Your Guide To Which Nail Shape Suits You

Nail Shapes – From Almond And Stiletto To Coffin And Oval

Hands up if you’re a squoval?

Whether you have dinky hands or long-lean fingers, bitten-to-blunt nails or two inch talons, you’d have to be living under a rock not to notice that nails are having a moment. Ranging from wild neon talons, to the update French manicured oval, all eyes are on your mani. But how do you know which nail shape is best?

The traditional ‘rule’, according to nail artist Miss Pop (who create designs for shows like Moschino and Oscar de la Renta) is ‘that your nail shape should follow the shape of your cuticle line.’ But with so many to try, sometimes rules go out of the window.

Arguably more extreme shapes are having a moment, with celebrities like Billie Eilish launching amazing but fairly impractical styles you’d be hard pressed to zip your jeans up in. ‘The ballerina file has really picked up a following – the very long tapered squoval that looks like the toe of a point shoe.’ But Miss Pop is championing the return of the less edgy, more elegant oval shape. ‘I love an oval nail,’ she says, ‘it’s the most common shape in high fashion editorials and a favourite of celebrities because it’s so elegant and elongates the finger. It’s the nail of all my favourite heroines’. For her, a ‘typical New Yorker who talks with her hands’ it gives a chic finesse.

So if you talk with your hands, here’s our guide to finding the right nail shape to suit you.