With 25 years of experience, a head of fabulous hair, and unwavering kindness, Julie Kandalec has achieved longevity in the industry by being a strategic professional. In this spotlight, we discussed the experiences that have shaped her career, and the lessons she’s learned from them.
All In a Day’s Work
October 2010 was full of iconic moments in pop culture: Instagram launched, The Walking Dead premiered and Julie Kandalec moved to New York City. “I've always loved to do nails. I've always been creative,” she says, still vibrant despite the London evening I can see settling over her hotel room through our Zoom call. Kandalec recalls the moment she decided to take a big step in her career at 10 years in an Ohio salon, ”I was watching a documentary about an actor talking about nails, they wanted their nails to make them seem more like a creepy character. I thought, ‘I want to do that. I can do that.’”
In 2025 Kandalec has done that and more, but what does it look like to manage a clientele of varying talent, needs, and schedules?
“The biggest thing is that my schedule is never set,” Kandalec explains, an intro that perfectly illustrates the untamed landscape of an entrepreneur, “I'm basically on call 24/7. Clients can call me if they're doing a TV show, like Good Morning America. That could be a 5 a.m. call time. If they're holding me, sometimes they hold me for the whole day. If it's a red carpet, glam will be 3:00 p.m. If they have a concert or a show, it's late. I've even done clients like after their concert, like literally 11:30.”
It’s easy to capture the excitement that must come with these high-profile manicures. Even with much time management, a schedule of unpredictable days and nebulous hours can create challenges in scheduling appointments and finding a predictable flow. The ever-resourceful professional she is, Kandalec has found her workarounds like planning hair appointments during travel. There is no way to be a remote manicurist. Julie K. press-ons when?
There’s also the matter of experience, retention and trust. Kandalec has invested over 25 years into her craft, and maintained the role of a celebrity manicurist for 15 of them. “It's gotten easier. When I first moved to New York, I was on set like every day. Doing editorials, jobs for no rate, but I was building my book. I would be there on set all day. Sometimes they'll release you early. I could be there until 1:00, I could be there until five o'clock,” she says, “With celebrities, especially the ones that I work with regularly, they trust me and respect my schedule. It's a really good place to be finally.”
As an entrepreneur providing a specialized, in-person service, accessibility is a part of your brand. Kandalec’s biggest strategy and most practical tools have been identifying how she needs to react in different conditions, and how to get that information before getting on set.
Covering the Craft
Kandalec remembers everything in steps. Her strategic nature perfectly complements her passion to teach and provide resources for those who come after.
Although she fulfilled many a creative’s dream of getting up and moving to New York, she didn’t do so on a whim. “I built my entire book and got an agent with already having done the test shoots and reaching out to people. I used Model Mayhem.” For those who don’t know, which would put you in good company (mine), Julie describes Model Mayhem as a “kind of Facebook for creatives,” and an invaluable tool in a pre-Instagram professional landscape.
“My first cover to myself was on Inked magazine with Eve,” Kandalec, benevolent as she is, paused long enough for us to both spell out the rapper’s name, me in starstruck disbelief and her in proud affirmation.
“There’s a funny story on my Instagram, mistakes that I made the first time being on set,” Kandalec shared, remembering the day in full color. The story involves nerves that caused her to show up way too early and eventually make simple and ultimately minor mistakes that have stuck with her. The story is the exact kind of thing most of us cringe at, but Kandalec beams through the retelling. It’s clear by how she plainly lists what she would’ve done differently, and what she’s done since, that these experiences are practical tools for her to show up stronger and give to the people who look to her for advice.
“It starts when you're booking a job,” she says, and her posture changes as the metaphorical educator cap spawns atop her head, “What's the rate? What's the budget?” Each job you get is multidimensional, and every opportunity has its differences. “What’s the usage of these photos?” Kandalec starts, and my pen is out as she goes down her list, distilling every shoot into a handful of attributes that you can use to map out each job for yourself.
Who or where is the job coming from?
How will the content be used?
Is this promotional marketing or maybe it’s internal use?
Any of these things can help a contracted manicurist discern an appropriate rate and adjust as necessary from job to job. Pricing yourself and determining rates is a significant hurdle for any freelancer, but that’s only one part of the work. Once the question of rate has been settled, the next most important inquiry revolves around a resource you’ll be hard pressed to find if you wait until the last minute: help.
Julie recalls one of her first jobs in the city, “There were 10 or 12 models. They all needed press-ons, and I was the only manicurist. ” She says the words to me, but for the first time she’s more in the memory than in the conversation as she replays the pressure of the job, “I don't think I looked up. I think I looked down working the entire day.”
This is where something like a call sheet would’ve saved her. Looking back, she’d play it out differently, “Let me see the call sheet. How many talent? Are they all coming at the same time? If they’re all on set at the same time, I need like four assistants.” There are only two hands for every two hands, and usually, both are handling one nail at a time. Help makes an immense difference, creates openings for other opportunities and decreases intensity as you work.
“Then, obviously, what's the inspiration?” Kandalec says “Are we doing short buff manicures, press-ons, 3D? What am I bringing?” This is good for the fun, creative part, but also helps you prep appropriately; you don’t want to overpack and be stuck with a ton of product or equipment. Kandalec shared a good rule for preparing materials for clients. “I call it, the neon green glitter girl,” she starts, breaking down her client dichotomy, “There are clients that will never do a neon green glitter, and there are clients that could.”
Keeping Up
All creative work constantly experiences evolution, as new ideas and new talent enter the ring, ambitious professionals want to stay on the ball. At Kandalec’s level, many imagine a very competitive field, which could be discouraging for aspiring artists.
“There's plenty of work to go around,” Kandalec says plainly. Competition is far more internal than anything else to her, “I think staying competitive with yourself and always taking new classes. Always trying new products. It sounds so cliche and so obvious, but always trying new things.”
“I have one client, she knows that I want to try new trends on her,” Kandalec’s community is critical to her growth. Whether it is her peers or clients that encourage her to experiment and learn with them, the people she’s surrounded herself with allow her to explore the pinnacle of her ability, creatively and professionally. ‘
Keep learning, find your people, and please Julie, when you read this, give us cat eye tortoise shell nails.
The Smashing Machine
“I didn't work on a film set until kind of recently,” Kandalec says, and I jump out of my seat to finally mention her most recent work on the Smashing Machine. Kandalec hosted a premiere party for the film this Fall to celebrate her 15 years in New York, where I had the pleasure of meeting her in person for the first time.
In the film, actress Emily Blunt has pink and white acrylics tailor-made by Kandalec, “That was probably one of my favorite projects that I've had the honor to work on. I've been working with Emily now for about three years. Pretty much every project that she does, photo shoot, things like that—I see her regularly and, because she is an established actress, I can chat with her directly about the inspiration that she feels is appropriate for the role.”
“For Smashing Machine, because it was based on a true story, that's exactly how Dawn wore her nails back then. She still wears them to this day.” The expert that Kandelac is, she notes that actually, Dawn’s new nails are a bit different, a modern equivalent more than a one-to-one match, “I've been doing nails for so long, since that time period. I knew right away: pink and white acrylic, we're going to use CND.”
For something like a film, consistency and precision are critical. Kandalec took time deciding how much flare the nail would have and worked with makeup as well as her celebrity client to get a just-right pink for the look. The impact of these details, and the craft behind them, is the difference between ordinary and extraordinary nails.
Leaving A Mark
We closed out our conversation on a topic that is important to all creatives: credit. As artists, being identified for your art is critical to your growth and success. Where manicurists differ from other artists in the beauty profession is that their work is not consistently highlighted, and the names behind exceptional work get lost.
“For years, I was too shy,” Kandalec admits, and we share stories about the struggles of self-advocacy and the spiral it creates. Julie leaves two opportunities for manicurists to adopt to ensure they receive the credit they deserve for the work they’re putting forth:
Merch yourself! Get a towel made, through Etsy or a local embroiderer, that has your Instagram handle. Put it on your lap, on your station, somewhere visible. It can get picked up in BTS content or seen by other pros who can pass it along to the person crediting the look.
Connect with the other professionals and ask for the tag. Follow them, make sure they follow you and reach out with a friendly message: “So nice to meet you today, working with a celebrity name,” so they have all the pertinent information to keep you in the loop!
Don’t ask, inform! Try “You can tag the nails at (your handle)” instead of “Can you tag me?”
Self-advocacy can feel big and intrusive, but remember: people are looking at your work all the time, and it doesn’t do anyone any good for them to be left wondering who did it.
