I am not good with nail care.  It’s my grooming weakness.  I try to blame that on my heavy keyboard technique developed back in the dark ages. {I’m sooo ancient that I actually learnt to type on a typewriter … a manual one}.

But truth be told, I’m just not into devoting time to a beauty routine that gives you but a brief moment of grooming pleasure.  The way I treat my nails I’m usually lucky to get 24 hours out of a mani – tops.

I’ve been down the acrylic and gel nail path before and it did give me what I wanted – nails that looked cared for.  That was until the day I decided to take them off.  I think it took six months for my nail beds to recover.

So when I heard about a new hybrid nail colour that uses the best of gel technology, I was curious and hopeful that I’d found a solution to my nail neglecting habits.

And I do believe I have.

Its name is Creative Nail Design Shellac.  And it gives you at least two weeks of chip-free nail colour with a high-shine gloss.  Yep, you read correctly.  TWO WEEKS.

I tried it first as a guest of Suite Three Beauty* in Buderim {phone 07 54456700}, putting it to the test on a deep purple black {Fedora}.  Here is what my nails looked like at the end of two weeks:

Pretty damn good, huh?  You can tell they’ve grown but there’s no ugly chipping in sight.

The process is a simple one.  Your nails are painted much as they would be with a regular manicure – a base coat, two coats of colour {currently you can choose from CND’s 12 most popular colours but there are more in the pipeline} and top coat.  Each coat is “cured” under a UV light and there is zero dry time  {yes, no smudging!}.  Now you must now be thinking that there has to be a whole bunch of nasties in the formulation to make this all possible. Ah, no.  The formula is free from formaldehyde, toluene and DBP.

And taking the colour off was also a cinch. I chose to do the removal at home before the next appointment {but you can have it done in the salon}.  I was concerned about how difficult that process would be and what state my nails would be in.  But that concern was unwarranted. The CND Shellac removal wraps {pictured below, but you could also use cotton balls and alfoil strips} work a treat.  Simply soak the pad in acetone and wrap around each nail for 10 minutes.  This will dissolve most the polish and you’ll just have to gently scrape the rest with an orange stick.  As for the health of my nails … all good.  I’d applied cuticle oil every day as advised and they had all grown* because there is no buffing down of the nail bed (like in acrylic nails), they were still strong as well.

{*The only thing to watch out for if you’re like me – and not so protective of your nails – is breakage.  As your nails grow – and they will – they may break off at a low point on the nail due to the strength of the Shellac above.  This happened just once to me over a month and it was towards the end of my second application.  I’m going to keep my nails at a shorter length to prevent this in the future.}

The next morning I went back for more … this time opting for a more subtle pale pink {Strawberry Smoothie}.  Nice nails are no longer just one of my beauty pipe dreams.  And they don’t have to be for you either.

* CND Shellac at Suite Three Buderim cost $30 per application which includes a cuticle tidy and nail file.  If you don’t soak at home, it’s $15 for an in-salon soak.

For information about your nearest CND Shellac professional, phone  1800 449 109.   

Popularity: 37% [?]