Nail of the day - Revlon Ruby Ribbon - Matte

Hello all.  I've been experimenting with the matte nails trend over the past couple of days.  I've bought the Rimmel matte topcoat as well as two matte nail polishes from the autumn/winter Revlon collection.  I only bought the Revlon polishes for the colours - I didn't know that they were matte until I got them home!

First up is Ruby Ribbon.  This is a gorgeous dark red colour, with a brown and plum undertone - perfect for autumnal days.  As well as being a matte finish, it also has a shimmer to it - quite a contrast.  The shimmer is definitely underneath the matte - it's a bit hard to describe, but it looks lovely.  I was sitting at my desk today with the sun shining in on my nails, admiring the shimmer and the mattness of them!

In natural light

I was a bit worried about how easy this polish would be to apply.  I've previously used Minted by Revlon - one of the summer's hottest colours.  It is one of the worst polishes to apply I have ever used!  I've tried to do a NOTD with Minted about 3 times now, but I've not been able to get a finish anywhere near photo-worthy, so I've given up with it! But I needn't have worried with Ruby Ribbon - it went on like a dream, dried quickly and only took two coats to achieve a lovely finish.  One good thing about matte varnish is that you can see it drying, as it mattifies as it dries - very useful really.  

In artificial light

But there is a problem with this polish.  You will see from my photos that there's lots of tip wear (and my other hand has a couple of chips).  And this is within 24 hours of applying it.  The reason is, of course, that because it's matte, you can't put a topcoat on it, as that would defeat the point of matte nails!  So it doesn't last very long at all.  The only way round this I can think of would be to put a topcoat on, and then put a matte topcoat on top of that.  And what's the point of this when the whole USP of the varnish is that it's matte? 

Have you got round the wear-problem with matte polish?

Thanks for reading!  xx