Some of you will have walked up Beeston Road recently and seen a hive of activity at No.7 as workmen have been in and out. Many of you will have heard murmurings about a charity opening a new nail bar in Beeston and we hope all of you will be excited to hear that it is now just a couple of weeks until The Shine Nail Bar will be up and running at 7 Hillside Buildings, Beeston, LS11 6AY.
Back in September 2014, here at The Shine Project (part of the charity St Luke’s Cares) we began talking about the idea of a social enterprise which would provide opportunities for local people to gain experience and employment but also be a successful and quality business which would raise funds to go back into the work of the charity. Now in April 2015 it’s all becoming a reality as The Shine Nail Bar prepares to open its doors.
In February we appointed Donna, who is the nail bar manager. In the recruitment process we were aware we were looking for a pretty niche candidate; someone who was highly experienced in nails and beauty but also someone who would be able to work well with young people in training, be passionate about the local area and excited about the social enterprise side of the business. Much to our delight, Donna applied, she has worked in Harvey Nichols and Debenhams as a nail technician at the weekend for many years as well as running her own beauty business on the side. During the week she also worked as a Connexions worker for a local charity in the south of the city supporting NEET 16-20 year old people to overcome multiple barriers to get back into education, employment or training and she had previously worked at Leeds City College. Ideal! Donna has been working extremely hard over the last few months to change an empty shop (which needed a lot of work) into an extremely chic nail bar. It looks fantastic and we can’t wait to show it off!
The idea behind The Shine Nail Bar is that it will firstly, be a great place to get your nails (and spray tans) done. It will be a quality and professional service with competitive prices and a lovely atmosphere. Secondly, when you go to The Shine Nail Bar, not only will you feel great about nails, but all the proceeds of the nail bar will go directly back into the work of St Luke’s Cares and The Shine Project in supporting young people in the local area to have opportunities, know their value and succeed in life. So you can feel great about yourself as well! Thirdly, in time, as the business becomes established, The Shine Nail Bar will provide many opportunities for work experience, volunteering, apprenticeships and work placements for people in the local area and we are really looking forward to getting this side of the project up and running.
As people have heard us talk about the nail bar and what we hope to achieve through it, we have found that many businesses and individuals have been really willing to offer their support so we want to thank them and their generosity; Rose Mountague who designed the brilliant nail varnish pots for our logo, Richard Hamlin who covered the bench and made the coffee table, Jessica Errington at kuboaa.co.uk for discounting the fabulous wallpaper, Emma Robinson at Only Fingers & Toes who donated 80 polishes, Gillian Cawthray at Beauty Partnership for display units, discount on products and brilliant advice and expertise, Kerry Seymour at DePuy for offering support with the launch event, Jay Ellis for all great joinery work and Leeds Community Foundation and Victoria Gate for generous grants which have helped to make all this happen.
Watch this space for an opening date in the next couple of weeks!
Get in touch with Donna at theshinenailbar@stlukescares.org.uk for more info.
This post was written by Kate Alty using our Create an article for South Leeds Life page.
