Coco Nails Art: Midtown, Manhattan, NY

a starry sky for jessica

design by: unknown

technician: unknown

price: $$

Studios are rated in a 1-3 star system. To learn more see our studio list.

Overall:★★

I had been following Coco Nails (or Coco Nails Art) on Instagram for awhile and I was impressed by their designs. My friend Jessica wanted to get her first set of nail art, and since she works in Midtown I decided this would be a great time to see if Coco lives up to their gram. As I walked into the studio off of 33rd street, I was happy to see the staff was moving Jessica to a different manicure desk, keeping her away from the draft of the door. Afterwards, we had dinner at Bareburger (which is apparently unnecessarily expensive) and Jessica was proudly holding up her water glass to show the world her beautiful nails. She said, and I quote, “I get why you spend the money, I am hooked!”

For the above design, the total was $70 without tip.

STUDIO: ★

Though the decor was predominantly white, like I last saw at Liz Nail and Spa, in this space the effect was more barren. Coming through the thin glass door, you see a large rectangular front room filled with manicure desks. It’s not cramped, but it’s full; it could be that the emptiness struck me because it was a slow Thursday night and most of the desks were unoccupied. However the staff is super nice. While Jessica got her manicure, Dali and I got pedicures done by two super smiley women who laughed with us as I squeezed myself behind the pedicure chair to retrieve the nail polish I had accidentally flung behind me. Coconails doesn’t take tip on card, which in my millennial opinion is kind of annoying, but this is New York City, one of the only places left in the U.S. with cash only establishments, so I probably should have known better. Luckily, they have an ATM in store that worked with my ratchet bank and only had a $1 fee.

NAIL CARE: ★

One of the first things we discussed during our Bareburger-post-nail-art conference was how Jessica felt about the two different technicians that worked on her nails. I had never had two technicians work with me in one session, but Dali has and she wasn’t a fan. The first tech only did her base polish and nail care, while the second did the art. Both worked very gently and meticulously, but while applying the base coat her first technician was pretty unsympathetic during an instance when Jessica was confused by the directions. The work done was fine, but Jessica would have had a better experience if the artist tech was able to work on her the whole time.

ART: ★★★

Jessica loves astrology and is a scorpio, so she wanted to get nails inspired by her sign. We looked up a bunch of inspiration photos, and since she wasn’t married to any one in particular I told her to bring them all in and see what they say. Jess’ nail artist had no problem looking over the designs and coming up with something in her price range. I feel like the picture distorts the color, but in person the lines are very solid and well made. Instead of mixing the subjects together, she decided to do the constellations on one hand, and the symbols on the other. I thought this was a nice touch since asymmetry seems to be on the rise. She also varied the metallic accents, using dots for the constellations and stars for the thumbs. Though it may look simple at first, upon closer look there is a wealth of detail that only comes from having a great artist.

LONGEVITY: ★★

Like Allison experienced at MG Nail, after about 3 weeks some of Jess’ nails popped off. Since they lasted past the three week mark, we didn’t feel like it was a sign of low quality. It seems like that’s just what happens to some people.