I know I haven't posted in awhile, but I swear it's like every product that I've been waiting to review these past few months have gotten lost in the mail or have arrived super late! And there's been a few products that I've been very eager to review but will never get the chance to because of the packages getting lost. But one of the packages that I thought was lost in the mail finally arrived!

Born Pretty Store sent me some products to test and review and I'm so excited to share them with you. If you haven't checked out Born Pretty Store's website yet, you're truly missing out! BPS offers inexpensive nail art supplies and offers free worldwide shipping with no minimum purchase.

One of the newest nail art trends that I hadn't had a chance to try yet was magnetic nail polish, so when I picked out the items I wanted to review of course I picked a magnetic gel polish! But you can't just buy a magnetic polish and expect it to work on it's own. To make magnetic polish work, you also need a magnet. The items that I'm reviewing today are the BPS double headed magnet (Item ID #42347) and BPS magnetic cat eye gel polish (Item ID #41907). Of course, if you're familiar with BPS you know I've just shortened the names of these products. It's much easier to say "magnetic cat eye gel polish" instead of "5ml BORN PRETTY Holographic Chameleon Magnetic Cat Eye Soak Off UV Gel Nail Polish Black Base Needed". Plus, this product is not holographic, so to say that it is holographic would be lying to you guys even though it's in the name of the product.

The type of magnetic polish that I chose to review comes in five different colours, but BPS has many other magnetic polishes on their site. And let's be frank, these names are kind of intense! There's Eye of God, Forever Young, Pillars of Eternity, Galaxy in Flames, and No Darkness Within Thee. Whenever I get to pick products to review, I tend to choose blue and purple colours because those are my favourite colours to wear on my nails. However, I decided to pick something different this time and chose Galaxy in Flames, which is a nice, burnt orange colour.

I prefer not to use gel polish unless it's necessary for using certain nail art supplies such as powders and pigments, so I don't have any gel polishes other than gel top coats. But as long as you have a UV lamp to cure this polish, then you can use regular base coat, black polish, and top coat with this product.

To use this product, start off with a base coat and then apply a black base. Apply an even coat of the magnetic polish, and then hold the magnetic stick as close as you can to the nail but without actually touching the surface of the uncured gel polish. The magnetic stick has two ends, one long magnet for straight lines, and a small circular magnet for radial and wavy designs. I chose the long magnet to create a cat eye effect going across the nail and found that using the magnet for about 3-5 seconds worked best to achieve a bold and pigmented strip across the nail. The longer I had the magnet close to the nail (about 10 seconds) the more the pigment tended to disperse across the nail instead of making a clean, more centralized strip of magnetic pigment. I probably had a bit of a shaky hand, causing the magnet to make the magnetic particles in the gel polish travel across the nail. Another important thing to note is that it is best to try and keep your fingers splayed apart so that the magnet doesn't get close to more than one nail at a time. It's a small magnet, but stronger than you'd think. It can ruin the design of the nails that you've already finished if you haven't cured them yet.
Next, you'll want to cure your nails under a UV lamp. I found that even after the product was cured, the polish on my nails were still very sticky, so I used an alcohol wipe to clean them off. This helped so much! Then lastly, I applied a regular topcoat to protect the design. The finished result is so lovely and my pictures don't do it justice. There's much more of a holographic effect on the nails. Not like HOLO (shout out to my fellow Simply Nailogical fans), but like the holographic/lenticular shifting images that you used to see on plastic collectable cards as a kid.

Overall, I wish that the cat eye effect looked more bold like it did in the pictures advertised on Born Pretty Store's product page. However, I was pleased with the effect that I achieved and would definitely try it again. I'd like to test out a radial or wavy design next time, and would also like to see if I can mix the magnetic gel polish with one of a different colour to create a multicoloured look.