Sorry for the delay in today’s content – I didn’t have my photos uploaded (I thought I did), so it had to wait until I could access that SD card.
Last week I shared that I received a Formula X Polish System due to winning a giveaway. I broke it out on Saturday before our Christmas party to get festive.
After shaping and gently etching the surface of your nails with a fine-grit buffer, reach for you break out the left-most bottle in the Formula X Polish System kit. This bottle contains a thin, light blue liquid – this is the Cleanse step. It is basically just a nail dehydrator similar to those used on you at the nail salon before enhancements or with in-home DIY gel nails. I twisted the cap open and heard/felt a, “snap!” only to find the squared off caps on the Formula X Polish bottles are vanity caps. You have to pull it off before you can unscrew the simpler, cylindrical cap beneath. The snap was a piece of the interior to the vanity cap snapping off. Boo.
After that, continue to the clear pink – this is your base coat; the, “Prime,” step. The Formula X Polish Prime is pretty normal base-coat as thickness goes. Here, though, the brush started to annoy me. I expected cheap bristles in the brush-on cleanser, but these bristles remind me of the thick-stranded, cheap ones that resided in Wet n Wild nailpolishes of the early-to-mid 90’s. With a base coat, it wasn’t too much of a deal, but getting my nails fully covered wasn’t as easy (and as you can see, I don’t have large nails).
Formula X Polish System
Though the base is clear, it doesn’t leave behind any noticeable color behind on your nails. Wait for it to dry (which doesn’t take long, less than 75 seconds), and move on to color.
Obsessed from the Formula X Polish line is a deep, rich wine color – in the right (wrong?) lighting it might be mistaken for black, but my camera wants to make it look far more red than it truly is. The following photo is only a single coat, but based on that coat?
I’m really not impressed. The brush is the same cheap, not optimally-shaped brush that you would find in cheap, kids’ polish. The brushes in OPI are far superior for a non-gel formula and allow for even coverage in fewer strokes. This brush’s bristles, because they are bound in a circle, do not neatly flatten as you drag the polish across your nail. This, coupled with a thick consistency, results in unevenness and streaks. This isn’t an issue of technique–nails are my thing; this is by far the messiest first coat I’ve ever applied.
In spite of my dissatisfaction based on this first coat of the Formula X Polish, I must admit that although it is VERY thick, it is also a very swiftly drying polish (which might be part of why it streaks a bit). That is pretty good, but we’ll have to see if the top coat is as fast-drying as the previous two steps of the system.
I removed it then before slapping the top coat on because I had neither the time nor the patience to continue, but I will attempt it again and give it a better assessment when I’m not in a rush. Still, I feel that for as much as this polish costs ($10.50 per bottle of colored polish for their standard line, not counting the cost of the System, which is $32), it should, at absolute minimum, have a higher quality brush than what it has. I hope I can get the Formula X Polish system to cooperate next time, as Obsessed is quite pretty.