For someone whose career was rooted in beauty at the time (and the go-to “Manicure Monday” person for our magazine’s Instagram), having the right proposal nails felt like a non-negotiable. I thought I was going to get proposed to at the end of the year, so I started getting my nails done every two weeks from November 1. I wasn’t going to leave anything to chance—I told my nail artist to keep a standing fortnightly appointment because hell would freeze over before I was caught off-guard, facing my fiancé and a diamond with chips or overgrown nails. I knew exactly what I wanted: a milky champagne shade on round, mid-length nails. Simple, timeless, and ready for whatever.
I ended up getting my nails done a total of seven times (same, each time!) before I actually got engaged. Then, when my mum casually told me to move my manicure refresh date from February 18 to the 15, I just knew.
Take my hand, but first…
Scrolling through Instagram, you’d think the perfect proposal nails sit somewhere between oxygen and wi‑fi on Maslow’s hierarchy. Shradha Luthra, celebrity makeup artist and self‑confessed French‑ombre devotee, jokes, “If a tip had chipped, I’d have made Nitesh propose again!”
My group chat was split. Two newly engaged friends didn’t give their nails a second thought (mercifully, they were mid‑holiday-mani anyway). Pooja Mehta—co‑founder of PR agency Moodboard Co and a lifelong evangelist for Kareena Kapoor Khan’s Jab We Met‑inspired red tips—chose classic crimson the moment she sensed a proposal on the horizon. “It’s my power colour,” she says. She says she would have cherished the moment, nail prep or not…but red made it pop.
On the flip‑side, Akanksha Kamath, a London‑based fashion, culture and arts editor, and her now-husband Luke opted for a promise ring instead of an engagement rock. She had no pictures to show because, horror, her nails “weren’t done”. Did it ruin the night? “Absolutely not,” she laughs. “If anything, it underlined that the promise mattered more than the polish.” Would she fancy a tidy mani in the photos now? “Sure. But hindsight always has better lighting.”
Ring, meet nails
“Hands are a huge part of the proposal reveal, right?” says nail artist Anisha Mulchandani of Studio Nails. “So, nails aren’t just nails anymore; they’re part of that memory and that photograph that’s going to be shared and cherished forever.” Who hasn’t zoomed in on an engagement selfie to check out the nails? Guilty! I zoom in on every ring reveal—if the mani’s neat, neutral, and textbook classic, I file it under she definitely knew; if it’s chipped or neon, I’m betting on an honest‑to‑goodness surprise proposal. With #EngagementNails clocking tens of thousands of posts (and counting), I’m clearly not alone. “Your hands are literally in the spotlight during a proposal—they’re holding the ring box, wiping a happy tear, showing off the new sparkle to friends and family,” she says.
Best hand forward
That scrutiny is why many brides‑to‑be veer classic. A clean, neutral set won’t hijack the moment—or the comments. But trends tempt. Brigette Pheloung—a content creator with 902K followers and a strong focus on aesthetics—spent months wearing sheer pink polish, almost manifesting a proposal. The week she swapped to playful cherry nail art, her partner popped the question. Was it a crisis? Hardly. She posted a follow‑up reel laughing at the timing—and the cherries. But a tiny bit of frustration over the choice of nails? It was there.
So yes, nails can either blend into the background or steal a bit of thunder. Alia*, 31, a Mumbai-based lawyer, is currently dodging butter‑yellow manicures on the off‑chance her upcoming “family holiday” turns into something sparklier. Her logic: keep attention on the rock, not the rainbow on her fingertips.
Perspective, with a side of polish
Still, a manicure is just that: an hour in a salon chair, a cup of matcha, some light gossip. It can make you feel polished (pun fully intended), but it can’t define the promise you’re making. The engagement photos will live on; so will the memory of the sad toast you inhaled the next morning because you were too busy FaceTiming relatives to order room service. Both count.
So, book the appointment, bring the mood board, debate the exact shade of “glazed doughnut” if it sparks joy. Then exhale. If a hangnail photobombs the shot, post it anyway—Instagram is fickle. Love (ideally) is not. Wedding planning will hand you plenty of hills to die on: seating charts, rogue uncles with microphones, his cousins’ 10‑song dance medley. Let the manicure be the hill you stroll down—champagne flute in hand—because the promise, the laughter, and the slightly sweaty fingers fumbling the ring box are the details no salon can shellac.
*Name changed on request
