Nail Care Challenge: Top Coats

Here's part 1: Basecoats and here's part 2: Cuticle Care if you missed either of these.

This week we're talking about Top Coats. I'm also going to briefly touch on Over Coats.

In short, Top Coats are meant to protect the nails and prevent chipping. There's a wide variety and I've found I actually own more than I thought I did simply because a few of my polishes I thought were Over Coats are actually Top Coats. OK, so what's an Over Coat, then? These also come in a wide variety: crackles, flakies, glitters. Essentially anything used to create a special effect; these are applied over your regular polish but under Top Coats.

The only Top Coat I've seen which I want to try is Seche Vite since I've read so many good reviews about it.

Here are the two Top Coats I have used the most, and they're both by Sally Hansen.

Let me start with Sally Hansen's Teflon Tuff. I've been using this one for years, long before I started blogging about polish. I'm not entirely certain it IS a Top Coat. The bottle just describes it as Clear. So I dunno. Just browsing the Internet, I'm not the only one who has been using this as a Top Coat, so there ya go. Mine is old enough that it's started to turn yellow but this doesn't seem to have effected it any. I think it does OK - my nails typically chip within 1 or 2 days with it. I might try using this one to make a Franken at some point :)

My newest Top Coat is Sally Hansen's Insta-Dri. Manicures are supposed to last up to 10 days with this. So far, mine seem to average about 2 days before chipping. One of my recent manicures DID last about 4 or 5 days before chipping and I *think* it was actually my Sinful Colors which lasted the longest, go figure. The thing I love about this Top Coat is it definitely speeds up the drying time. The instructions claim manicures will be dry to the touch after 30 seconds after applying this... I've found it's more like 2 minutes. Whatever, I'm used to waiting hours for manicures to dry so this is definitely my go to Top Coat!

edit: I got a question about the Sally Hansen Insta-Dri: The bottle itself is red, but the Top Coat is clear. Great question, thanks Nichole!

Next up are my new and old Top Coats which I haven't tested out yet. I'll definitely make a point of playing with these 5 over the next few months.

The first one is just a generic polish I received in one of those gift sets you find in Walmart, Walgreens, etc. around Christmas time. Nothing special here, but I will have to try it out more to test it.

Next up are my two CoverGirl polishes.
The pink one is number 420 called Pink Twinkle. I've had this one for several years without ever really using it and guess what? It's a gorgeous flakie! I've just tested it out on a few things but it is really pretty. I definitely need to swatch this one and just use it more in general. Flakies are notoriously difficult to photograph, but here is one manicure I tested it out on.

The purple one is number 410 named Amethyst Mist. It's a really pretty glitter, with a very sheer purple base, micro silver glitters and rainbow hexagon glitters. This one is also gorgeous and I definitely need to use it more often as well. I show cased this one briefly with my first Water Marble.

My last two are brand new: Essie Shine of the Times and LA Splash Glitter Top Coat. I haven't used the LA Splash at all yet. Shine of the Times is actually on my nails right now and oh my it is so beautiful!  I haven't had a chance to test it out yet as a Top Coat, however. I just had to share that yes, it is gorgeous :) I didn't know Shine of the Times is  a Top Coat until I received it in the mail and looked at the bottle, so there ya go. You never know how many more Top Coats you might have.

Next up are my Over Coats. I just want to mention these here a little bit because they do kind of stand out in a class of their own; however, as my Top Coats prove, sometimes an Over Coat is really a Top Coat.

Sally Hansen Crackles: I recently bought these two from Copious.com for a penny. I own Distressed Denim and Cherry Smash. These seem to be pretty difficult to work with so far, but I'll keep testing them out. I did discover they seem to crack just fine over Shine of the Times, which btw creates a very cool effect.

OPI Black Shatter is my first and so far favorite crackle / shatter. Here's my manicure using it.

Zoya Opal, I thought, was my first flakie until I realized Pink Twinkle was a flakie. It's really gorgeous, and you can find a few pictures of how I've used it here although as usual, it didn't photograph very well.

So, to summarize, Sally Hansen's Insta-Dri is definitely my most used Top Coat... and I've definitely discovered I need to try out more of those I own more often. Thanks for reading and please let me know if you have any comments or questions!