China Glaze Instant Chemistry

China Glaze Instant Chemistry from the 2012 Magnetix collection

I finally decided to try my magnetic polishes! I've seen these all over the place by many different brands including China Glaze, Color Club, Nabi, Icing, and new ones seem to pop up every day. The concept seems like nail art for those who can't do nail art (like me!). The little iron particles in the polish are manipulated by the magnet producing a pattern like stripes, waves, chevrons, etc. My favorite pattern is the star, as the effect is reminiscent of a star sapphire.
Instant Chemistry is a dark purple leaning red. The application was just like any other polish, and despite my poor clean up (sorry, I didn't realize how rough it was until I looked at the pictures on the computer!) was a very normal application. I found no flaw with the magnet itself, though it must be said that the magnet is pretty easy to use, but challenging to master. The magnet has a nice little groove in it so it can sit right below your cuticle comfortably. I always got a decent image, but I did have a few times where I got the magnet too close to the nail and smudged the polish- the magnet does clean off with polish remove though. It also took several tries to figure how to get a centered image.
It was fun and I will use them again, though I don't know that it was really much easier than freehand art.