INCOCO Real Nail Polish Appliques: Review & GIVEAWAY!

Happy Monday everyone! It’s always difficult to get the week started, so today I have a treat for you to boost your spirit! I’m excited to show you my first Incoco Real Nail Polish Applique review and GIVEAWAY! For those of you who are not familiar with the Incoco brand, here is how the creators describe their nail polish strips:

The 100 or so different shades of nail polish art from Incoco follow the trends of the seasons, and look incredibly authentic on your nails! Instead of having to use nail art tools and crazy techniques to get cool designs, you can easily apply our nail polish strips for intricate patterns in half the time! You don’t have to worry about the mess or dry time! And, getting your manicure to match perfectly on both hands is a piece of cake!

This brand carries such a wide variety, from solid color nail polish strip to intricate, gorgeous and fun nail designs, french manicure, design french manicure, and pedicure strips! And another bonus, all Incoco nail strips are made of real nail polish expertly crafted with 3 layers: base coat, color coat, and top coat. So all you need is to dress your bare nails with these nail strips and you’re good to go!

Compared to some other nail polish strips that I have tried before, my first experience with Incoco nail designs was beyond pleasurable. I would highly recommend them to anyone, so let me show you what the fuss is all about!

I was provided with 3 nail design strips, a nail buffer, an emory board, and an orange wood stick – everything I’ll need for easy breezy application. Today, I will show you Ikat Catwalk, the first strip I tried:

I’m in LOVE with this Ikat design! It’s my first time wearing this pattern and I think it’s the perfect combination of fun and chic! Application was super easy and took me around 20 minutes. The colors of these strips are very versatile, I wore them during the snowstorm last week (yes, it’s the end of February and Vancouver’s still getting snow!) but I also kept them on to welcome the sun this week. Personally, I think it’s perfect for the spring season. Look at how detailed the design is! I love how the texture create the effect like as if the ikat design is woven on a silvery and silky canvas ♥♥♥

You can see how well the strips fit around my cuticles. The only one I needed to trim was my thumb because it’s the only nail that has sort of a square-ish cuticle shape compared to the rounded shapes of my other nails. There’s no other product used besides the polish strips – that’s right, no base coat and no top coat!

For application instructions, I find that the Incoco How to Apply tab on their website to be informative and complete with infographics, written step-by-step instruction, and a video tutorial (also at the bottom of my post after the giveaway for easy access)! So, do go there first and you’ll learn just how easy it is to use these strips! One note here is that they recommended you buff your nails prior to applying the strips to minimize the ridges. Although I do have ridges, in my Nail Care Routine post, I talked about how I generally dislike buffing my nails cause it tends to weaken them. What you’re seeing in my photos are the nail strips applied directly on my clean, naked nails without buffing. If you do have serious ridges on your nails, you might want to try lightly buffing your nails as recommended by Incoco. Removal was just as simple using my usual nail polish remover. The only difference is an extra thin layer of glue, which easily wiped off once the polishes came off. If you have any other questions, please feel free to leave me a comment and I’ll try my best to get answers to you 🙂

Now, I know you’ll want to know the wear of these strips. Well, Incoco claims that their nail strips will last up to 14 days. Since I’m a nail blogger, I normally never wear anything more than a couple of days on my nails, 4 days is usually my maximum if I really love the polish color or my own nail art. However, I was super busy with school and work when I had these on, so I was able to keep them on for 7 days! Let’s see how they faired…

First, a further away shot so you get the effect of what they would look like to normal people. I can definitely see the tip wear, especially around the corners of my free edge. But, for someone like me, this result is really amazing since at work, most of the time I’m typing on a computer or running around setting up rooms, banging my hands into game and exercise equipment; and at school, I do even more computer work.

Here’s a close up shot. You can see that some of the edges are beginning to peel (I’m looking at you, pinky!). There’s a larger gap around my cuticles due to nail growth. But, do keep in mind that I work with seniors, so I wash my hands constantly. I also did some baking and crafts for special events at work the week I wore these strips, which may be partly the cause of the lifting. However, my dominant hand is my right, and my photos here feature my left hand, so there may also be less wear simply because I’m not as rough with my left hand as I am with my right. Bottom line: even at 7 days, I still loved the look! I encourage you all to give the Incoco Nail Polish Strips a try. I know they’ll now be my go-tos any time I travel and when I know I will be busy and still want to have my nails dressed beautifully 🙂

Now it’s time for the Incoco Giveaway!!

I’m beyond excited to share my new found love of the Incoco nail strips by hosting my first blog giveaway! One winner will get one set of Incoco Real Nail Polish Appliques of their choice. The giveaway is open to all US and Canada residents, effective now until March 17, 2014, 12:00 A.M. Pacific Time. The winner will need to respond within 48 hours or a new winner will be chosen. See full Terms & Conditions in the Rafflecopter widget.

Besides sponsoring the generous giveaway, Incoco has also provided all of my readers with a 15% Incoco promo code: LACQUER15, effective until March 17, 2014. If you want to get something now before my giveaway ends (like those new St. Patrick’s Day designs that I’m eyeing), then just enter the above code in the promo code box at checkout.

To share this giveaway, please use the picture below and link back to this post. Have fun shopping and GOOD LUCK!!!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Incoco How to Apply Video

Thank you so much for reading and have a wonderful week!

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