Manicure

Manicure is a cosmetic beauty treatment for hands and fingernails. Manicure treatment can treat only hands or fingernails or both. You can do it yourself at home or a manicurist will do it for you at his or her salon or spa. The word manicure is derived from the Latin word manus, which means hands and cure, which means care.

Purpose and Benefits of Manicure

The main purpose of the manicure treatment is to improve the look and feel of your hands and fingernails. Another purpose is to clean, strengthen, shape, make attractive and sometimes even dress your nails. The other benefits associated with manicure include:

It improves the health and texture of your hands and fingernails.

It helps in preventing hang - nail formation.

It may help in treating sore or broken skin if present around the nails.

It helps in preventing nail damages like fragile tips, cuts or splits.

Massage that often accompanies manicure helps in improving the health of the skin by increasing blood circulation.

By improving the health of the skin, it discourages the wrinkling of the skin on hands.

Tools and Supplies used for Manicure

The most common manicure tools include:

Bowl of warm water

Nail cutters or Nail clippers

Nail brushes

Nail filer

Nail buffers

Cuticle knife and clippers

Cuticle pusher

Orange stick

The most common manicure supplies include:

Cotton swabs

Liquid soap

Cuticle remover

Cuticle cream

Cuticle oil

Hand and body lotion for massage

Nail cleaners

Nail polishes

Nail polish remover

Sanitizing sprays

Hand towels

Different Types of Manicures

There are many different types of manicures available. The steps carried out during any of the manicure types are same. That what distinguishes a type from another is the different shaping of the nails and application of different oils and creams.

French Manicure: This is the most popular type of manicure. It involves the application of clear or nail-colored nail polish on the body of the nail and pure white nail polish at the tips of nails. The nails are shaped round, oval or square as per desire.

Paraffin Manicure: In this type of manicure, either your hands are dipped into wax or warm wax is rubbed into your nails. This will make your hands soft.

Hot Stone Manicure: In this type of manicure, hand massage is given by using hot stone therapy.

Luxury Manicure: This type of manicure includes the use of paraffin wax and heated mittens for softening and warming the hands and hydrating the nails.

Spa Manicure: This type of manicure includes few additional steps than the normal manicure like a hydrating mask or an aromatic salt rub.

By Gayatri Haldankar Published: 2/11/2008

source:buzz.com