As a dancer, it is important that you are dressed up and look polished from head to toe. That includes your nails too.
But if you are a dancer that performs regularly, it’s quite cumbersome to have to do your nails frequently for your performance. Trying to do nails in the backstage is annoying, and I’ve heard from a couple of dancers that they did that and spilled their nail polish on their costumes…!
Recently a cosmetics company called Madam Glam reached out to me and sent me their product so I can review it and share it with you. Since I’ve been curious about doing gel nails at home, I’ve decided to give it a try. So here’s my honest review, and if you want to give it a try, I have a 30% off coupon code you can use, and I’ll share it with you below, so keep reading. 😉
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So my package arrived a week after I received their confirmation email. It was packaged nicely.
They sent me a nice set of LED lamp and 3 bottles of their soak-off gel nail polish – base coat, top coat and this sparkly pink colour called Sparkling Hearts.
I like how the lamp looks. Mine is black, and nicer looking than other brands I’ve seen in stores before. Very compact, so I could pack this easily when I travel too.
No instruction comes with the package, so I had to do a bit of research on how to do gel nails at home first. So to save you trouble, here’s a quick tutorial on how to use it.
How to: Easy Gel Nails at Home
First, make sure your nails are nice and clean.
Apply base coat. Try to avoid getting the polish on your cuticle or skin. This helps the manicure to stay on longer.
Then place your nail under the lamp. This process is called curing. This process settles the gel polish on your nail. Madam Glam’s gel polish cures in 30 seconds if you use the LED lamp, which is faster than other brands’ gel polish that I tried after this, so it’s nice.
Next apply your gel polish, again avoid the cuticle and skin. Cure under the lamp. Madam Glam’s lamp has an automatic timer so the lamp turns off in 60 seconds by itself. I like how I don’t have to stare at the clock. 🙂 I just watch a video on YouTube while curing, and when the lamp is off, I apply another coat.
For this polish, I applied 3 coats. For each coat, you have to cure it under the lamp. I find it the easiest if, for each coat, I start with 4 fingers, place under the lamp, then the thumbnails, then the last 4 fingers.
Then finally, apply the top coat and cure it for the last time.
You’ll notice that the surface is tacky at this point. Take a paper towel, soak it with some alcohol, and wipe off the tacky surface. And you’re finished!
I love the final result. It’s super shiny and smooth.
Madam Glam Review
It may seem tedious, but what I love about this product and gel manicure in general is that I often do my nails late at night, because that is the only time I have to sit down and do my nails. But what usually end up happening is I go to bed and my nails get scratched or smudged and in the morning I get disappointed to see marks everywhere on my nails. But with gel nails, once the polish is cured, it’s hard. So I can do this late at night while watching a show or something, and go to bed right away.
For me, this gel manicure lasted about 10 days. My regular polish only lasts about 5 days or so before it starts chipping, so it’s quite a time-saver. For dancers, if you have weekend performances, Madam Glam is good for 2 weekends.
I’d say the drawbacks of gel nail polish is that it’s a bit harder to remove than regular polish. You can use the same acetone nail polish remover, but you have to wait longer. I’ll include a link to a great tutorial showing how-to in description. But to me, it takes just as long to remove regular glitter nail polish, and the removal process is the same, so if you are used to wearing glitter nail polish, it may be no different.
Also, gel nail polish costs more than regular polish. Madam Glam’s gel nail polish is pricier than ones you find at drug stores. But, as I mentioned before, I tried a different brand’s gel nail polish after I tried Madam Glam. The other polish was cheaper, but I noticed Madam Glam’s polish cured way better in a shorter amount of time, and the final result looks better too.
So considering how easy to use and how long it lasts, I still recommend Madam Glam’s gel nail polish and doing gel nails at home 🙂
They’ve got a great selection of polish colours as well. The one I used is Sparkling Hearts, and I love the shade. Go over to Madam Glam’s website, and tell me which colour is your favourite! And when you check out, be sure to enter the code SB30 to get 30% off!
Complete your enchanting look with beautiful nails, and feel confident and powerful on stage!
Special thanks to Madam Glam for their lovely products!
Thanks for reading, and keep sparkling!
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P.P.S. If you love beauty topics for dancers, you’d enjoy this post too 😉