You know even pedis take approx an hour at the salon. With gel manis at a salon The tech can do the other hand while one is curing. We DIY ers are not capable of that (unless we grow a third hand which would raise a whole new dilemma) of course it takes longer. But I honestly love my handiwork more than that of a salon. And all my co-workers are jealous to say the least.
DIY Gel polish-Sensational by Nailene
- Thread starter Byie
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Ya that's the thing, we just don't have enough hands to double up on curing and polishing.
Well over an hour. BUT...
That's for quite a few reasons. First is that I soak off 1 hand at a time. I could do both at a time, but for some reason I just prefer it that way. So a 15 minute soak is now 30 minutes.
Second is that I have a laptop set up in my manicure room and I watch TV shows and movies while doing my nails. Quite a few times I have caught myself getting caught up in a scene and forgetting about my nails for a bit while I watch the excitement.
Last but not least, I am meticulous about my application being correct. I do a full manicure (cuticles, ridges, filing, etc) each time I change which takes a bit. And I tend to work more slowly with painting gel than I do with RNP because I don't care if I am messy with RNP, I just clean it up after. Can't do that with gel, you gotta be careful to not get it on your fingers in the first place and if you do, clean it right up.
If I were to sit down and just do a strait soak-off and reapply without any distractions around me, I could probably get it down to maybe 45 minutes. But instead I just take my time and enjoy myself. It's relaxing me-time
I think this is the most important point. While the manicure process itself does take longer, you are not doing then anywhere near as often.
Plus once they are cured, they are done and good to go. With RNP you have to deal with smudges and chips which take extra time to repair ;(
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Ha! The other day I was doing a soak off and I got so caught up watching Netflix that I left it on for like a half hour! Manicures take ages when you don't focus.
Same here! Because my applications are not the fastest, about 1.5 hrs since I almost always do 3 coats of color, I do my prep the day before.
Here's my routine:
Saturday: Removal and nail prep
1. Cut and shape nails before removing old mani (I can see my nail shape and length better without being influenced by the variations in free-edge)
2. Soak off gel with aloe vera gel and olive oil added to acetone (15 min)
3. Wash hands and moisturize with lotion
4. Push back cuticles while still damp from soak-off
5. Later that day (at least an hour later to allow my nails to fully dry) I buff ONLY new-growth at the cuticle and the free edge to seal nail (sealing has made a HUGE difference in nail peeling)
6. Clean/dehydrate nails with alcohol
7. Add rnp base coat, sparing 1-2 mm at cuticle and free edge
Sunday: apply new gel mani
1. Clean/dehydrate nails with alcohol
2. Apply gel manicure. I scrub in the base coat, which adds a couple minutes (1.5 hours)
I decided to add some bling to my week-old sensationail purple orchid manicure. Blurry pic shows the colors of the holo glitter better.
Attachments
AAAAAARRRRRRGGGG!
Tried to soak off "Going for the Rose Gold" today. It took over an HOUR! My poor nails! I had to do a little prying in the end. It's such a beautiful colour but I don't think it's worth it
Can't be messing with that kind of possible damage.
Tried to soak off "Going for the Rose Gold" today. It took over an HOUR! My poor nails! I had to do a little prying in the end. It's such a beautiful colour but I don't think it's worth it
Can't be messing with that kind of possible damage.
That sucks! In addition to the fact that this was a difficult soak-off, it was also only 1 week ago that you did this manicure. Too frequent soak-offs will likely damage your nails secondary to excessive dehydration--not even taking into account any damage done by scraping stubborn gel. Unless you can get your soak-offs down to about 10 minutes with ease, you might get damage from doing them so frequently. Of course everyone's nails are different. If you can't stand wearing the same polish for so long, you might try playing with rnp on top of your gel mani. The glitter that I added to my current mani is rnp.AAAAAARRRRRRGGGG!
Tried to soak off "Going for the Rose Gold" today. It took over an HOUR! My poor nails! I had to do a little prying in the end. It's such a beautiful colour but I don't think it's worth it
Can't be messing with that kind of possible damage.
Has anyone else tried the new Sensational easy soak off base coat. I used it two weeks ago and I was able to remove my mani very easily and I was wearing at least 5 layers of polish because I did glitter over top of 3 coats of color.
I think Sensationail has a reputation for taking longer to remove, but even so, it's still one of my favorite brands. Next time you might try Hoosieraussis step of using RNP base coat first.AAAAAARRRRRRGGGG!
Tried to soak off "Going for the Rose Gold" today. It took over an HOUR! My poor nails! I had to do a little prying in the end. It's such a beautiful colour but I don't think it's worth it
Can't be messing with that kind of possible damage.
Thank you for your concern about the excessive soak off. I have extremely strong fast growing nails. So my manicure was showing a lot of obvious grow out. Since my new soak off builder gel and first Gelish products had arrived I figured I would just clean up my hands. Gave me a chance to practice sculpting a nail extension and my French manicure is back to a super natural color so won't show my grow out so I can leave it on for 3 weeks
.No worries, changing my gel polish isn't constantly a once a week thing for me.
Thank you for this info. Sensationail was my intro to gel polish brand. Ive started looking into professional Gelish.
Gelish is the same way for me, maybe a little less difficult than SensatioNail. I have dry skin & nails & have found that Ink & IBD remove easier & OPI is okay too.
Cool. I'm thinking of doing training and starting an in home salon so I want to figure out my preferred professional brands.
Thank you for your concern about the excessive soak off. I have extremely strong fast growing nails. So my manicure was showing a lot of obvious grow out. Since my new soak off builder gel and first Gelish products had arrived I figured I would just clean up my hands. Gave me a chance to practice sculpting a nail extension and my French manicure is back to a super natural color so won't show my grow out so I can leave it on for 3 weeks
No worries, changing my gel polish isn't constantly a once a week thing for me.
Okay, great! I wish I could say the same about my nails-mine are thin and prone to peeling. Good luck with your new Gelish products!
Good to know. I was wondering if there was a noticeable difference. Did it wear the same as your previous manicures?
Thanks for the info about Ink. I don't have any of their products yet, but I've been seeing some really nice colors. Another gel base coat with easier soak off for some is Gelish Vitagel. I'm actually using the Recovery gel now. The first time I used it without rnp base underneath, and while large pieces came off easily at first, stubborn bits were difficult to remove after like 40 minutes. I, like lots of other people, had issues with Vitagel lifting after 3-4 days, but since I started scrubbing it in, no issues