OPI Is Bringing Its Gel-Nails To Your Home

Halle-frickin-lujah! We love the shiny finish of gel manicures, and their chip-free longevity. What we don’t love is going to the salon every few weeks for polish changes or, more often, peeling off raggedy polish (and layers of our nails) because we don’t have time for manicures.

Enter OPI’s GELement, the first at-home gel system from our favourite nail brand. It’s pretty much the whole salon experience, minus the hand massage.

You’ll need to fork out a little bit in the beginning for the lamp ($49.99), Essentials Kit of base coat, top coat, prep pads, cuticle sticks and files ($99.99), Removal including foil wraps, polish removers, cuticle sticks and files ($39.99) and individual polishes ($19.99 each). But think of the savings! A gel mani these days will set you back about $50 a time, and a pedi even more. And yes, you can buy an LED lamp and all the trimmings online, but it won’t be much cheaper than this, and it won’t have the OPI seal of approval.

We can’t wait to get our (unmanicured) mitts on this when it comes out in September. And while we’re reasonably confident that years of applying polish at home and watching the manicurists work their magic in the salon have given us some degree of expertise, we’re happy that OPI has launched a GELiversity series on YouTube, in partnership with manicurist Adeeba Khan (aka YoDeebs) so we can get all the shine and staying power of a pro gel mani, without leaving the house.

OPI GELement will be available at Shoppers Drug Mart and Amazon Canada. —Aileen Lalor