Reviews: Gel Couture Nail Polish by Essie

So, if you're a nail polish junkie like me, you've probably heard of Essie's new line of Gel Couture polishes. I was really excited to try these polishes, so I picked one up a couple of weeks ago during Ulta's 20% off sale for Platinum members.

In case you haven't heard, this line of polishes is being marketed as Essie's enhanced, long lasting, gel-but-not-gel line of polishes (similar to OPI's Infinite Shine 2 Lacquer line and Butter London's Patent Shine 10X Lacquer). Essie's Gel Couture is supposed to last up to 14 days without chipping, there is no light required, and it comes off with regular polish remover. It's also available in 42 shades, which gives you a good range of polishes to pick from.

I have sort of mixed experience with these sorts of products; for example, I wasn't the biggest fan of OPI's Infinite Shine, but I love Butter London's Patent Shine. I decided to only buy one of Essie's Gel Couture polishes to start with because I wanted to test out the formula before I spent a lot of money on these polishes. I purchased mine in the shade Beauty Nap, which is a grey toned mossy green. Like other "enhanced" polish lines, the Gel Couture polishes are more expensive than regular Essie polishes. Each Gel Couture retails for $11.50, whereas normal Essie polishes usually cost about $8.50 per bottle. So, obviously, it's pretty expensive; however, it does last longer than normal polish, so the cost is somewhat justified. However, if, like me, you change your polish every few days, the wear time of the polishes is, obviously, less important.

In terms of the packaging, this polish is a bit different from normal Essie polishes. As you can see, the bottle has a twisted twirly shape, which I believe has something to do with the way the polish coats the brush, although I don't really know. Anyway, it's certainly visually interesting! The brush itself is wider than regular Essie brushes, which I love! My nails are sort of wide, so I'm always annoyed by Essie's normal, thin brushes.

The actual polish itself goes on very nicely. It spreads evenly and it isn't too streaky. However, I do think that the polish has a tendency to bubble. I got a small cluster of bubbles on my thumb nail and on my pointer finger; at first, I thought it was just my application, but I saw a couple of other reviews mention bubbles too, so I think it's a flaw in the formula. Other than that, though, I think this polish has a nice formula.

Based on the reviews I read, most of the shades take two coats to be opaque, although some require three. Beauty Nap is a two coat polish. Two coats seems fine to me, although I think that three is a bit excessive for such an expensive polish. I really wish that Essie would work on making their polishes more opaque in general.

In terms of wear time, this polish does not live up to its 14 day promise. I started to get some slight tip wear on day 4, although, honestly, if you weren't looking for it, you probably wouldn't notice it. By day 6, I started to get some bigger, more noticeable chips on a couple of nails, although most of my nails were fine. I ended up taking it off after 6 and a half days.  If you don't mind a couple of chips, this polish might last for 14 days, but, if you're like me and can't stand chips, you'll only get 4 to 6 days of wear time out of this -- which isn't terribly impressive. However, if you're willing to tolerate some minor chips, you'll probably get decent wear time out of this polish.

Final rating: 8/10