Dua Lipa’s Manicurist on Fall and Winter 2025 Nail Trends

Everyone can agree that Dua Lipa, as per a recent Instagram caption, is “never not having fun.” The internet as a whole lives vicariously through the glittering IG dumps of her glitzy tour life and loved-up posts with actor beau Callum Turner, so needless to say, we’re mesmerized by every scroll—often zooming in on the small details that make her so effortlessly cool, like her turquoise lashes and polka-dotted manicures.

Because the latter has become the talk of the beauty-editor town, I decided to go straight to the source—Michelle Humphrey, celebrity manicurist and purveyor of all of Lipa’s coolest sets—to see which fall and winter nail trends we can get ahead of before the in crowd does. Turns out the one thing that makes a set really pop, in Humphrey’s eyes, is when one element is slightly “off.” Allow me to explain.

Whether they’re mismatched, star-spangled, or peppered in black and white florals, the pop star’s nails are all over our Pinterest boards. The chic yet wearable eccentricity that draws us to Lipa’s manicures like moths to a flame is something I liken to the “wrong-shoe theory,” popularized by stylist Allison Bornstein. This theory claims that when most of the elements of a look match besides one (for instance: a dressy shoe with a casual outfit or, in this case, a sheer nude nail polish with 3D bling), your look instantly becomes more interesting. After listening to Humphrey’s musings, it seems that the same applies to nails.

However, if you ask the manicurist, all the credit goes to Lipa. “She’s got the ideas! She’s bringing nail art back,” Humphrey tells me over a video call. “I feel like it went a little flat for a while, and she’s reviving it a bit, which makes my job a bit more exciting, you know?”