French Manicure Made Easy (Manicare French Manicure Pen)

Member Name: freeandsingle

Product:	Manicare French Manicure Pen
Date:	01/05/09 (273 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: The white wand is good for a perfect shape

Disadvantages: chips very easily

I called into my local chemist the other day to have a prescription made up and as usual I had gone at the wrong time. It was so busy I had a fifteen minute wait.

I don't know about you but the one thing that really makes me uncomfortable is standing in a chemist with a load of people coughing and spluttering with various ailments all waiting for medicine, and why is it that mine always seems to take longer than other people in the queue?

I started to do the usual slow browse around the shop passing babies nappies and soothers attached to cards etc. Cough mixtures and elastic stockings, I was getting a bit bored and only five minutes had passed.

Oh this place really needs a face lift it has had the same stock in for years, and yes the ladies gift sets are on display Lavender water with talc, Black Rose Soap in a pack of two, who actually buys this stuff?

Ten minutes gone and no sign of my medicine as yet, and then I noticed 'Sale Basket' now that is more like, it if there is one thing that cheers me up no end it is rummaging through a basket full of bargains.

Bottles of hair conditioner, toothbrushes, and the usual hideous coloured eye shadow pallets and then I saw what I first thought was a mascara but on closer inspection found it to be a French manicure pen by Manicare.

I have heard of these before and knew that they usually cost about 4.99, sale price was 2.99 so I considered it a bargain, just as I walked back to the counter to purchase my snip my medicine was ready so I left the chemist not feeling as fed up as I did when I first entered the place.

I took the manicure pen into the salon where I work so that I could try it out on my colleague; she always has her nails French Manicured using an air brush so I thought that it would be interesting to compare a salon treatment to something that can be done at home.

The pen itself has a silver barrel with a glass phial on each end one with white paint in and the other a soft pink shade of varnish.
Smiley line stickers are provided in the box to help you to get a perfect white tip, but to be quite honest I didn't bother to use them because they always end up smudging the white paint.

Before I applied the white paint to the tip of the nail I made sure that the nails were clean and grease free.
The tip of the wand for the white paint resembles a felt tip pen so maneuvering it across the nail to get the correct shape was relatively easy but I found that I had to apply three coats in all to get a good even lay, I made a mistake of doing the second coat before the paint was dry and it just lifted and went very tacky so make sure that each coat is perfectly dry.

The pink overlay varnish has a brush that in my opinion is not up to the job because it was far too narrow and very difficult to get an even stroke down the nail but with a bit of perseverance I got there in the end.

This procedure only needed one coat because when I tried two it seemed to over power the white tip. I also found the overall sheen a bit drab so I applied a clear top coat of nail varnish to finish it off.

Lasting effect:

I purposely left two nails with no additional clear top coat so that I could see just how good this product was on its own and found that those two nails chipped within twenty four hours but the rest looked good for a week.

Conclusion:

Not a bad product to apply a French manicure at home, the white tip applicator was great for getting a perfect shape but the pink over lay varnish was too pink for my taste and lacked luster.
A separate clear top coat is needed to seal this product because it chips so easily.

I doubt if I would buy it again but for a quick home treatment it is worth a try.

Summary: Needs a good clear top coat to last.