L.A. Girl DIY Nail Art Review Part Four: Overall Value and Recap

Hi everyone!

So I have had to change my original plan for the last part of my review of the L.A. Girl DIY Nail Art Kit. Originally I had a couple of more simple nail art tutorials with the kit to show you, but unfortunately I ended up running out of polish to work with!

They were mini bottles after all, so I should have seen it coming.

Instead, I want to recap the entire kit as a whole and re-evaluate the value and effectiveness of the product now that I've used it to its full potential.

So let's take a final look at the product.

The Contents

I showed you in the first part of the review the contents and individual colors for the Nail Art kit in "Flashy." To see my initial thoughts and more swatches of the individual colors, you can jump over here.

The kit included four mini bottles of bright neon colors, a small nail art brush, chevron nail stickers, and a full instruction sheet to help you get started.

The Colors

For  the most part, I really liked the colors both individually and how they coordinate as a set.

The pink was a real stand out as a bright barbie like neon shade. Feedback from my initial look at these colors proved that I wasn't alone in saying that this is a color you NEED in a full size for summer.

The orange was just as a bright and easy to work with, so if you're into orange polishes and looking for a good neon citrusy hue, I'd spring for this one full size as well. It looks great on toes!

If you read my thoughts on the yellow, then you already know this is a hit or miss. On one hand it's hard to work with, takes a lot of building and isn't very flattering for some. It's actually the first color I ran out of since it took so many layers to get it opaque each time. On the other hand this is a pretty common problem with bright yellow polishes across the board, so L.A. Girl really isn't to blame here. The formula takes getting used to. If you have the patience and a good top coat, you can make this color work in the end...it just won't be easy.

The blue has an incredible formula and is a great basic go-to for nail art. As a stand-alone color it's not anything special, but not something you'd regret having in your stash.

The Tools

The Brush

The picture above shows the brush before I began using it. I was scared at first  at how on earth I could create any nail art look with the bristles that spread out, but a couple of dips into nail polish remover and then shaping the tip fixed it. As many nail art brushes as I have around, I think I'm really going to be using this one often for small line work. I've used and abused it over the past week, and it's still like new. It's surpisingly durable, making it reliable for both beginners and more experienced nail art enthusiasts.

The Stickers

The nail stickers I was unfortunately unable to show you in action before the polishes ran out, but it's not to say I didn't attempt to use them. Unfortunately, they are too big to create  an actual chevron pattern. The size allows for only one strip to be applied per nail. It can still create a cute look, but it's still not the look they were advertised to achieve. 

I attempted to cut them down to make them thinner, but then I had to deal with crooked edges. In the end it would be easier to achieve the actual pattern using the brush than trying to use the stickers. They can be effective when used to create a single chevron stripe accent or even to achieve regular stripes if you cut them in half at the corner.

The Nail Art

The kit advertises that you can creative a total of atleast five different nail art looks:

Tiger/Zebra Stripes
Leopard/Cheetah Spots
Chevron Stripes
Polka Dots
(No Water) Swirl Marble

I demonstrated two of them for you, while making attempts to create the other three.

Overall, the colors in the Flashy kit in particular make creating these looks a bit harder than they should have been due to the semi-sheer formula of all but the blue. 

I recommend using the lighter shades as your base and utilizing the blue as the main detail color when possible as it is the only fully opaque shade.

The tiger/zebra and cheetah/leopard looks create the best result from the materials used. 

To see the full tutorial of these looks, just click the images below.

   

But what about the three remaining looks?

I already explained the trouble with the chevron stickers, but the other two looks only  require the brush.

I was unable to show the polka dots, but that's pretty self explanatory  

Now, I prefer the precision of a dotting tool for but that's now to say that the look couldn't be achieved with the brush. The trick is being able to pick up a generous amount of polish on the tip of the brush and hold it completely upright when dotting on the nail. The dots are small but were surprisingly perfectly round.

The swirl marble is really not a look a favored in the first place, but I still gave it a shot. 

It looks a little messy in my opinion, but I  actually found it to be easier to do by mixing the orange, pink, and yellow shades. The thin formula actually works to their advantage in this case as they blend together in a much more pleasant manner.

The Value

Even after actually running out of a couple of the colors, I still stand by my initials impressions of this kit and think it's a GREAT value. 

For the small price of $5 you're getting 4 mini polishes, a sheet of 24 chevron shaped nail stickers, and a  multipurpose nail brush. For the average user this kit will last longer than it did for me. You have to take into consideration that I had to swatch multiple times due to photography problems (neons are a pain to photograph!), and experiment with the same look until I achieved the best results to show you. So I went through the polishes much quicker than I should have. 

And let's not forget that the brush is something you can use for a very long time, so it's a minuscule price for an important nail investment.

Final Thoughts

After working with this, and only this kit for the past week or so I thought I'd get really sick of it, but I really didn't. It was nice to have exactly what I needed all in one kit and I was still able to create multiple looks to keep me from getting too bored. 

The Flashy kit is actually probably my least favorite of the color options available for a couple of reasons:

1. The formula for nail art polishes really needs to be opaque, and three out of the four were not.
2. There needs to be more contrast in the colors in my opinion.

Now, I stumbled upon a  preview of one of the other color options in "Fabulous." Brianna over at BreezyTheNailPolishLover displayed a skittle mani here of each of the looks created with her kit, and you can see how much better that color combo worked. You can also get a glimpse of just how big those chevron stickers are.

After seeing both her kit and mine, overall I would definitely recommend picking this up if you see it around. Even if it's just to test the colors, you're definitely getting your money's worth. I don't think it matters if you're a beginner or an expert. It's a great little kit for polished lovelies of all skill levels.

So that's  it! 

I know this was long and you're asking yourself why I spent so many days concentrating on this one product. 

I felt it was important to really break it down and focus on each aspect of the kit.

I give it a thumbs up, but do you?
Let me know your thoughts and whether or not you'd  give the kit a try in the comments below!

To see all the L.A. Girl line has to offer, visit their website at lagirlusa.com and give them some love on Facebook and Twitter.

Thanks for reading!

-Melody

*The products in this post were provided for my honest review. Any material provided does not influence my opinions in any way. Gotta keep it real!