Nail glossary

Freehand

Art painted directly with a brush — no stamps, no stickers, pure brushwork.

Freehand is nail art painted directly onto the nail with a brush — no stamps, no stickers, no transfers. It is the discipline where a nail tech is simply a painter with a very small canvas: line work, florals, portraits, lettering, abstract composition. Because nothing is pre-made, freehand is the most flexible art form in nails and the clearest window into an individual artist's actual skill — no two techs freehand alike.

It is also, fairly, the most time-intensive and priciest art on the menu, and the hardest to order from a screenshot, since you are asking one artist to reproduce another's hand. Nailly's design studio includes a freehand drawing tool for exactly this reason: sketch the art yourself, place it on the exact finger, and the artist sees your actual intent rather than a description of it.

Coming soon

Now see it on your own hand.

Vocabulary is the map; the try-on is the territory. Nailly renders any design onto a photo of your actual hand — coming to the App Store for the US and Canada.

Coming soon to theApp StoreRead the FAQ