By Khara Ahmed

Images credit: Olivia Collins

Despite her change in career paths, Liv never stopped doing nails, becoming the resident nail artist on campus for many of her friends. When the COVID-19 pandemic hit during her second year of university, Liv – like many – began to remotely pursue her passion. Her press-on nail business was born, and grew exponentially after being featured by Black Owned Toronto. Although business was booming, Liv felt an inherent calling to establish an in-person nail community.

“I just love doing nails for and with another person,” Liv expresses. “I have social anxiety, and it can be difficult for me to connect with people. But for some reason, I just love that feeling of creating something for my clients in front of them – of creating something together.”

OPI’s neutral Bubble Bath and Funny Bunny nail polish shades aren’t in Liv’s vocabulary. Her nail art is a love letter to maximalist self-expression, whether that’s hand-sculpted 3D decals for junk nails, bringing back the Y2K duck nail style, or adding LED lights to the ends of her nails as part of her look for the Beyoncé Renaissance Tour. Liv’s current inspiration is centred around conveying a feeling or idea through nails.

“For the Beyoncé nails, I wanted to feel like an alien with really long fingers – I wanted to be ET,” Liv chuckles. “I have a lot of really amazing clients who are learning how to be creative through their nails, so they always give me really cool ideas. Sometimes I find it difficult to label myself a creative, but I have always called myself an executor. I really enjoy it when people give me an idea and I figure out how to make that possible.”

Images credit: Olivia Collins

Many of Liv’s sets invoke a feeling of childhood nostalgia. Her clients often use beloved toys or characters from their youth as the inspiration for their sets. But beyond these tributes to childhood, Liv’s artistry enables her clients to boldly broadcast their inner selves to the world, a practice often lost as we evolve into adults. Fittingly so, appointments feel more like a playdate between Liv and her clients.

“My desk is like a playpen. When I'm doing nails, there's so much paint, colour, glitter and glue everywhere and everything's sticky,” Liv describes. “When a client comes in who wants to collaborate, it’s really like we are playing, like we're basically doing arts and crafts. It's truly very satisfying for my inner child, and I always try to encourage people to be as colourful and crazy as possible because that's how I was when I was a kid.”

And what exactly would younger Liv think of her adult career? “You know, it’s girly, so I think she would really like it,” Liv fondly imagines. “I first wanted to be a geologist, because I like sparkly, shiny things, which I think translates well to my current job.”

On top of the glitter and gemstones, nail art has also helped heal the part of Liv’s inner child that struggled to find her individuality as an identical twin.  

“Growing up, it's a bit hard to discover your own hobbies because you're constantly doing things with your twin and you're always kind of lumped into this group,” she explains. “Having something that's my thing, something that I’m known for, I didn't think it was attainable.”

There’s an intriguing juxtaposition to putting childhood characters onto long stiletto nails that could tear up the playground; it’s almost like a symbolic meeting of the ways one has engaged with play over time. From her experience working with clients, Liv believes nails are a go-to vehicle for exploration and play because of the scale of the medium. 

“I think because nails are on a smaller canvas, people are a little more willing to take it a step further than they would with other things. I always say nails are an accessory, similar to your shoes or your purse,” Liv explains. “They’re small, but they're there, and they can really add to your look without necessarily making or breaking it specifically. I have clients who will do a little bit at first, and then by the next session, they’ll try a lot more. They start dipping their toes in the water more and more, and it’s so fun to watch.”

Images credit: Olivia Collins

While Liv’s appointments are a safe bubble for unabashed self-expression and boundary-pushing nails, what happens when clients step outside the studio doors? Despite a growing appreciation for Liv’s style of nail art, a notion of what “acceptable” nails look like persists. Many workplaces demand neutral, monotone, short nails. The barely-there style of “princess nails” mimics the Royal Family’s beauty protocol as a way to achieve elegance. While there is inherently nothing wrong with this style of nails, its elegance is defined by its proximity to whiteness, and in the case of princess nails, to colonial power. In contrast, long, exuberant nails maintain the connotation of “unprofessional,” “low-class,” and “ghetto,” largely because of their connection to Black expression and fashion, which has historically been marked as deviant. 

“I see it in so many girls and, even with myself, where you wonder what kind of message people are receiving from us just existing and being creative in the way we want to be,” Liv shares. “I have white clients who aren't thinking about that stuff; they just want to have fun. I want us, as Black women, to also feel that way about beauty.

“I do have Black girls who come in and feel a little nervous. They say they don’t want to do too much, or they say ‘so and so said this about long nails’ or ‘my hands are too big,’ and I'm like, ‘nope, we're not doing that.’ I want to redirect them towards thinking about their nails and expression in a way that's really fun, and more specifically, beautiful, desirable, and perfect, no matter what social space we are in.”

The policing of Black bodies extends to what we wear, how we style our hair, and how we do our nails. But this policing is also the very reason why fashion and beauty have been empowering outlets for resistance – bold nail art is a wearable intervention within the respectability politics that try to shrink Black women. For Liv, it’s not possible to discuss nail art without acknowledging the women of colour who have pioneered and proliferated these styles. 

Images credit: Olivia Collins

“Everything we have now in the nail industry would not be present without the Black women wearing those nails and the Vietnamese women who were doing them, especially in Canada,” she emphasizes. “These contributions are still devalued in a way that's really frustrating to me. I think Black women have done an amazing job at taking more power back from the beauty space, and I feel I have a responsibility as a Black woman in the beauty industry to continually think about the ways that I can make sure I'm sending that message to people.”

Liv has made big strides in her career: she’s been flown out to Berlin and Los Angeles for nail art collaborations, and has even had clients fly into Toronto to get their nails done by her. A recent milestone, she did nails for Nigerian singer-songwriter Tems on her most recent tour. In terms of next steps, Liv dreams of opening up her own nail studio, preferably living above it. Her studio would feel like a sanctuary, creating a community where Black and queer individuals can freely play, experiment, and explore the possibilities of nail art. 

“Nail art starts as doing something small for yourself, but it eventually expands into your entire being and a sense of self. There's something about being able to experiment in that way that's temporary – you can keep doing it over and over again. As your taste, feelings, and experiences change, your style changes with you. I’ve always thought that’s really beautiful – the experimental nature of it all.”

Check out more of Liv’s work at @jayseenails on Instagram and TikTok.