Hand-painted nails · Greenpoint
Thirty-eight colors, and I mixed every one of them.
One chair, one set at a time, painted freehand with a brush and no stencils. Pick a number off the ring and a shape off the board, and I will tell you honestly how long it is going to hold on your hands.
What I have been painting
Every set carries the numbers it was mixed from, so you can point at one and say that, in a fourteen and a six.
Hand-painted
Checkerboard, painted crooked on purpose
03 06
TechniqueFreehand check, dry brush
In the chair2 h 40
Hand-painted
A small window on each hand
06 07 15 12
TechniqueLeaded panes, jelly fills
In the chair3 h 05
Chrome and metallics
Gold leaf pressed into oxblood
07
TechniqueTorn leaf, pressed wet
In the chair2 h 20
Chrome and metallics
Marble with one silver vein
03 05 18
TechniqueDragged veins, foil ribbon
In the chair2 h 45
Every color I mix
Thirty-eight in the box, eighteen that leave it most weeks. Each one is a pigment blend I mix myself, which is why it has a number rather than a name off a bottle.
The other twenty are seasonal or one-offs and live in a drawer. If you want a color that is not on here, bring me something that is that color and I will mix it in the chair. It adds about twenty minutes and it is free.
Nine years, one chair, no drills
I learned in a basement salon under a laundromat in Sunset Park, where the rule was that nobody left with a set they had to explain to anybody. I have kept that. I paint by hand with a brush, I do not use stamps or stencils, and I will not put an electric file anywhere near a natural nail, which costs me about one booking a month and is worth it.
Everything I use I mix myself from a fixed set of fourteen pigments. That is why every shade on this page has a number instead of a name, and why the same number is the same color in April and in November. If you bring me a photograph of something, I will tell you which of my numbers gets closest and whether it will still look like that in three weeks, which is usually the more useful answer.
I take six people a day at most. I would rather run half an hour long on your hands than start the next set on time.
Marisol Quiñones
Three I could not work without
01 Rice Paper
Three coats and it still reads as skin. It is underneath about half the sets on this page.
06 Ink Well
A true black with no blue sitting in it, which is much harder to mix than it sounds.
13 Acid Lime
One nail of this rescues a set that has gone too polite. I use it more than anyone expects.
Painted on tips first
Nothing goes on anybody's hands until I have painted it once on a tip and hung it on the wall. Some of these have never been booked. Somebody should book them.
Six shapes, and what each one is for
Shape decides how a set wears far more than the color does, and almost nobody is asked about it. So: ask.
Square
Natural, short
The strongest of the six on your own nails, and it shows a color flat and true. Every swatch on the board is painted on one.
Squoval
Natural, short, medium
A square with the corners taken off. It catches on far less, and it is what I put most people in the first time.
Round
Natural, short
Follows the shape your nail already wants, so it grows out invisibly. Pick this if you type all day or play anything with strings.
Almond
Medium, long
Narrows the hand and lengthens the finger. It wants a little extension unless your beds are already long.
Ballerina
Medium, long
A tapered wall with a flat tip, so there is real room to paint. Most of the busier sets in the gallery are on this.
Stiletto
Long
The most dramatic and the least forgiving. Lovely for a week of photographs, hard work for a month of laundry.
Shape costs nothing and length is free within the shape. Anything past medium on extensions adds $15 and about half an hour. If you are not sure, tell me what you do all day and I will pick.
Five things to book, and how long each lasts
The track is drawn to one scale across all five, so an appointment that is cheaper but puts you back in this chair in two weeks reads as exactly that.
Time
1 h 10
Price
From $55
Wears
2 weeks before you are back
Time
2 h 30
Price
From $95
Wears
3 weeks before you are back
Builder gel overlay
A thin structural layer over your own nail, then color. For nails that peel.
Book thisTime
2 h
Price
From $85
Wears
5 weeks before you are back
Extensions and art
Tips built to whichever shape you picked, then whatever you like on top.
Book thisTime
3 h 30
Price
From $140
Wears
6 weeks before you are back
Time
40 min
Price
From $30
Wears
1 weeks before you are back
The whole price list
No packages, no membership and no upselling once you are sitting down. The art is priced by the nail, and the multiplication is done for you.
In the chair
Single color
Shape, cuticle work, one number off the ring, two coats.
Full set, hand-painted
Everything above plus a freehand design on all ten nails.
Builder gel overlay
A structural layer over your own nails, then color.
Extensions
Tips built to any of the six shapes, shaped and colored.
Removal only
Soaked off properly, then buffed and oiled. Free if the set came from here.
Art, by the nail
French or micro-French
Painted freehand, no guides and no stickers.
Chrome, pearl or foil
Mirror, oil slick, or a torn leaf pressed in.
Freehand line work
Faces, script, checks, anything drawn with a brush.
Set stones or pearls
Placed one at a time, flat back only.
Encapsulated flowers
Pressed and sealed under the top coat.
Prices are the same whoever you are and whatever day of the week it is. A design on two or three accent nails is charged for those nails only, which is why the per-nail figure is the one that matters. Removal is free on a set that came from this chair, $20 on anything else.
What two and a half hours actually looks like
Mostly so you know which parts you can hold a phone through and which parts you cannot.
Look at the photograph
You show me what you brought, we pick the numbers off the ring together and I tell you what will and will not work on your nail length.
10 minutes
Prep
Old color off, cuticles worked back with a pusher and nippers, shape filed by hand to the form you picked. This is the part that decides whether the set lifts.
35 minutes
Base and color
Base coat, then two or three thin coats of the number, cured between each. You can still hold a phone here.
30 minutes
The painting
The part you came for. Ten nails, freehand, one hand at a time. You cannot hold a phone here, so bring headphones or talk to me.
55 minutes
Top coat and oil
Sealed, cured, edges capped, cuticle oil worked in, and a photograph for the board if you are happy for me to take one.
20 minutes
Extensions add about an hour to the middle of that, all of it before the painting starts. If you are running late, tell me before you get on the train and I will tell you honestly whether we can still do the design you wanted.
What people say on the way out
Full set, ballerina · Bushwick
I brought her a photograph of a tile floor in a restaurant and she painted it on ten nails without complaining once. Three weeks later I lost exactly one to a bike chain, which is my fault.
Devon Okafor Books here every five weeksBuilder gel overlay · Greenpoint
My nails have peeled since I was fourteen. She was the first person who looked at them and said what was actually causing it rather than selling me something.
Priya Ramanathan Client since 2022Editorial hands · Manhattan
We needed nine looks changed on set in under two hours and she did it without ever once making it my problem. I have booked her for every shoot since.
Colm Brennan PhotographerSingle color, natural nails · Greenpoint
I came in for something plain and left with number four, which I would never have chosen, and I have had it every visit for a year.
Ruth Feldman Books here monthlyWhere the work has turned up
Editorial
Hands for the spring beauty story
Nine looks, shot over two days in Red Hook
Ten nails, ten paintings
A four-page feature on freehand nail work
The people who still paint by hand
Interview and portfolio, print and online
Collaborations
Launch week hands for a fragrance house
Sixty sets over four days, Brooklyn and Manhattan
Runway hands, independent designer
Fourteen models, one shade mixed for the show
Album artwork hands
Three sets built and painted for the shoot
Teaching
Freehand line work, two-day class
Six places, twice a year, at the studio
Color mixing for nail technicians
Guest week, vocational program, Queens
The things people ask before booking
Can I come with gel on from somewhere else?
Yes, but say so when you book so I can add the removal time. I soak it off rather than filing it away, which takes thirty-five minutes and does not thin your nail. If you turn up with it unannounced we will probably lose the design you wanted.
How long will a set actually last?
Two to three weeks on natural nails, five on a builder gel overlay, six on extensions. That is what the tracks in the services list show. What shortens it is not the polish, it is prep, and prep is the thirty-five minutes I refuse to rush.
Do you use an electric file?
Not on natural nails, ever. I use it on the surface of extensions and nowhere else. This is the single biggest reason people's nails end up thin and sore, and it is entirely avoidable.
Can you copy a design from a photograph?
Almost always, and I would rather you brought one. What I cannot copy is a photograph of a set on nails four sizes longer than yours. Send it when you book and I will tell you what it needs to become to work on your hands.
Do you do a design on just a couple of nails?
Yes, and it is the reason the art is priced by the nail. Two accent nails cost you two nails, not a flat fee for the set. Plenty of people do exactly this every visit.
What if I have a reaction or I am pregnant?
Tell me when you book, not once you are in the chair. I patch test anyone new to gel forty-eight hours ahead, and there are products I swap out during pregnancy as a matter of course. None of it changes the price.
Anything not covered here: write, and say what you need in the first sentence. It gets a faster answer.
Tell me when, and what you want
I answer every one of these myself. The four lines beside the form save us both a rescheduled appointment, so read them before you send it.
Thank you. I read these myself, usually the same evening, and I will come back with the two or three dates I have open.
Before you come in
- Come with bare nails if you can. If you are wearing gel from somewhere else, say so and I will add the removal time to the booking.
- Bring a photograph of what you want, even a bad one off a phone screen. It tells me more in five seconds than a paragraph does.
- Eat something first. A full set is two and a half hours and you cannot use your hands for the last one of them.
- If you are pregnant, on medication, or have reacted to gel or acrylic before, tell me when you book rather than in the chair.
The terms
- Deposit
- $30, off the total
- Notice to move it
- 48 hours
- Late
- 15 minutes, then it is a repaint
- Cash or card
- Either, no fee