I'm not really the biggest fan of writing negative reviews about things as there is far too much negativity in the world at the moment and I always try and promote positivity wherever possible. It's not always easy though, especially when something doesn't go right or you don't have a good experience. I'm certainly not one of those people who sit on Facebook all day posting negative comments on every single post, about stuff that they have no interest in what's so ever. However this is something I feel I do need to do a review about and sadly, it's not going to be a positive one.
I love getting my nails done. It's the only beauty treatment (if you'd call it that), that I'll actually get done professionally, even though I do have a kit at home to do my own gel manicures. I always get a gel polish done on my natural nails as I keep my nails quite long any way and have no need for extensions. I would usually get about 5 weeks out of my gel manicure which is brilliant. If I do them myself, I'd be lucky if I get even a week out of it.
I had got my nails done the week before my work Christmas party and I had got my usual 5 weeks out of my manicure but they were starting to chip and some of the polish was starting to come off. I managed to stop myself from picking the polish off as it is bad for your nails and can leave them very weak, as well as pulling layers of the actual nail off. I knew with it being between Christmas and New Year, I wouldn't be able to get an appointment in my usual place, so I decided to give Angel Nails a try. They are a little salon in my local shopping centre that had a lot of hype surrounding it. You don't need to book an appointment with them and can just pop in at any time and get your nails done. this sounded like a great idea, especially as quite a few people I know had got their nails done there before and found them to be pretty good. It was the Friday before New Year's eve and I had popped into town to get my old gel polish removed and new polish applied for going out on New Year's Eve. Angel Nails weren't overly busy with only two or three people waiting.
So here's how my visit went:
1)I sat and waited about 10 minutes before a man was free to take me. When I went over to him, he asked me what I want. I explained that I wanted my old gel polish removed and new polish applied. The staff in Angel Nails don't speak much English which can be a bit of an issue when trying to explain what you want done.
2)Having had my nails done several times before, I know that the best way to remove gel polish is to soak it off with acetone. This leads me to the first issue I had with Angel Nails. Firstly the guy used an electric nail file to file the polish off my little finger. I had heard of this method before but I had never experienced it before. I was then horrified when the guy PICKED, yes PICKED off the rest of my gel polish. I was nearly crying and I'm not even joking. I was paying this man to basically pick off my old polish when I could have done that myself. Yes, some of the polish had lifted slightly but you DO NOT PICK OFF gel polish no matter how tempting it is. My nails were in horrible condition after this and it was obvious that a couple of layers of nail had came off with the polish, leaving my nails weak and brittle. There was no point me even saying anything as the guy would not have understood a word. He then used the electric nail file to file my nails down and shape them but this still left them in awful condition. Ideally, I should have got them cut down to a shorter length since they were very weak and let them grow back themselves.
3)I then had to wait about 15 minutes on one of the three woman to be free to do my actual polish. The staff that work there do not keep tabs on who's been waiting and who has just arrived so they just pick someone at random and do their nails. A woman who came in after me got taken before me, even though I'd been waiting a good ten minutes. Neither the woman or the staff said anything. This is the worst thing about them being a drop in nail salon. I was already in a bit of a hurry as we had a dinner reservation booked and I had already set aside an hour to get my nails done as it was.
4)I finally got taken and I told the woman I wanted just gel polish so she set down several of those wheel things with the colours on it. I knew that I wanted a blue glitter and picked one out. They do have a huge range of different colours which is a good thing I guess. When It came to doing my nails, the woman acted like she couldn't be bothered. She didn't speak to me once and spent more time talking away to her two friends, not paying much attention to what she was doing to my nails. There was no professionalism from any of the staff. She held my hand in hers as she painted my nails and didn't even time the drying process properly. She only applied one coat of base coat, two coats of the blue glitter polish and one top coat. There was no UV gel builder applied before the base coat, there was no buffing of the nails to get rid of the brittle and there was definitely not any nail hardener applied either. She had even smudged some of the polish and didn't bother to fix it, nor did she fix up any of the mess that was made around my nails or under the nails where the excess polish had gone. When I was done, the woman didn't even tell me how much my nails were so I just handed her £20, then she disappeared out the back and didn't come out for a few minutes. I didn't know if I was being given change or nothing so I just left.
The Verdict: I was not impressed at all. Don't get me wrong, I loved the colour but my nails were shockingly weak and I could bend them. I was scared that they'd break on me. My right index finger actually was that weak that it snapped off one day and it was so painful as well. That was after 2 and a half weeks. Some of my other nails started chipping too and hadn't strengthened at all.
I love getting my nails done. It's the only beauty treatment (if you'd call it that), that I'll actually get done professionally, even though I do have a kit at home to do my own gel manicures. I always get a gel polish done on my natural nails as I keep my nails quite long any way and have no need for extensions. I would usually get about 5 weeks out of my gel manicure which is brilliant. If I do them myself, I'd be lucky if I get even a week out of it.
I had got my nails done the week before my work Christmas party and I had got my usual 5 weeks out of my manicure but they were starting to chip and some of the polish was starting to come off. I managed to stop myself from picking the polish off as it is bad for your nails and can leave them very weak, as well as pulling layers of the actual nail off. I knew with it being between Christmas and New Year, I wouldn't be able to get an appointment in my usual place, so I decided to give Angel Nails a try. They are a little salon in my local shopping centre that had a lot of hype surrounding it. You don't need to book an appointment with them and can just pop in at any time and get your nails done. this sounded like a great idea, especially as quite a few people I know had got their nails done there before and found them to be pretty good. It was the Friday before New Year's eve and I had popped into town to get my old gel polish removed and new polish applied for going out on New Year's Eve. Angel Nails weren't overly busy with only two or three people waiting.
So here's how my visit went:
1)I sat and waited about 10 minutes before a man was free to take me. When I went over to him, he asked me what I want. I explained that I wanted my old gel polish removed and new polish applied. The staff in Angel Nails don't speak much English which can be a bit of an issue when trying to explain what you want done.
2)Having had my nails done several times before, I know that the best way to remove gel polish is to soak it off with acetone. This leads me to the first issue I had with Angel Nails. Firstly the guy used an electric nail file to file the polish off my little finger. I had heard of this method before but I had never experienced it before. I was then horrified when the guy PICKED, yes PICKED off the rest of my gel polish. I was nearly crying and I'm not even joking. I was paying this man to basically pick off my old polish when I could have done that myself. Yes, some of the polish had lifted slightly but you DO NOT PICK OFF gel polish no matter how tempting it is. My nails were in horrible condition after this and it was obvious that a couple of layers of nail had came off with the polish, leaving my nails weak and brittle. There was no point me even saying anything as the guy would not have understood a word. He then used the electric nail file to file my nails down and shape them but this still left them in awful condition. Ideally, I should have got them cut down to a shorter length since they were very weak and let them grow back themselves.
3)I then had to wait about 15 minutes on one of the three woman to be free to do my actual polish. The staff that work there do not keep tabs on who's been waiting and who has just arrived so they just pick someone at random and do their nails. A woman who came in after me got taken before me, even though I'd been waiting a good ten minutes. Neither the woman or the staff said anything. This is the worst thing about them being a drop in nail salon. I was already in a bit of a hurry as we had a dinner reservation booked and I had already set aside an hour to get my nails done as it was.
4)I finally got taken and I told the woman I wanted just gel polish so she set down several of those wheel things with the colours on it. I knew that I wanted a blue glitter and picked one out. They do have a huge range of different colours which is a good thing I guess. When It came to doing my nails, the woman acted like she couldn't be bothered. She didn't speak to me once and spent more time talking away to her two friends, not paying much attention to what she was doing to my nails. There was no professionalism from any of the staff. She held my hand in hers as she painted my nails and didn't even time the drying process properly. She only applied one coat of base coat, two coats of the blue glitter polish and one top coat. There was no UV gel builder applied before the base coat, there was no buffing of the nails to get rid of the brittle and there was definitely not any nail hardener applied either. She had even smudged some of the polish and didn't bother to fix it, nor did she fix up any of the mess that was made around my nails or under the nails where the excess polish had gone. When I was done, the woman didn't even tell me how much my nails were so I just handed her £20, then she disappeared out the back and didn't come out for a few minutes. I didn't know if I was being given change or nothing so I just left.
The Verdict: I was not impressed at all. Don't get me wrong, I loved the colour but my nails were shockingly weak and I could bend them. I was scared that they'd break on me. My right index finger actually was that weak that it snapped off one day and it was so painful as well. That was after 2 and a half weeks. Some of my other nails started chipping too and hadn't strengthened at all.
Here's my nails when they looked nice.
This is them two and a half weeks after. the index finger is the one which snapped off. The middle one had started chipping.
*******
After the two and a half weeks, I had to go to Claire, my usual nail artist (not sure of their official name) to get the blue polish removed and new polish applied. This is where another issues arose. Claire had did her usual method of removing gel polish by filing the top coat then putting some acetone onto a piece of cotton wool, setting it onto the nails and wrapping it in silver foil. She left my nails for about 10 minutes, or maybe it was 15 minutes. Usually the old polish should be easily scrapped off but this polish was not for budging and dried as soon as the cotton wool was removed. Claire found it difficult to get the old polish scrapped off. It appeared the polish Angel Nails had used was one they shouldn't be using or it was acrylic based which they use on acrylic nails rather than the proper gel polish. This made me even more annoyed at Angel Nails because they aren't even using the correct type of polish for people who are just wanting gel polish.
My nails hadn't got any stronger and were actually even weaker and very brittle. Claire had to rebuild my right index finger nail to make it the same length as my other nails or else they all would have been cut down really short. This was a very simple process and the first time I've had any type of nail extension. Claire then filed down my nails and made them as smooth as possible before applying the gel builder, base coat and two coats of the purple colour I was going for. The fake nail didn't look fake at all and matched in perfectly with my own nails. We added some blue/purple glitter to two of my nails to add a bit of sparkle. Claire also applied some nail hardener too. I was very impressed with my new nails and love the colour. Hopefully I will get a good 5 weeks out of these ones and my nails will get stronger over time. It will take a while for the broken one to properly grow back though.
Here are my new nails. You wouldn't think the index finger one is fake.
Comments
Post a Comment