick off the mistakes when I got done; the polish doesn’t stick to skin like it does to nails. Same for the toes. But then I got tired of having constantly chipped nails and redoing my polish every three days. Now I have acrylic nails because the polish never chips and I kind of like the cheesy, long, square porn star nails. But the regular nail salon manicures last longer too and they’re not that expensive and will save lots of time in the long run.
tremorviolet, I used to have acrylic nails and I loved them. I never got any infections, and any polish I put on lasted forever. I only took them off because I hated losing 2-3 hours out of my weekend and breathing all of those fumes. Also, my real nails were trashed underneath. It took about a year to get them back to normal. Thanks for all your suggestions, I’ll try that maybelline polish.
I only just (like in the last month) got de-stressed enough that I no longer chew my nails. I didn’t even realise I’d stopped chewing until I caught one of my nails on something at work. So, all of a sudden, I can paint my nails.
I only used to paint my toenails, and I only painted them really fun colors. (Green, blue, orange, etc. cause I never wear pink or red.) But now, I’ve realised blue toenails are fun, but blue figernails are scary. I am going somewhere with this, I swear! So now, I’ve started buying Cover Girl Continuous Color in various pink shades, and it’s great! I work with my hands, and this stuff really holds up. It’s a new formula, 3 in 1, and I don’t even have to put on a second coat with it. YMMV.