Project Type

An 1,100 sq. ft. luxury nail boutique, built out and branded from a white box.

Scope

Space planning and design concept / branding support / finish selections / lighting / custom millwork / GC interviews and bid collection / value engineering / procurement and material ordering / contractor coordination and project management / furnishings, styling, and final installation

A Lincoln Park salon, and the brand it started.

She had spent years perfecting her craft and carrying one idea the whole time: her own salon, on her own terms. An immigrant, a business owner, and a gifted nail artist, Studio MAK's client wanted to build something the industry doesn't offer much of, a nail experience that felt genuinely elevated, centered on non-toxic products and service worth returning for.

It began as a white box in Lincoln Park and had to become a whole brand. A salon polished enough to draw clients from the neighborhood, greater Chicago, and the North Shore, yet personal enough to still feel like hers. We built the business up from nothing alongside her, from the layout and design direction through the finishes, lighting, and furnishings, and through the unglamorous machinery too, the contractor interviews, the bids, the value engineering, the ordering, the management that turns a vision into an open door.

The look had to walk a fine line. Luxurious but never stiff. Colorful and feminine and clean, with enough personality that the experience felt special from the moment a client stepped in. Nothing about it reads like a standard nail salon, which was the entire point.

The proof came later. Four years on, the first Flamant had done well enough to open a second, in Wilmette, which makes this more than a beautiful salon. It was the start of a brand.