Radiance Nails Studio — Local services in San Diego

I went to get my nails done at this salon in September with my mom and my sisters for my oldest sister's wedding and they did a terrible job on both my mom's and my acrylic nails. First of all for the services I received, they were both doing my pedicure and manicure at the same time. It showed me that they were trying to rush me and my family out the door and seemed understaffed for the amount of customers they were trying to squeeze in that day. Second, my nail technician in the black Lululemon leggings and green/blue colored crop top shirt with glasses shredded some of the sides of my nails to the point where raw skin under my nail was left exposed and sensitive to the elements. Lastly, she did a terrible job thinning out the hardened acrylic beads under my nails. They were so thick! Whenever I ate finger foods, I would have to take a toothpick and dig out the dirt from the crevices under my nails--lack of attention to detail.

I will say, however, that the lady who did my pedicure was great, but I don't remember her name or what she looked like. That's the only reason why I'm tacking on an additional star to my review.

As for my mom, not only did they do such a bad job on her nails where they shredded some of her skin off, but one of the nails wasn't glued on properly and there was a gap! I felt so bad for her because she was the mother of the bride and she didn't want to complain and ruin my sister's wedding weekend.

My mom and I went back to our regular nail salon a week later to have our nails fixed. I got mine removed.

Overall, a manicure should NEVER be this painful as I described. Please be advised going to this salon despite it being in La Jolla/UTC and make sure you get what...

It was my fault for waiting til last minute to get my nails done before flying out for a wedding the next day!! I called Radiance in the late-afternoon and they VERY GENEROUSLY booked a same-day appointment for me, just 30 min before closing. It was pretty busy but Jennifer helped me pick the perfect color for my skin tone (got plenty of compliments!) and gave me a beautiful dip set (see photos). She VERY KINDLY stayed 45 min past her shift to make sure they met her standards of perfection. Soon after the wedding, I hit one finger on a countertop and broke the entire nail tip off. I went to Radiance afterwards to repair my one nail and was assigned to Jennifer again. We had to wait for the one nail to loosen in polish remover.. so she gave the old set a COMPLETE MAKEOVER, just for fun! I insisted that she really didn't have to, but she said there were no new clients and we'd have to wait either way. So she 1) shaved them down, 2) buffed them out, & 3) added clear top coats to make them extra shiny! Also, since we weren't in a rush this time, her & I talked a lot more -- Jennifer is also SUPER personable, sweet, and kind. After she repaired my nail, I started reaching for my wallet.. she VERY GENEROUSLY said to not even worry about it and motioned for me to leave, haha! And although I greatly appreciated the offer, I had to tip because it felt wrong to just walk away after getting my entire set re-vamped! I'm really not one to get my nails done often, so I am sending a huge THANK YOU to Jennifer plus the rest of all the (clearly) hard-workers at Radiance for a consistently...

I have mixed feelings about my experience here. I’ve only been twice, my first technician was wonderful, the second one not so much.

A few things bothered me from the second visit. First off, the tech cut my pinky and never acknowledged it. Second, we had some miscommunications in the color I wanted and she appeared to become impatient when I was examining the polish, so I felt pressured to go through with the color even though I had reservations about it. Third, she couldn’t do the design (mini hearts) that I asked for but claimed it was because I had shorter nails in comparison to the reference image - I’ve done the same design on this length at multiple other salons and never had a problem. One of the finished nails also had air bubbles that she tried to fix but didn’t.

I think if I had only come for a solid color gel refill knowing exactly what color I wanted, the experience would’ve been acceptable. But these are the kind of things that make a salon stand out - in other places, I’ve had techs that tried on different colors patiently for me to find one that worked, and I’ve had the manager step in when a design is too difficult for the tech that I was assigned.

My fair assessment is that this salon does have skilled technicians, but can perhaps improve on their...