Ask for a technician by name, not just a time.

The team

• 

  Owner & master gel technician

  Marisol Vega

  Marisol opened the studio in Little Italy in 2018 and still works at the desk five days a week. She is a California-licensed manicurist, trained in Gel-X and structured builder gel, and an educator for a HEMA-conscious gel range. Soft gel extensions are her speciality: length that protects the natural nail rather than thinning it. She books every first extension set by consult, because it depends on the nail bed.

  She handles most of the check-in quotes too. If a price has to move, she would rather tell the client face to face than let it appear on the bill.

  Keeps a glass file on her desk that has outlasted three e-file motors.

  Ask Marisol about

  Extensions, and whether your nail bed is ready for them.

  Acrylic damage, and how long a natural nail takes to recover.

  Where in the price band your set is likely to land.

• 

  Pedicure & natural nail technician

  Hana Takeda

  Hana runs the pedicure chairs and the quiet Tuesday and Thursday walk-in hours. She is a California-licensed manicurist with extra training in foot care and hygiene. No blade ever touches a callus here, so each pedicure is shaped around what the skin will safely allow in one sitting, not around a fixed list.

  Most of her week is spa pedicures, natural manicures and nails recovering from damage. If something looks like it needs a podiatrist she stops, tells you, and charges only for the work actually done. On Saturdays she works the manicure desk.

  Works with the pedicure room lights low; the basin filter is the loudest thing in there and that is deliberate.

  Ask Hana about

  Whether your feet need a spa pedicure or a simple tidy.

  How a manicure works for hands with arthritis or a tremor.

  Bitten or peeling nails that keep breaking at the edge.

• 

  Nail artist

  Teo Alvarez

  Teo is a California-licensed manicurist who trained in freehand art and structured builder gel. He takes the art sets: florals, fine line work, chrome, and the clients who were told elsewhere that the design they wanted could not be done short. His builder sets are a thin apex, a slow cure and a careful file.

  Detailed art and long sets fill most of his desk, so he works mainly in the morning and midday bands. He also sketches each design on a tip first, which is why a full art set is always booked with time to spare.

  Times his own cures. Says a gel is not set until ten seconds after you think it is.

  Ask Teo about

  Nail art, and why no design here is rushed.

  Builder gel sets and the longer morning appointments.

  How often a builder overlay really needs a refill.

• 

  Brow, lash & front-desk esthetician

  Imani Brooks

  Imani is a California-licensed esthetician trained in brow lamination, keratin lash lifts and tinting. She takes the brow and lash bookings and the clients who arrive nervous. Her first treatments are kept gentle on purpose: a patch test, a careful map, and only as much product and time as the skin will accept.

  The rest of her week is the front desk and the phones, where the job is finding the right technician and time before anyone has to wait.

  Keeps the tea tin on the low shelf so a nervous client can see where it lives.

  Ask Imani about

  Booking a first brow lamination, and what the patch test involves.

  Brows that have been over-plucked or over-waxed elsewhere.

  Lash lifts, tints, and looking after them between visits.