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Nine months ago, Terri Silacci had snakes on the brain. The 40-year-old nail technician prided herself on keeping her finger on the pulse of the latest nail trends — painting everything from Bengal tiger stripes to leopard spots and speckled guinea feathers onto her patrons’ tips and toes. Silacci knew that snakes were very on-trend in the fashion world; she herself had just bought a snakeskin handbag and was dying to figure out a way to match her nails with the tote.
She was mulling this over when her two children brought home the shedded skin of a 4-foot python courtesy of their neighbor, who happens to run a reptile shop.
“It wasn’t until my kids brought it home that I thought, ‘That’s it. I’m going to do it with real snakeskin,’ ’’ says Silacci, owner of Nail Candy Lounge at the Euphoria Lounge, a salon in Monterey, Calif. And thus the latest nail trend was born: the snakeskin manicure, currently taking city fashionistas by storm.
Right now, just four Manhattan salons offer the scaly spa service, in which hand-cut swatches of snakeskin are applied to the nail bed and sealed between a coat of instant-drying Bio Sculpture Gel base color and a clear top layer.
The process is costly (the mani/pedi combo can cost as much as $550) and labor-intensive (a manicure — done by two technicians simultaneously — takes almost two hours).
But that isn’t deterring New Yorkers hell-bent on taking a (snake) bite out of the trend du jour.
Danielle Corbin-Jaime, owner of Nail Taxi NYC, a mobile spa boutique, has done “a couple dozen” such procedures since completing her snakeskin training in April. Her clients have included a shoe designer looking to match her scaly kicks to her pedi and a Queens mother who loved her snakeskin digits so much, she booked the pricey procedure for her two daughters, both under the age of 10.
Evita Pigatt booked an appointment at her Uniondale, LI, home two weeks ago with Corbin-Jaime to get her first snakeskin mani.
“At first, I was a little hesitant, like, ‘What do you mean, snakeskin?’ ” recalls the 24-year-old health-food store owner, who is a regular Corbin-Jaime client. But she allowed herself to be convinced — and was pleased with the results, despite the high cost.
“It’s a bit steep. I’m not going to lie,” says Pigatt. “[But] if you’re in for the ‘wow’ factor of it, you’re going to get your money’s worth.”
Nearly 100 patrons have come to Spa Martier’s Midtown East location for its snakeskin special, says owner Joseph Khaloyan. But not everyone’s a fan of the procedure. When Khaloyan started offering the service two months ago, customers weren’t mad about the cost — but they were irate about what they assumed required animal cruelty.
“A woman called me and said it was terrible, what I was doing, and I should be ashamed, and she was going to call PETA on me,” recalls Khaloyan. He calmly explained to the animal lover that no snakes are injured in the process, and that the skin is attained through the reptiles’ natural shedding.
And what A-list skins they are!
While Silacci still sources her skins from her generous neighbor, New York salons are getting theirs from Hollywood handlers. Bio Sculpture Gel, which claims its special formula is perfect for fusing snakeskin to nails, has a deal with Reptile Island — a West Coast chain of stores that also rents creatures to movie and TV productions. Bio Sculpture supplies its gel and red-carpet-ready snakeskins to salons worldwide. (Before making a cameo on clients’ fingertips, some of the store’s snakes appeared on the likes of “Saturday Night Live” and “Fear Factor.”)
“A lot of times, the skins would just be thrown away. There wasn’t a huge demand for them until this came about,” says Robert Walter, a partner at the Stanton, Calif.-based Reptile Island.
“And now we’re saving them and cleaning them and providing optimal conditions for our snakes,” says Walter, who points out that snakes are shedding better skins as a result. Now, he says, “they shed in one piece.”
“Bio Sculpture particularly likes the red-tailed boas and ball pythons,” he adds. “They’re a good size, and the scales are a good size and the markings are good.”
Silacci herself prefers to use smaller snakes “because of the detail per square inch. But it doesn’t matter what type of snake it is. They all have very pretty skin,” she says, though she most often uses python skin.
Luckily, there’s enough good snakeskin to go around for now (especially during the summer, when the belly crawlers shed more rapidly).
The question is — does this trend have legs, even if the snakes don’t?
A snakeskin bag is one thing. But snakeskin nails? It can be a ssslippery slope from fashion-forward to, well, ick.
“The snakeskin is definitely an extreme,” says Heather Muir, 26, beauty news editor at Allure magazine. “It’s costly, so I don’t think you’re going to go to Middle America and see girls rocking it.”
Muir says that “at Allure, we’re not huge fans of nail art, typically.” Nevertheless, there has recently been a huge push for it on the runway.
“Last season, Phillip Lim had the half-moon manicures, and so did Vena Cava,” she says, pointing out that Sally Hansen recently introduced nail stickers, and Nails Inc. has a new top coat that produces a hologram effect.
Khaloyan is even toying with the idea of introducing feather manicures in the fall.
Still — will people be too skeeved out to embrace snakeskin on their fingers and toes?
“It’s a real psychological trip on people,” admits Silacci. “At first they say, ‘Gross, is it dirty?!’ . . . but then they want it immediately,” she says.
Christina Han, an associate beauty editor at W, was initially shocked by the snakeskin craze — but she’s now a big fan, and even had Silacci give her a nude-colored snakeskin pedicure in March.
“It was genius of Terri,” says Han, 28. “I wasn’t grossed out by it. I thought it was great — a new way to add texture without getting ‘Hello Kitty.’ ”
Still, she admits that it was probably a one-time experience. Snakeskin nail art lasts three to eight weeks, and needs to be removed with a soak-off gel procedure that can only be done in certain salons. So when Han popped into her local nail spa to shed her pedicure, the beauticians were horrified.
“They were totally dumbfounded by it,” Han laughs. “When it comes off, you can actually see the snakeskin, and they were like, ‘Ugh, what did you do to yourself?!’ ”
dschuster@nypost.com
Reptile rules
Curious about the way a snakeskin manicure works? Here’s what happens:
1. Nails are prepped, cuticles cleaned and cut.
2. A base coat is applied.
3. Naturally shed snakeskin is cut and fit to nails, then saturated with a coat of Bio Sculpture Clear.
4. The snakeskin is then applied over the base color.
5. Next, the natural snake pattern is outlined with a contrasting color, and some “scales” are highlighted with a third complementary hue.
6. To remove, visit your salon for the soak-off treatment, which takes 20 minutes or so. There will be an additional fee for this (up to $20).