Topic Tuesdays: Favorite Base and Top Coats

There is an Instagram account that I follow called Topic Tuesdays, which presents nail polish related prompts every Tuesday. This week topic was on your favorite base and top coats. Figured that it'd be a good time to discuss mine here. These are my opinions as of August 7, 2018.

Left to Right: Glisten and Glow HK Girl top coat, UNT peel off base coat, Glisten and Glow Stuck on Blu! base coat

My current HG (Holy Grail) combo is Glisten and Glow Stuck on Blu! base and HK Girl top with UNT peel off base coat. I can get up to four days with this combo, three being average. If I forgo the UNT then it'll last even longer.

(Note: The Glisten and Glow base and top used to be called Stuck on Blu! and HK Girl respectfully, but are now simply known as base and top coat. I'll refer them to their older names here since I still own and use my older bottles.)

I particularly adore HK Girl. It's essentially Seche Vite without all of its cons. HK Girl dries super fast and shiny, doesn't shrink my polish, doesn't smear nail art, and doesn't require thinner until I'm almost out. There are other top coats I've enjoyed, yet I always go back to this because I enjoy it that much. I can't tell you how many bottles I've gone through.

American Classics Gelous

When it comes to glitter, however, I don't rely solely on the HK girl. I also rely on a "glitter food" topcoat. My current go to is American Classics Gelous. I've only seen it IRL at Sally Beauty Supply. It's intended as a base coat, but people use it as a top coat all the time because it's great at smoothing glitters. One or two coats help tame glitters significantly. That being said, I do not use it own its own as it refuses to dry on me. If I do wear this, then I must wear a fast dry (preferably HK Girl) on top. I get smearing and denting otherwise.

Left to right: Vibrant Vinyls Fast and Hard top coat, Get a Grip base coat, You Matte-r matte top coat

Finally, if I'm not using my Glisten and Glow base and top combo then I'm using the ones from Vibrant Vinyls. These are newer to me but I'm enjoying these muchly so far. They are all scented in the limited edition fragrance Galactic Unicorn. The Fast and Hard also dries swiftly and glass shiny. Haven't used it for nail art yet but I see people using it for that purpose all the time. The matte top coat performs just as amazingly as my favorite drugstore matte top coat Essie's Matte About You. I love wearing these when I want a scented manicure. I even got a bottle of the latest Polish Pickup scent in Tough Cookie because they smell so good. Can't wait to try that one.

What are your go to base and top coats?