Nail Tips, Wraps, and Enhancements
This domain covers the add-on services: nail tips, fabric wraps, and the repair work that goes with them. The exam tests fit, adhesion, and how much you blend without thinning the natural plate.
Tips
- Tip styles include full well, partial well, and well-less (pre-blended). Choose the tip that fits sidewall to sidewall without pinching or pressure; if the client is between sizes, go larger and file down.
- Apply adhesive in the well, hold the tip at about a 45-degree angle against the free edge, and roll it into place to avoid trapping air. Bubbles become lifting and moisture traps.
- Blend the seam with a medium-grit file, then refine. Blend only the tip material - filing into the natural plate thins it and creates a weak point.
- Shorten with a tip cutter or file before shaping; never crack or snap the tip off.
Wraps
Silk, linen, and fiberglass wraps use a fabric strip plus a resin or wrap liquid that cures by evaporation. They add strength, repair a cracked free edge, and can overlay a natural nail. Apply resin, lay the strip, saturate it, smooth edges, let it cure fully, then buff. Wrap resin and wrap remover are solvent-based; remove by soaking rather than ripping.
Worked example
A client has a small crack at one corner of the free edge on an otherwise healthy nail. Reasoning: the crack will spread under stress, so it is stabilized with a wrap: clean and dehydrate the plate, apply resin, place the silk strip across the crack, saturate, cure, buff smooth, then apply polish or an overlay. No acrylic is applied directly into an untreated crack.
Traps that cost marks
Glue touching the sidewalls or skin (bonding skin is painful and can trigger sensitization), oversizing a tip and pressing it onto the nail bed, over-blending until the natural plate is paper-thin, and skipping dehydration so the wrap lifts within days.