by Rebecca Shrimpton

It’s a rare occasion when you can find a spot to get an incredible mani and feel like you’ve walked into an urban NYC loft. The Ten Spot’s new Leslieville location could easily become Toronto’s best-kept secret. The second edition of the popular beauty bar already found on Queen Street West, its entrance is slightly hidden, located off of an alleyway behind the Red Rocket Café, just a couple blocks east of Leslie. The idea is: you have to know about it to go to it. It has a different feel then its sister location: exclusive, metropolitan, and fresh with its white walls and bright green accents. Their original product lineup only adds to the elite feeling of this “anti-spa”. They use a unique line of scrubs and lotions for their manicures, actually made by a woman in the Leslieville neighbourhood, called LoveFresh. The lineup of scents are unreal and the products are 97% natural and parabin free. And they’re one of the few, or only, nail bars to carry a new line of polishes called Cheeky Monkey, which offers creative colour choices that complement the fun packaging and absurdly hilarious colour names (camel toe, anyone?). It’s a pretty phenomenal thing when you not only get a great service, but you get it somewhere that has perfect symmetry between atmosphere and product. It’s also not often that you can find a beauty bar that’s so laid back; where chatting with the staff or just listening to them chat amongst themselves makes you feel like you’re with your own girlfriends, just hanging out, getting pampered, you know- the usual. Whatever your reason is for hunting down Ten Spot’s new locale; whether it be for a mani, pedi, or their notorious brazilly wax, I would carry with you great expectations, because I’m sure you’ll leave feeling pretty satisfied. Emphasis on pretty.