Sally Hansen Salon Effects Nail Polish Strips vs. Art Club Glam Instant Nails

Let me preface this post by saying that I usually screw up anything remotely crafty. Especially if there is stickers or glue involved. I wanted to try the Sally Hansen Nail Strips though and my sister bought them for me right after I'd also bought some Art Club Instant Nails (which I could only find on that Canadian site at the moment).

Sally Hansen Nail Effects

I tried Sally Hansen first. It took me 45 minutes to do all of my nails and they came out looking OK if you didn't look at them too closely.

"Laced Up"

I made a number of mistakes. If you enlarge the above photo, you can really see how I messed the thumb nail up and then on my other hand my ring finger was messed up because I made the strip too skinny. I didn't actually have to cut these because they fit fairly well. You get 16 total strips, a nail file and a cuticle stick.

I liked how with these, you were able to easily kind of tear away the excess nail strip by using the cuticle stick. That was a definite pro because when you first put them on, they definitely don't look quite right, they need to be shaped to your nail. Or at least mine did, I have been told my nails are small so I don't know if maybe I'm just a freak case.

Once you have the strip on your nail, it doesn't move around as you try to fix the fit. What is stuck to your nail sticks and you easily remove the excess.

Pros:

- Easy to shape/fit to nail

- Fairly easy to smooth on without bumps

- Easy to file away the excess at the tips

- Looks very nice when done right

Cons:

- Loose their stickiness pretty easily so if you are having trouble placing one, you might need to peel off another before it's all over.

Price: Just under $10
Availability: Drugstores (I can't find these online though!)

Rating: 2.5/5

Now onto the Art Club nails. These cost a little more than half what the Sally ones did.

Art Club Glam Instant Nails

These are clearly of less quality than the Sally Hansens. These are not as flexible and are way more sticker-like. In fact... I couldn't even work with these. I did all of my nails but when I got done and looked at the final product, I didn't even want to photograph them for you guys it looked so bad. So I scrapped them.

THIS was my final result.

Pros:

- Easy to peel off when you realize what a mess you've made of your nails

Cons:

- Hard to work with/not flexible enough

- Move around on your nails as you're trying to remove excess

- You basically need to cut these to fit

- Less than attractive designs available

Price: $5.95

Availability: I found these at Sally's and then at this website

Rating: .5/5