Manicure robots are a cool addition to the craft of the manicure, but sometimes there's no substitute for the real thing. It's an affordable luxury, like going to a restaurant versus making food at home." If I were building a machine to paint my nails, it wouldn't use a brush - it might use a sponge or something less difficult to model in software. "It's a time that you take to allow someone else to take care of you. Add to that that they're now loaded with nail polish (a viscous substance that alters how the bristle moves), and the problem becomes extremely hard. "A manicure is an intimate experience. You're holding hands with someone," says Amy Ling Lin, founder of Sundays nail studio in New York City. There is something to be said for the meditative, relaxing experience of a spa manicure. Add to that "a rise in anti-Asian hate and violence, and people feel their businesses are also suffering because customers don’t want to interact with Asian folks," she says.ĭuring pandemic salon closures, I discovered that even the most artfully painted nail looks amateurish with one scraggly corner sticking out. According to a joint June 2020 report by the California Healthy Nail Salon Collaborative and the UCLA Labor Center, of the approximately 100,000 licensed manicurists in California, an astounding 91 percent had to apply for unemployment.Įven now that nail salons have, for the most part, begun to reopen, Nguyen points out that some manicurists are just starting to repay the debt accrued or rebuild the savings lost during the pandemic. Statewide, nail workers have faced a roller coaster of closures and reopenings since the pandemic began. According to the company, appointments were booked through July. The speedy, no-frills service is no doubt appealing to those short on time and money (each manicure costs just $8). ![]() "We started working on this company towards the end of 2018, pre-COVID, because we really believed people wanted an 'in-and-out' option." Apte sees Clockwork as "an amenity" that could one day be available in places like corporate buildings, retail stores, and airports. "Our goal is to be an express option for nail treatments," Clockwork’s founder, Renuka Apte, tells me. ![]() And it's not the only manicure robot in the works: Companies like Nimble (an at-home robot) and Coral (still a prototype) are also aiming to get a piece of the market. In about 10 minutes, all 10 of your nails are painted. ![]() Clients strap in, finger by finger, and the robot's mechanical brush fills in concentric circles of polish. The machine behind the whirring is Clockwork, a nail-painting robot only slightly bigger than a dorm-room mini-fridge, and it began accepting manicure appointments in June.
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