Claw Your Way
to Spring’s Haute Hues
 It
’s been said that people can be easily sized up
with a quick look at their hands. Ragged nails
and dry cuticles are a dead giveaway that details escape
you; while nails that are perfectly polished and right
on hue exude style through and through.
Here’s how to get and keep a flawless manicure
this season, plus the top five products under $10 that
will extend the life of your salon manicure tenfold.
Haute Hues
Spring
is all about bright, spunky color for hands and feet.
Essie’s new “Neon Collection” is perfectly
on trend, boasting four look-at-me shades including
flirty fuchsia, funky limelight (a
bright yellow), perky purple and punchy
pink ($8 each).
Pink and orange rule spring and Finger Paints gets
the color story just right with Tangerine Tint
and Pretty as a Picture pink ($4.99 at sallybeauty.com).
Another favorite is Dashing Diva’s Drama Queen,
a crème fuchsia and Miranda's Law, an
opaque coral ($8 each at dashingdiva.com).
Butter London’s 3 Free lacquer line – so
named for its lack of formaldehyde, toluene and DBP
– serves up brilliant spring color with Jaffa,
a juicy orange and Underground, a hardcore
pink ($14 each at amazon.com).
For those who dare to go beyond basic color,
celebrity manicurist Alisha Rimando of NYC’s famed
Dashing Diva nail salon created an almost ombre look
for models at designer Akiko Ogawa’s NYC Fashion
Week runway show. Rimando, who has polished the likes
of Jennifer Hudson, combined a light pink base and faded
pink tip using Headliner, Dashing Diva, Cosmopolitan,
and Debutante.
Perfectly Polished
 To
keep that sweet spring color from streaking or smudging,
Rimando recommends drying each coat of polish for one
minute before applying the next coat, allowing solvents
from the polish to evaporate, thereby creating a hard
coating of color. Next, apply a quick dry silicone
or oil solvent. And if nails should end up smudging,
Rimando swears by this flawless manicure secret: using
a liberal amount of polish remover on your finger, lightly
rub the top of the nail to smooth out the crease or
smudge, let dry and the re-apply a top coat.
When you head to your favorite manicurist, extend
the life of that salon manicure by bringing your own
high quality base coat, color and even quick dry system.
This will not only assure that you have the right hue
on hand for touch-ups (a must for the well manicured),
but by insisting on using the products you love and
trust, you can really lengthen the life of your manicure.
We travel with Zoya’s Anchor Basecoat,
Armor TopCoat and Hurry Up Speed Dry Drops
so that, no matter where our quest for the perfect manicure
may take us, we know that the polish color we pick will
last. Plus, the fast working Speed Dry Drops
assure that we avoid the heartache of ruining a new
manicure by grabbing car keys or putting on seat belts.
So even if you haven’t updated your wardrobe
for the season, you’ve got the tools for nailing
spring style at your finger tips.
Five under $10
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