This $16 Tool Makes Painting Your Own Nails So Much Easier

I have about 40+ nail polish bottles in my medicine cabinet— gorgeous glossy colors and glittery finishes in every color category. But barely any of them, save for a safe nude or a silver glitter, has ever lived on my nails because painting your own nails is impossibly difficult.

You have to be near-ambidextrous in order to paint your non-dominate hand without getting paint all over your skin or smudging the polish. If I don't have an acetone-soaked Q-tip handy to clean up all my mistakes, or plan on sitting still for at least an hour after, it looks like I've been finger painting. I could keep complaining, but I'm aware this is a fairly common sentiment, which explains why so many of us just spend the extra cash and head into a salon instead.

But Sarah Gibson Tuttle, the founder of the famous Olive & June Salon in Beverly Hills, California, wasn't happy with that solution. Even though she owning a salon is her profession, she wanted to make it easier for people to successfully paint their nails at home and be proud of the result. That's how Poppy was born.

It's a $16 patented tool that's designed to fit on any nail polish bottle handle. It has an ergonomic design that is meant to stabilize your hand, which prevents the shaking that leads to smudging or painting all over your cuticles.

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Given my history with at-home manicures, I had to try it out. I can't vouch for "universal," but I tried three brands' nail polish bottles, all of which had different shapes, and it fit on every handle.

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I found Poppy to be the most beneficial when I was painting with my left hand, or my non-dominate hand. It gave my hands something larger to grip onto and squeeze, which helped eliminate all of the shaking, and I had less mess to clean up at the end.

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As we've already covered, I'm no pro at painting my own nails so I definitely didn't end up with a salon-worthy manicure. But besides a little over-painting on my middle finger's cuticles, it did look pretty decent for an at-home attempt, and I felt confident heading into work wearing it.

I truly think the only way to get better at painting your own nails is practice, and I'd say the same thing about using Poppy.

Maybe one day my right hand's polish will finally match my left, and all of those polish bottles sitting in my medicine cabinet will finally get some playtime.