When I went to write an article on men’s nail polish, I was initially going to bash it. All I could think of was the opening of the very first episode of Jersey Shore (big fan here) with the Situation going to get manicures and being all Situation-y about it. Then I read up on it and found out that Seal and Zac Efron wear actual factual colored nail polish. So does Johnny Depp! And Adam Lambert! Okay that one is not surprising at all. But still. Zac Efron?
There is a company out there called Alpha Nail that is pushing men’s nail polish, and they actually have a pretty smart way of marketing their products. They reference the peacock. If you didn’t know, the male peacock flashes his beautiful tail feathers to a female when he wants to mate. Chris Aubrey Marcus, the creator of Alpha Nail, calls using nails to get women “peacocking.” He also gives the clever idea of painting each hand a different color and using the painted nails as a conversation opener. “Ask a girl which she likes better… you’re in the game,” says Marcus.
Then I thought for a minute. If I wasn’t attached, and a guy came up to me with nail polish on and asked me which hand I liked better… well. I probably wouldn’t think there was any possibility that he was hitting on me. I’ll just put it that way.
People like Zac Efron and Seal and Johnny Depp might paint their nails, but they are Zac Efron and Seal and Johnny Depp! They can do whatever they want! It’s different and interesting when celebrities do strange things like wear meat dresses or change their hair color every five minutes, but it’s not like I am going to wear a meat dress to the mall or get my head shaved. I still don’t think it’s acceptable in normal suburban (or even urban) society for men to use nail polish. Men can get manicures, sure, that’s perfectly normal. But painting their nails wacky colors? I don’t know about that.