Recent NOTD: Nabi Magnetic Red and Natural

Much as I liked the crackle trend (and will continue to wear it from time to time), I like magnetics more. Magnetics are fun like crack in that they transform on your nails, but they've got more flexibility in that if the design comes out wonky, you can redo it without starting over, and you can use them as a regular polishes, too. Earlier this week, my nails were adorned in two colors of Nabi Magnetic: Red and Natural.



I used Barielle Fortifying Nail Builder and Salon Sciences Instant Artificials as my base, then two coats of the Nabi, then OPI RapiDry top coat. I wore this for four days and did have some small chips. I seem to recall getting better wear than that with my usual Sally Hansen Insta Dri top coat the last time I wore a Nabi, so perhaps the just OPI didn't get along with them.



One of these comes with a diagonal stripe magnet design and the other with a horizontal stripe, but due to my relaxed approach to placement, I bet you might be having trouble seeing which design I used on which nails.



And here's a look at my right hand, because I didn't paint it the same as the left like I usually do. I reversed the colors, putting the less eye catching Natural on most of the fingers and using Red for the accent (the thumb on each hand matched the accent nail). I did this because I smashed my right middle finger into a door handle and crushed the nail tip so had to take it shorter to remove the damaged part. I just couldn't bear to shorten all my nails to match, so filed down the rest of my right hand a bit so that hand wouldn't look too strange. I thought by switching up the color scheme I'd distract people's attention from the mismatched nail lengths between my hands. Not sure if it worked, since the people I interact with most don't pay nearly as much attention to my nails as I do, but it amused me so that's reason enough to do it again sometime, even after the problem nail grows out.





I enjoyed this mani so much that I decided I needed to buy more of the Nabi Magnetic colors, but my Walgreens took out their display when the Sally Hansen Magnetics came in, so I turned to my friend the internet and found SHOPNABI on amazon.com, where most of the colors are under $2. I couldn't figure out the pricing strategy; they range from $1.75 to $2.30. If you buy enough, the shipping isn't too bad on per bottle basis, either. My order came surprisingly quickly and the bottles were all in good shape. I find the Amazon reviews on these confusing, with some people saying they don't work at all, when I've never had any issues with the colors I've tried.