Give Yourself An At-Home Manicure In Under 10 Minutes

I originally wrote this at home manicure tips post in 2016, before gel manicures really started to take off. Back when everyone would do their own nails with regular old nail polish. Today, I’m bringing this post out of the vault and giving it a face lift.

With the current state of social distancing, a lot of us are living without our monthly gel or dip manicure. I know, I’m sad too. I did a hack job of getting my dip manicure off, let my nails breathe for a couple weeks, and now I’m ready for some color on my hands. Personally, I prefer to have polish on my nails, because it makes me feel put together! Time to put my vast nail polish collection to work.

The photos below are vintage from the old post, but they’re still accurate! So here’s my tried and true, 10 minute nail routine!

PRODUCTS I USED:

TWEEZERMAN NAIL FILE | ORLY BONDER BASE COAT | ESSIE PEACH DAIQUIRI | OUT THE DOOR TOP COAT

At Home Manicure Tips

1. FILE. File your nails and shape them however you like. I won’t tell you how to do this.
	2. BASE COAT. I like to use Orly Bonder base coat. I think it does a good job of making your polish stay on longer. Just one coat of this goes on first.
3. DOT. I place a dot of polish near my cuticle, then use the brush to push the polish towards my cuticle. This lets you control where the polish goes, rather than starting at the cuticle and getting polish all over your skin.I’m using a fun bright color by Essie called Peach Daiquiri.
	4. SMOOTH. Smooth the dot forwards, then back out toward the tip of your nail. Try to use the least amount of swipes possible.
5. FILL IN THE SIDES. Use a swipe of polish to the right of the middle stripe, and a swipe of polish to the left of the middle stripe to completely polish the nail. I like to add a second coat of polish immediately after I finish my first coat.
	6. OUT THE DOOR TOP COAT. This top coat is the star of the show. It is the only top coat that actually dries in 5 minutes. I absolutely swear by it. You know when you paint your nails before you go to sleep and you wake up with sheet grooves on your nails? Not with this! I could paint my nails every week in law school because I knew I could do it in 10 minutes max. Magic.

VOILA! Nails done perfectly in less than 10 minutes. I promise I didn’t touch up with any remover. I took these photos while I was doing my own nails, too.

I know it takes some practice to paint with your non-dominant hand, but it’ll come back to you in no time.

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–Roxanne

Do you have any at home manicure tips?  Let me know in a comment below!