When Were The First Artificial Nails Created And Applied?

Alongside careful cutting, filing and preparing of nails, acrylic artificial nails are a major part of the nail artist’s toolbox.

Alongside protecting the nails and preventing biting, acrylics are most commonly used to help people who change their nail style faster than their nails grow, allowing them to try new, unique and elaborate styles that can be carefully removed with the help of a professional technician.

Much like nail art itself, long, artificial nails are nothing new and there have been long fake nails for hundreds of years.

The first known long nails were likely those found in Ming Dynasty China (1368-1644), and like a lot of early uses of nail art, long nails were a sign of class and social status as much as they were a statement of personal expression and artistry.

Long nails, as anyone who has worn big acrylics at a party can attest, are delicate and require some care to avoid breaking them when opening a door or using a smartphone.

This was even more extremely the case for the upper class of the Ming Dynasty, as well as some later Chinese royals such as Empress Cixi and her nails were so long that they required six-inch guards made from gold to protect them.

Alongside the ornate protective guards, themselves a form of artificial nail, they would also have servants who would perform all of their personal tasks to ensure that their nails would not break.

This was what made them a statement of social status; everyone else needed to keep their nails fairly short to make sure they could do their job, but long artificial nails were a statement of superiority, although that is not the case today with fake nails being far more accessible.

The trend spread through Europe largely through Greece in the early 19th century, where women of higher social status would wear fake nails made from empty pistachio shells, a trend that would eventually spread as the manicure did.