“I love doing other people’s nails because it can kind of just be an outward show of your inner personality, depending on what you wanna get,” Sitara Fan, a Berkeley High School junior and nail artist, said, “It’s a really fun creative outlet for me.”
Fan was in seventh grade when nail artists on the internet sparked their interest. They bought a starter nail kit from Amazon. Fan said, “I just kind of sat in my room for hours ... practicing a lot.”
Last year, Fan rediscovered their old nail kit and began doing students’ nails. They are still refining their skills, practicing by picking designs from Pinterest and recreating them. Right now, Fan is enjoying the trend of detailing 3D lips on nails. They are especially proud of a set of stained-glass nails they recently created using 3D welding.
Asha Bui, who is another BHS junior and nail artist, also derives her main inspiration from platforms like Pinterest. She has built up her collection of nail-art tools and supplies to match what she has seen in salons. Now, show her any inspiration photo and she can replicate the design. “It’s one of the ways that I kind of express my creativity. I like to do art … it’s a fun, personalized way to show that off,” Bui said.
For BHS junior Henry Robinson, social media inspired a different passion. After being motivated by haircut videos on his social media feeds, he said, “I got my friend, and I was like, alright, I’m just gonna give it a shot … I just never turned back.” Robinson has now been cutting hair for two years.
Both Robinson and Fan have Instagram pages where they post pictures of their work, and through which prospective clients can reach out to them. Robinson will send the people who reach out to him a list of times that he has available and they show up at his house. Right now, his most popular style is a low taper fade.
For Fan, doing people’s nails has forced them to develop different social skills. They have learned to maintain conversations with students whom they might not have much in common with for sessions that can last hours. “It’s definitely brought me confidence to be able to talk to people who I don’t know super well,” Fan said.
Additionally, for Robinson, cutting hair has given him a better sense of the broad range of students who attend BHS. Those who reach out to him for haircuts span across many different friend groups and backgrounds at BHS, many of whom he might not have had the opportunity to connect with otherwise.
Robinson said, “I’ve met people of different ages, backgrounds, races and stuff … Everybody’s different, and it’s kinda cool.”