For my first look with these, I used a two-coat base of China Glaze Passion for Petals, then bordered two nails with the glitters, and put two stripes down the middle of the nail on my other two fingers.
Do you see what happened when I added a coat of Seche Vite on top of the glitters?!
I only apply my polish in 3-4 strokes, and only lightly even touched the glitters with my brush, but they bled pretty badly.
Most of the gold coating came off of almost every glequin.
Since that was a bust, I decided to get out every topcoat, and even the base coats too, that I own, to test these glitters with. Every single top and base coat made the glitters bleed.
Wet'n'Wild, though, did the least amount of harm.
So... take two.
I put down a base of Zoya Blu and decided to try a flower design instead this time, using Wet'n'Wild's Clear Nail Protector as my initial topcoat, then covering that in Seche Vite.
Still, the W'n'W made the glitters bleed a little, but not nearly as bad as before. Of course I applied my Seche too thick because it started crinkling, but this method did help some to keep the glitters from bleeding as bad.
So, let's go over the pros and cons of these glequins.
Pros:
- Even though they sell these for $8 USD, it is a pretty large container of glitters. I haven't even made a dent in it.
- They did not stick together at all like a lot of loose glitters, I've found, will do.
- They are a tad on the larger side, but nothing too terrible.
- They don't curl.
Cons:
- They bleed. You can't tell from the sample pictures on the website that they bleed because those manis are done without topcoat. You can play with them and keep the bleeding down to a minimum, but regardless, you must be careful or you'll have gold streaks all over your mani.
- $8 is a tad high compared to similar products elsewhere, but not too unreasonable.
Overall, these are great glitters. Their one main downfall is that they bleed. So it's really a contemplation between whether they are worth it, despite their good qualities, since they are a pain to work with when it comes to finding a topcoat that will keep them from losing their color coating.
Personally, I really like these glitters. They are like little gold coins, and I am bound and determined to find a way to use them and topcoat them without making them bleed! But I suppose that's just a bit of a fun little challenge for myself.
Basically I am saying that regardless of said downfall, I like these enough that, instead of discontinuing use of them, I want to work with them and find a way to make them behave so that I can use them worry-free! If I didn't like them so well, I would just throw them in my nail supply box and probably never touch them again. But they do have potential.
I've used thinner in my Wet'n'Wild topcoat, so I want to get a new bottle and try dotting it on top of the glitters, rather than brushing over them, and after it dries, then covering everything in Seche Vite. That is my next test for these glitters, and I'm feeling pretty optimistic about it!
The product in this post was provided to me for my honest review by KKCenterHk without compensation.