Review & Tutorial: Pretty Woman Magnetix Nail Polish

Yesterday I gave you a sneak peek of the new magnetic polish collection I spotted at Rite Aid and now that I've been playing around with the color I purchased, I'd love to give you a little tutorial and my thoughts on this product.

Pretty Woman Magnetix Nail Polish

(retail: $7.99 at Rite Aid; 0.34 oz)

There is no shade name on the box, but this is sort of an olive-khaki green with gold sparkle. There are other shades in this range--going from memory I know for a fact there's a silver, magenta, vampy purple, teal and navy blue color in this collection.

The bottle shape is pretty distinctive--it's asymmetrical and unlike any other polish I own.

I LOVE that you get two magnets with this polish--a squiggly line and a straight line design:

The magnets are flexible and housed in little rubber "boats". Notice the curved sides on each "boat": this is where you rest your finger when you're holding your polished nail against the magnet.

Following directions, I applied a layer of polish to my nail:

And then I rested my nail on the lip of the magnet, making sure that my nail did not touch the actual magnet:

And here's what it looked like after I rested my nail above the magnet for 15 seconds (as directed):

Pretty cool, huh? Then I painted another nail and rested it above the squiggly-line magnet and here's the result:

TIP: after doing the above process on all of my fingers, I noticed that the closer you can hold your painted nail above the magnet the better. The farther away your nail is, the less magnetic pull there will be, so my advice is to hold your nail as close as you possibly can to the magnet without touching it. I accidentally touched one of my nails to the magnet and it smudged it a bit (you can see a smudge in the first "after" pic above).

Another tip: I think this system works better if you hold your nail to the magnet after you've applied TWO coats of polish, with the second a bit on the thick side. The design appears more bold and vivid after TWO coats of polish, so my advice would be to apply your first coat as normal, and then one by one, apply a thicker second coat. You want your nails to be wet when you use the magnet (if the polish dries too much, the magnetic pull becomes weaker) so be sure to hold each nail up to the magnet one by one, right after you paint each nail.

One more tip: hold each of your nails up to the magnet for longer than 15 seconds (the time suggested on the box). I think 30 seconds yields much better results.

Here's what my nails looked like after using TWO COATS of polish and then using the magnets on each finger (no top coat). I held each finger to the magnet for about 30 seconds.

I used the squiggly-line magnet on my pinky and middle finger and I used the straight-line magnet on my ring and index fingers.

Notice how there is barely any visible design on my pinky? Yeah, well that's not for lack of trying. I don't know if it had to do with the small surface area of my pinky or what, but I just could NOT get the magnet to work its magic on my pinky nail! I tried about three times, doing exactly what I did to my other nails, and what you see above is the result. Hopefully after some more practice I can get the design to show up on that nail.

Application: this polish applied just like a standard polish. I didn't find it too thick, too watery, or difficult to work with. The brush is pretty standard--not extremely wide or flat, yet not extremely thin either.

Dry Time: this polish didn't take an abnormal amount of time to dry, but it wasn't a quick-dry formula either. I'd say it's pretty standard.

Removal: this polish removed as easily as any of my other shimmery nail polishes. The only issue I had was that, due to the high sparkle content, there was sparkle on my skin after removal (but then again, that happens with most super-sparkly polishes I own).

I can't comment yet about the wear-time of this polish because I just bought it yesterday. But so far, I'm pretty happy with this purchase (aside from the fact that I can't yet get the design to show up on my pinky) and I would definitely consider buying another shade. I think it's a really fun product and the final look reminds me of a Tiger's Eye gemstone. If you've been wanting to try nail art that's extremely quick and easy and requires absolutely no talent at all, this product might just be for you. For $7.99 at Rite Aid, I'd say it's a great alternative to the pricier magentic polishes on the market.

Do you own any magnetic polishes? Are you excited that this trend has hit the drugstore?