By Archana Ram

With the sheer number of cheap nail salons in New York City, I wish I could say I get manicures all the time. It’s fun, looks polished (no pun intended) and can make accessories like rings and bracelets really pop. But I’ve been plagued with the totally non-medical syndrome of nailpolish peeling, meaning any time I get the least bit fidgety I peel. (Clearly, my nails are pretty fragile.) So my mid-year resolution was to stop the peeling insanity, and I figured the best way to do that was to get a nice manicure, which would, hopefully, make me realize what I’ve been missing out on.

I did a bit of research online and learned that getting a quality topcoat was most important, so I headed to Duane Reade and picked up Seche Vite, which seemed to get rave reviews on sites like makeupalley.com.

Here’s what my mani from Orchid Garden Spa looked like on Day One:

…day three…

…and day five

Even with doing the dishes and washing my hands, my mani actually held up. But then by day 7, I made the mistake that reviewers online had warned about: I had put on too thick a coat of the Seche Vite, and the polish started to peel in one fell swoop. It was tattered-manicure central by then.

Word to the wise: Seche Vite is a great product to preserve your manicure, but do as the masses say – three thin vertical strokes, followed by one thin horizontal stroke at the nail tip, and that’s it!

Archana also writes her own blog at LettuceVeg.com.