Manicures
from $28
- 5 services
- 30m to 1h 15m
Five manicures, from a thirty-minute tidy to a structured gel that is built to survive a fortnight of typing. The difference between them is time and what goes on the nail, and both are on the line.
Since 2015 · six tables · 3 pedicure chairs
About the studio
A small shop on 61st Street that decided early on to compete on time and honesty rather than on price, and then had to build a website that could actually do that.
How it started
Marisol opened the shop in 2015 with three tables and one pedicure chair, and did every appointment herself for the first year. The second chair arrived in 2017 and the third in 2019, and by then there were four people at the tables. Nothing about that is a remarkable story; what is slightly unusual is what the shop decided in the first year and has not changed since.
The three decisions
Time is published. Every service has a length on it and the length is what the diary reserves. It came out of the first year, when the shop was running forty minutes late by three in the afternoon every Saturday because a booking system was selling hour-long slots to hour-and-a-half appointments. Fixing that meant publishing the real numbers, which meant admitting that a full set is an hour and a half of somebody's day.
Files go in the bin. Single-use consumables are the biggest running cost in this shop after wages, and the alternative is a porous block being rinsed between clients, which is theatre. It was never really a decision.
People get told the truth about their nails. Somebody who booked a fill and needs a removal hears it before anything is filed. Somebody whose gel keeps cracking at day twelve is told that the answer is a structured manicure rather than a different colour. Somebody with a nail that has lifted from the bed is told we cannot work on it. It costs money in the short run and it is the reason people come back for eleven years.
Why this website looks like this
Because the three decisions above are only worth anything if somebody can find them out before they arrive. So the price list is the main page, every price has a length beside it, the booking form works out how long your particular combination will take before it offers you a time, and there is a whole section of this site — thirteen pages of it — about the things that go wrong and what happens then.
There is no product brand named anywhere on it and there are no certificates on it, and both of those are deliberate. What a shop can honestly show you is its practice.
Where the shop is
On 61st Street between Roosevelt and Woodside Avenue, four minutes from the station that carries the 7 train and the Long Island Rail Road. Most of our regulars live within eight blocks and walk. A good part of the Saturday book is people who work in Manhattan and would rather have their nails done at home.
There are no certificates on this website. This site describes what happens at the table. It does not display certificates, memberships or ratings, because a photograph of a certificate tells you nothing about the person who will be sitting opposite you.
No product brand is named on this site. No product brand is named anywhere on this site. What matters is what goes on your nail and how, and we will tell you exactly what we used if you ask.
What is in the room
- Six manicure tables along the window wall, each with its own extraction arm
- Three pedicure chairs, plumbed with a fresh disposable liner for every appointment
- A back room for tool washing, sterilising and drying, separate from the floor
- A step-free entrance and a step-free route to two of the six tables
- A quiet corner table for anyone who would rather not be in the middle of the room
- No lash bar, no brow bar, no waxing room, no hair, no massage and no drinks licence
What we do
Seven kinds of work, 22 services, every one of them with a published price and a published length.
Pedicures
from $40
- 4 services
- 30m to 1h 15m
- Needs a chair
Four pedicures in three chairs. Every chair gets a new liner, the basin is scrubbed between appointments, and there is no jetted plumbing in the building for anything to sit in.
Extensions
from $58
- 4 services
- 1h to 1h 45m
Acrylic and hard gel, full sets and fills. These are the longest appointments in the shop and they are taken by the two people who do them all day.
Nail art
from $45
- 1 service
- 30m to 30m
Most art is an add-on to whatever you are already having. If you already have a set on and you only want it decorated, book the art session instead.
Repairs and removals
from $14
- 3 services
- 15m to 45m
One broken nail, a soak-off with nothing going back on, or a full set taken off properly. All three are bookable on their own and none of them requires you to have had the work done here.
Hand and foot treatments
from $20
- 3 services
- 15m to 20m
- Needs a chair
Paraffin, callus work and a proper massage. These are usually added to a manicure or a pedicure, and they are also bookable alone if that is all you want.
For children
from $18
- 2 services
- 20m to 25m
- Needs a chair
Two short appointments for under-twelves, with no gel, no acrylic and no drill. A grown-up stays in the room.
Six tables · three pedicure chairs · a published price for everything
Book an appointment
Pick the service and any add-ons and the calendar adds up the minutes before it looks for a slot, so the times you are offered are times that actually fit what you asked for. A pedicure also needs one of the three chairs, and if none is free at four o'clock on a Saturday it will say so rather than book you in and hope.