Opi Glitter Off - another review

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Earlier this week I was wandering through the Douglas store in my town and came across Opi Glitter Off. Now I have never tried a peel off Base Coat before. I have tried of course the foil method to get rid of all that stubborn glitter but soon returned to the true and tried elbow grease method. However Opi nudged me over to trying a peel off Base Coat.

Opi Glitter Off is a Base Coat based on glue and water. Apparently you can mix that all by yourself but frankly, I am not one of those experimental characters - I rather get them all nicely done in a bottle. Also I have to admit, that I am not too worried about ingredients - after all we dye our hair, wear tattoes, brush our teeth with whitening tooth paste - well I could go on forever here, right? So no, I am not reading all those long lists of ingredients, not only because I am too lazy to dig out my reading glasses. But let's get down to the actual post:

Glitter Off applies like a thick ridge filler and right after application it really looks like white thin glue slapped on your nails. It takes a couple of minutes longer to dry than any of my other Base Coats. Once dry, it has this satin finish.

I did not try it with a plain glitter polish yet, but when wearing one of my two favorite ways of wearing glitter - this would be over a cream.

I applied two coats of Picture Polish Honey Dew. That cream went on awesomely over Glitter Off, a lot less streaky on the first coat already and I am even under the impression that it sped up dry time. Additional and unexpected bonus: Some of my nails are badly ridged - Glitter Off is the best ever ridge filler I tried. Honey Dew was smooth and even after two regular coats (with my regular base coat I always had to go for a third coat). I then dabbed/painted one coat of Different Dimension Love is an Open Door - a clear based glitter with white, turquoise and turquoise holo glitter in small size, relatively big round glitters, half moons, silver holo hearts and white snowflakes (or let's call them flowers, since we are now mid March). I applied two coats of Glisten&Glow HK Girl for a smooth finish. The above picture was taken after two days!

I wore this mani for two full days, washed my hair, my dishes, did some cleaning without gloves, was at work (and I type all day there), went to sports and had only two minor chips at the edges of my nails - a normal occurrence if I do cleaning without gloves and do sports that include dealing with handles.

Removal: It was very easy to lift the whole polish package at the base of my nails. As you can see in the picture, I could push down the polish pretty evenly. However, it did not come off in one piece but rather in chunks, but no scratching or poking was needed. I peeled it off with the nail of my thumb but you can also use a nail tool of course. I was quite surprised to find my nails softly shining underneath, the surface totally smooth and intact. - The picture shows my nails more stained than they actually are. There was only very small residue along the sides of my nails that went off easy peasy with my regular nail polish remover. On my less ridged nails, the polish peeled off in one piece, the more ridged, the more snippets there were. However, it still takes some time to peel the polish off, certainly longer than if you swipe off a regular cream, but still quite faster than using elbow grease or the foil method.

Final thoughts: So far I am totally sold on this Base Coat. I yet have to try it over a plain glitter polish though. I will also try Glitter Off as Base Coat for some of my streaky pastels - wouldn't it be awesome if those challenging polishes would morph from painful to apply to pleasure to apply, well maybe that is a tad steep, but still?

AMENDMENT 1: OK so I feel like I have to add some more information after having worn Opi Glitter Off as Base for 4 am in the morning. My experience with this mani was rather different from the above. The polish literally flaked off from my index but mind you - stuck like concrete on some of the other fingers. I ended up peeling snippets from my nails. Analysis: I GUESS the coats of Glitter Off need to have a PARTICULAR thickness - too thin will make the base adhesive but renitent for peeling off. Too thick and you find yourself with a half naked nail hours after application and without ANY effort from your side.

Final thoughts revisited 1: what a different experience - I am annoyed!!! I am sorry if any of you already invested in this and experienced also some flaking off!!! Apparently it makes the world of a difference first how thick your layers are and second what polish you slap on. 4am in the morning is NOT a plain cream AND dries to a satin finish. The Picture Polish held rock solid.............. le sigh.... I haven't gotten the faintest idea.

I yet have to try it over a plain glitter or glassfleck. Once I have those checked off my list, I will get some more amendments added here.

Have you tried Opi Glitter Off yet - your thoughts?

I bought Opi Glitter Off with Douglas.

I look forward to reading your comments - thanks for visiting!!!
Christine