I believe that the most important thing as a professional nail technician is to stay current. Current on trends, styles, colors and new application procedures.
Some extra help has recently arrived from Gelish.
Danny Haile, CEO and Founder of Gelish has started a beauty and fashion style magazine offering nail technicians an in-depth, behind-the-scenes look into the gel polish brand.
There is a free application for I-Phone and I-Pad users.
The magazine will take you through step by step tutorials, style in sights, and a insider look at the inspiration for “Under her Spell” collection. There is also a link to Gelish’s U-Tube account.
Historically, there has been a bad connotation with the word “primer”. Some folks, when they think of a nail primer, they envision the old old old acrylic nail primers that contained methacrylic acid.
In the olden days, this primer was used in conjunction with excessive filing of the natural nail before applying acrylic liquid and powder nail enhancements.
Thank goodness, technology has help the nail industry evolve. And allows us to use more healthful methods of applying artificial nail enhancements.
To help understand the uses of a primer, it should be defined.
Primers are any substance that improves adhesion. Base coats are primers for your nails and nail polish!
Just like we primer our walls before we paint, using a primer before applying nail polish is a must.
Primers act as a “joiner” between the natural nail and your favorite polish color.
You can think of it like double sided tape. Where one end adheres to the nail and the other end adheres to the color.
There are several advantages of using a good base coat. And there are many different types of base coats for different uses.
Let’s look at them. There is base coat for natural nails, acrylic nails, and gel nails.
Each one of them is designed with certain chemicals to work in conjunction with your natural nail and a certain product.
Natural nail base coats are a thin coat of priming agents to help color adhere.Ridge filling base coats are great for use with nails that are less than perfectly smooth. Or for use with acrylic nails to save your technician filing time.
Gel base coats are an integral part of the gel color system and unless the gel color is a one step product, like Lacqit, you have to use the base coat. Otherwise, your gel color will come right off.
Natural nail base coats may contain products to help nourish the nail as well.
Another great reason to use base coats, besides it adhesion properties, is that it will help keep your color true during wear.
And when applied properly, will speed up drying time. It also helps prevent chips in your polish.
Probably the most important quality in a good base coat is that it will keep your polish from staining your nail!!!! Who wants icky looking nails after wearing that fabulous vixen red color???
Healthy natural nails grow about 1/10th of a inch every month, but nails grow faster in the summer than the winter. I always say, “we are like flowers, sun and good temperatures makes us grow faster!”
And pregnant women will grow nails faster than people who are not pregnant. Especially in the third trimester. Hormones are quite the little devils. (As if we didn’t already know that one! Ha!)
Picture from whattoexpect.com
Children’s nails will grow much faster than older people.
Picture from momsintheknow.com
And our toe nails grow slower but are strong than our fingernails!
Healthy natural nails are firm, flexible, shiny and little bit pink. (This from the blood vessels in the nail bed.)
Picture from nailexperts.com
They are smooth, and are spot and lump free.
Our nails are actually porous and allow water to pass through them. Natural nails contain between 15-25% water! Even though they appear to be dry. This is what keeps them flexible. If, heaven forbid, you end up with some type of nail injury you can expect your fingernails to grow off in approximately 4-6 months, and toe nails renew themselves in approximately 9-12 months.
Nail disorders and diseases of the nail range from minor to sometimes being quite painful. That is for a future post though!