Product Review: Claire’s Nail Art Equipment

 Claire’s Nail Design Pen, in white and black. You can see what color which pen is by referring to the cap. Clever. The tip is like a Sharpie tip, but much more harder. When I first used the black pen it was brilliant– the polish flowed out easily. I found the white much more troublesome (I used white in the Math nail art design on Nick’s nails).
So for a while I thought these were AWESOME and I just loved them but after almost a month of owning them, they seem to have already dried out a bit. I have to press hard to get anything out, and that will scrape up my polish so there’s a lot of useless pumping to try to get a flow going. The first time I used the white pen, the flow wasn’t great and I had to go over my designs twice. The black pen, eh not at all– once was enough. However they dry matte, so if you want shiny designs you will need to apply a topcoat.
Also when they dry up it’s very easy to scrape them off your nails so there’s another reason why a topcoat will be necessary when using these. It’s like a sealant.

 Claire’s two-way nail art pen and brush. They have different colors, and clearly the one I am holding is their glitter one.
The very top part of the handle is the brush while the bottom part is a pen. The brush is a striping brush– very thin and long, while the pen looks like the tip of an ultra fine point Sharpie, with the metal thing and a tiny felt point at the end.

I personally like the striping brush a lot. I use it frequently to jazz up my manis that I’m already bored of. It’s glitter in a clear jelly base and comes on sometimes unevenly and sometimes chunky. You can see this effect in the close up above– see how some areas are full of glitter and some are just sparse.
As for the pen tip, I haven’t been able to successfully use it. It’s kind of intimidating looking, and I haven’t even been able to pump any glitter out of the tip. The one time I tried NOTHING happened. Methinks the glitter was too thick to get out of the pen end.

Cons of this formula– the glitter is a total BITCH to get off. I have to use the acetone and foil method, soaking my nails in a piece of cotton ball soaked in acetone to be able to get it off. It’s rough and stays on like a barnacle!

Score? 2 for the nail art pen, and 3 for the striping brush.

Product Review: Claire’s Nail Art Equipment

 Claire’s Nail Design Pen, in white and black. You can see what color which pen is by referring to the cap. Clever. The tip is like a Sharpie tip, but much more harder. When I first used the black pen it was brilliant– the polish flowed out easily. I found the white much more troublesome (I used white in the Math nail art design on Nick’s nails).
So for a while I thought these were AWESOME and I just loved them but after almost a month of owning them, they seem to have already dried out a bit. I have to press hard to get anything out, and that will scrape up my polish so there’s a lot of useless pumping to try to get a flow going. The first time I used the white pen, the flow wasn’t great and I had to go over my designs twice. The black pen, eh not at all– once was enough. However they dry matte, so if you want shiny designs you will need to apply a topcoat.
Also when they dry up it’s very easy to scrape them off your nails so there’s another reason why a topcoat will be necessary when using these. It’s like a sealant.

 Claire’s two-way nail art pen and brush. They have different colors, and clearly the one I am holding is their glitter one.
The very top part of the handle is the brush while the bottom part is a pen. The brush is a striping brush– very thin and long, while the pen looks like the tip of an ultra fine point Sharpie, with the metal thing and a tiny felt point at the end.

I personally like the striping brush a lot. I use it frequently to jazz up my manis that I’m already bored of. It’s glitter in a clear jelly base and comes on sometimes unevenly and sometimes chunky. You can see this effect in the close up above– see how some areas are full of glitter and some are just sparse.
As for the pen tip, I haven’t been able to successfully use it. It’s kind of intimidating looking, and I haven’t even been able to pump any glitter out of the tip. The one time I tried NOTHING happened. Methinks the glitter was too thick to get out of the pen end.

Cons of this formula– the glitter is a total BITCH to get off. I have to use the acetone and foil method, soaking my nails in a piece of cotton ball soaked in acetone to be able to get it off. It’s rough and stays on like a barnacle!

Score? 2 for the nail art pen, and 3 for the striping brush.

First Water Marbling attempt!

 The glittery ones have a glitter as a base, from Claire’s– let me tell you that thing comes on clumpy, and DOESN’T leave. Bad idea for a base. I used a light blue shimmer by a Perfect 10, and Midnight Blue by Sinful Colors. I originally wanted to do the Claire’s glitter, but it didn’t spread very well over the water.

 Really bad one haha.

 The ring finger on the left is my favorite!

 My fiance, Nick’s favorite. He also assisted me with the water marbling activity because he was so fascinated by it.. 🙂

 

Lessons learned? Don’t use glitter in water marbling. They tell you to use plastic or glass bowls/cups FOR A REASON. We tried to be cheap and use a Styrofoam cup but after one marble the bottom corroded through and we had water all over our bathroom counter. Also don’t use Claire’s “top coat glitter” as a base (unless it comes out perfectly like that ring finger above).

First Water Marbling attempt!

 The glittery ones have a glitter as a base, from Claire’s– let me tell you that thing comes on clumpy, and DOESN’T leave. Bad idea for a base. I used a light blue shimmer by a Perfect 10, and Midnight Blue by Sinful Colors. I originally wanted to do the Claire’s glitter, but it didn’t spread very well over the water.

 Really bad one haha.

 The ring finger on the left is my favorite!

 My fiance, Nick’s favorite. He also assisted me with the water marbling activity because he was so fascinated by it.. 🙂

 

Lessons learned? Don’t use glitter in water marbling. They tell you to use plastic or glass bowls/cups FOR A REASON. We tried to be cheap and use a Styrofoam cup but after one marble the bottom corroded through and we had water all over our bathroom counter. Also don’t use Claire’s “top coat glitter” as a base (unless it comes out perfectly like that ring finger above).