You may have heard the term "Shattered Nails" - this isn't referring to getting your nails smashed in a car door, but rather a great new product that goes on like a regular nail polish, but creates a striking and unique shattered glass look on your nails.
Crackle Polish is applied over top of a regular coat of nail polish, and as it dries it shrinks and forms cracked areas to allow the underlying color to show through. Each nail has a slightly different pattern, and with the combination of your base coat color and the crackle nail polish color, you can create an almost infinite combination of colors and patterns.
Many women consider OPI Nail Polish to be the highest quality brand of polish available on the market today. OPI has branded their crackle polish "Shatter", which of course it entirely appropriate and indicative of the line of polishes in this collection.
Their Shatter line has 7 colors available [which can then be used over top of any other color of normal nail polish]:
Light Blue
Dark Blue
Silver
Blue
Red
White
Black
When using OPI shatter, you should use a complimentary color under the crackle polish, and after it is dry apply a good quality top coat to protect your design.
China Glaze, another leading manufacturer of quality polishes, calls their line "Crackle Glaze". They offer 6 colors in their base collection:
White "Lightning Bolt"
Grey "Crackled Concrete"
Black "Black Mesh"
Blue "Crushed Candy"
Red "Broken Hearted"
Purple "Fault Line"
In addition to these 6, they also have a metallic crackle polish collection called Crackle Metals:
Tarnished Gold
Cracked Medallion
Platinum Pieces
Latticed Lilac
Haute Metal
Oxidized Aqua
The above sample is just 2 manufacturers offering crackle polishes. Most major lines including CoverGirl and other "department store" polish lines also offer a variety of crackle colors as well.
Some of the striking crackle designs you'll see out and about, or at your favor salon, include high contrast black crackle over a base of red polish, or the inverse with red crackle on top of normal black polish. You typically want a complimentary or opposite color combination between the crackle polish and the base coat.
The procedure is quite simple, regardless of which brand you choose - the hardest part is waiting for the layers to dry [base coat and then the crackle polish coat]. It is critically important that you let the base coat dry completely. Many salons have been requested to "fix" botched at home crackle designs, solely due to the base coat of normal polish not being completely dry before applying the crackle, which leads to blending of the colors and a muted crackle effect.
Many women prefer to prepare their nails and apply their base coat color one day, and then wait a full day before applying the crackle polish - the only risk here is chipping your base coat during those 24 hours. However, even if this occurs, the nice thing about crackle polish is it will basically mask any minor chips you may have, and once dry the design will never reveal any underlying minor chips.
Crackle polish is not priced much above a good quality polish, and no special drying lamps like UV lamps are needed, so it is fairly cheap and easy to at least try it and see if you like the results. It is one of the easier nail design techniques that gives you a wonderful look with minimal effort versus other design techniques.
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