Manicure Monday: Point Blanc

Rather naively, I had no idea that Calvin Klein even made nail polish.

Last week I was stocking up on Chanel's Dissolvant Doux at Debenhams and needed something else to add to my basket in order to qualify for free delivery, so obviously began perusing the nail polish section looking for something - anything - to help. That's when I discovered 'ck one long wear + shine nail color'. As it's only £9 and the range of colours still left were right up my street, I decided to throw caution to the wind and give it a go.

What a mistake.

The description of the product claims Long Wear + Shine boasts "state of the art formulations that ensures fast, streak-free application" and should last for up to 10 days. So far, so good. This sounded so promising, and after researching swatches of the colours online I was won over by the icy white of Point Blanc.

(IMAGE SOURCED FROM www.redsquare.co.za)

There's no getting away from the fact that Point Blanc was ridiculously disappointing. The colour is incredibly weak and took 3 coats for it to stop looking overly transparent, and even now the white tips of my nails are visible through the polish. The brush is enormous and as a result covered most of my nails fully in polish in one stroke: excellent for time efficiency, not so great for neatness at all. The polish dried streaky, and each new layer didn't help - if anything it got worse the more polish I applied. It flat out refused to spread and even out. To top it all off the polish took forever to dry and so I seemed to waste the best part of the afternoon sitting, waiting for my nails to dry and get on with my life. When it eventually dried it was incredibly dull, and was only lifted by my Essie Good to Go top coat.

If it's not already obvious, I'm really not impressed! The only plus point is that several hours after application the colour is starting to grow on me. It's very, very subtle - making it perfect for the office or jobs where garish nail colour is frowned upon - and I think it'd suit any skin tone. Also, no matter how many times I screwed the cap on, the text on the lid and the bottle was always perfectly lined up. As a neat freak this was worthy of two thumbs up!

I really wouldn't recommend ck one. Sorry, Calvin Klein but your nail polish is rubbish! At least with such a soft shade at a distance it doesn't look too bad, but I dread to think what the bolder colours look like!

As for lasting for 10 days… This is coming off as soon as I'm back from London and it's being replaced with Urban Jungle. Essie certainly wouldn't let me down like this!

Has anyone tried the ck one polishes and had a different experience? I'd love to know if it's just me! Let me know in the comments below or drop me a tweet!