Ambience Salon & Gallery

Kim is the best! I’ve been going here for about 3 months and I will never go to anyone else. So glad I found this place… and Kim!

I’ve been going to Cindy at Ambience for many years now and have got to call out Payal V. on her nasty review. This woman seems to have no job other than writing Unilocal reviews — is she employed by Unilocal I wonder since she averages one review every other day? Or does she really have no life? This salon is far and away the most luxurious manicure/​pedicure setting you will ever find. The girls who work there are sweet and courteous, and the quality of their work is excellent. It makes me mad that this Payal V. so casually seeks to discredit hard-​working people who give their all to their work and do a wonderful job.

The ambience was great. The service, not so much.
A friend and I came here for a pedicure. When you first walk in it feels like you are in an upscale spa. We chose our colors and someone came to get us.
We were seated in a room that looked fit for kings and queens. The decorations were pretty elaborate and gave a very soothing feel. The owner soon came in to great us. She was very friendly and offered us water and tea. So far so good.
During the pedicure I kept trying to get the massage chair to work, but couldn’t. The pedicurist offered no help. I finally got my massage chair to work after the service was over and we were drying. Unfortunately my pregnant friend’s remote was lying on the floor. She had no idea they were message chairs. It would have been good to know.
My friend and I were drying for about 10 minutes when one of the employees returned to ask if we were ready. My friend and I were confused, but I thought we were being moved to a drying station. Nope! The ladies returned with flip flops and asked us to check-​out. We were flabbergasted. It was the fastest pedicure service either of us had received. The ladies were rude too.
During check-​out I asked where to put tip and I was told they prefer cash for tip. That would have been good to know upon entering because I don’t tend on carrying a lot of cash on me. It sounded shady.
Bottom line the place looked great, but it was a shame we weren’t allowed to stay and enjoy it. There were no other patrons waiting for services and there were two additional, empty chairs if people had been waiting. If you want free flip flops and want a rush job this is the place for you. I prefer being pampered and enjoying my break from reality. I won’t be back.

The first visit is the best. You walk in the door expecting the all-​too-​familiar nail salon: the cramped space, the smell, the noisy foreign chatter. But then, you stop in your tracks — stunned by the floor-​to-​ceiling exotic asian art. Big art. Real art. You can’t stop starring.
You can relax here. Light, beautiful jazz-​y music envelops you. The ladies are sublime; their work is impeccable. Cindy, the owner, floats by periodically, keeping an eye.
Treat yourself.

Thank you Dina, I had a wonderful experience today. Came in with a special request and Dina didn’t hesitate. She was determined to make me happy, and she did. I am thrilled and can’t wait to show off my St. PATRICKS Day nails.

The place is beautiful and big inside; the inside design is lovely. I choose to get acrylics for the first time, and I absolutely love them. I will most definitely maintain them and keep coming back here. I usually hate getting pedicures, but the lady doing my feet made me feel comfortable. I will most definitely come here all the time for my nails!

This place is really a hidden treasure in the Bay Area! It is not only a nail salon but also really an art gallery! It’s like you are visiting a museum of Cambodia! I can’t stop taking pictures! And the owner she has really high standard about how her salon/​gallery. They even serve a lot options of organic tea, at least 3 kind of coffee!

Great place. They did a great job on my hands and toes. It was very peaceful. The nail specialist I worked with was Kelly. She was fantastic and very gentle and kind. I will go again! They were great.

This is the BEST, most tranquil and professional nail salon I have ever been to. After being a faithful customer to another local nail salon… I have switched to Ambiance… This is my new nail salon… and I drive all the way from San Francisco!
The ambiance is truly what it’s about here… calming music, water fountains, fragrant smells, hot tea and beautiful rooms and décor. Kim and Deena gave us relaxing pedicures with freshly sterilized packages of tools. The regular pedicure comes with a melon leg scrub and hot stone massage in a super soft massage chair. The owner Cindy is so sweet and personable and did a great job on my fill. Love this place.

I came here for the first time yesterday and after reading all the great reviews, i was really let down by this place. The inside of the salon is peaceful and decorated beautifully, the staff is nice, but the outcome of my nails wasn’t worth the prices. 70 $ (without tip) for a basic pedicure and a manicure that wasnt done very well. My nails aren’t completely covered with polish, my cuticles are not cut, and my nails are not straight (even when i told the girl they were crooked). My toe nails got messed up (from putting on flip flops) before i left and i asked the lady if she could fix it. She just repainted over it (which looks messy) and didn’t clean up around it so my toes look bruised from the color i choose. I give this place 3 stars only because the atmosphere and staff were great. But for the prices and quality, id give it 0.

Sadly not a good mani experience. Really great ambience and Kim was a sweetheart. But I saw her being hurried up by her boss (note that I was a walk-​in) making her visibly nervous even though she said nothing. This resulted in a pretty disappointing and shoddy manicure (cuticles not trimmed properly, nails not shaped properly, polish not even covering full nail).
I’m sad because I really really wanted to love this place and come back.

Best in Belmont! There’s actually nothing like it in the vicinity. When that door to El Camino closes behind you, be prepared to step into a private, zen-​like atmoshpere that is tastefully and artistically decorated in Asian-​themed art. The salon is clean, the staff is poised and professional (none of the back and forth banter/​gossip between nail artists goes down here), and the work is impeccable. Cindy (the owner) is a true nail artist. Whenever anyone asks me if I know of a great nail salon, Ambience is always first on my list. The price is higher than production line nail salons that rush you through the process to get as many customers in as possible. But it’s extremely reasonable if environment and total experience matters to you.

Came in her today for the first time with my daughter. What a wonderful experience. Had one of the rooms all to ourselves. The ladies who did our pedicure were great and I had a fantastic design drawn on.
Unlike other salon shops in this area; there is peace and quiet and not a bunch of people crammed in a bunch of chairs in a row getting pedicures and manicures. Not to mention the décor is absolutely beautiful.
While I have been going to another salon in Belmont, I got tired of the owner answering the phones, getting up to talk to people who walk in for appointments, etc. while she did my nails. Ambience is my new place to go.

I’m in town from L.A. and I desperately needed a manicure and a pedicure. I chose Ambience Salon based on it’s great Unilocal reviews and I was blown away when I walked in the door. It is the most serene nail salon I have been in. The décor is really beautiful and they have broken up the space so that all the stations feel very private.
Dina did my manicure and she was really nice and detail oriented. She reshaped my nails and was very patient taking off my gel from a salon in L.A. that had put it on too thick. My nails looked AMAZING when I left. The shape was better. The paint was better.
Karen did my pedicure and leg wax. She was equally great. I was in and out for my half leg wax in 15 minutes and the results were perfect. I was impressed by how clean their pedicure chairs were and everything is single use. I liked that they dont use those scrubbers for the bottom of your foot (eeeww). They use some sort of sander that has a disposable pad.
All in all a great experience and I will stop by next time I am in town. Thank you ladies!

I really wanted to love this place! It is peaceful and calm, and hands down the prettiest salon (love the artwork) on the Peninsula. Cindy and her team are always so friendly and accommodating. Calm washes over you when you come in.
So what gives? I have to say… I am bit disappointed with the quality. Within 24 hours of my last pedicure, I had two chipped nails. Since I had gotten my pedi on a Saturday and they are closed on Sundays, I had to go someplace else on Sunday to get them fixed. I don’t know what caused the chips, I was not particularly hard them. Inconvenient? Yes. The end of the world? No. I have gotten several pedicures there in the past and they were fine, so I will chalk this up to old polish?
However, what made it worse was when my acrylics started chipping. Yes… I know that no one does acrylics anymore, but with my brittle nails, shellac does not do the trick. So… yes…I have acrylics. At the same time as the chipped pedi, I got an acrylic fill. However, five days later, the first one cracked and part of it fell off. Then, the next day another cracked and chipped, and finally two days later another cracked. Within one week of the fill, I had three broken nails and my hands looked terrible. In all of my years of acrylics, that has never happened to me. What made it worse was I traveling on business and didn’t have time to find a place in a different city to get them fixed.
This was not the first time I was disappointed with the acrylic. On my first visit here, I did a pink and white fill. The were so pretty. However, the next time I went in for a fill, I asked the lady if color over the pink and white would work. She said it would work fine. So I picked a deep pink. But, the white showed through the color. When I asked the person who was doing nails if she could do anything about it, she just added another coat of color. But… you could still see the two-​tone colors underneath. When I asked a friend who has acrylics done elsewhere how hers were done, she said the nail tech usually grinds the white off when she was prepping the nail for the fill…
It is so hard to find a good place for acrylics… and I really wanted this to be the place to have them done. Unfortunately, it is not.
I really want to give them four stars, the place is clean, pretty, peaceful and the staff is friendly. But I have had more than one disappointment, so I just can’t. I will give them 3 stars… I would give them 3.5, if I could.

Love this Salon!
Earlier this week I was introduced to this Salon by my good friend — thank goodness for that. Cindy (the owner) did my mani/​pedi and she did an excellent job. Here are few of my observations:
–Very clean, neat and organized. Spotless!
–Semi private stations and spread out. I enjoyed chatting with my two friends without feeling like I was disrupting others.
–Extremely relaxing atmosphere. The calming music is excellent. I nearly fell asleep.
–The staff and Cindy are friendly with no attitude. Truly service with a smile.
–The pricing is very fair for the experience.
Ambience Salon has earned a new client! I look forward to returning!
5 STAR! Highly recommend!!!

Oh my – this place is beautiful, serene, and a joy to get a pedicure. My friend shared about it and we decided to go together the next time we needed a pedi. Once you enter, you feel like you’re in another world altogether. Between the interior design and gallery of beautiful paintings, it’s quite the experience.
We were brought into a room where it was just us and we could visit and hang out without disturbing others.
The pedicure was great, just like the place I go to in my normal routine. This one is a keeper and happy to share this little gem in Belmont with others.

Ambience is very nice. Everyone that works Is not rude. They have very good relaxing music. I took many photos of artwork in the gallery. They also have free WiFi, tea, and CHOCOLATE!!!
Best of all, pricing is not bad. It ranges about to $ 10-​$ 50. Not bad.

Great place. It’s very private and serene. You do feel like you’re in an art gallery as you walk in, it already puts you in a good mood. The owner is so sweet and down to earth. If you’re thinking of going here last minute, like I did. Make sure you call ahead and still make an appointment-​call when they open. They will try their best to accommodate you. The owner stayed with me even after hours. She did not rush me out and we had a great conversation.
They do a hot stone massage and it felt so warm and nice. It just calms your nerves. I was exhausted that day and coming here was a perfect relaxing end to my night. Thanks so much.

Since moving to California, my apartment has been a semi-​constant, revolving door for a gaggle of strange men… who all happen to work for Comcast.
Suffice it to say, the cross-​country move, not having tv or internet at my home (thanks to the monsters at Comcast) and the fact that I work almost exclusively online from home has been a little stressful for me. Because of that, my nails suffered in silence (literal silence, because I have no music, tv, or internet at my place) and were practically gnawed down to the cuticle because I’m gross and do that sort of thing when left to my own devices.
Enter, Ambience Salon.
I did a bunch of Unilocal research to try to find a place that did a decent no-​chip but had a hard time finding such a thing because apparently that’s not what it’s called out here in California. After a few confused phone calls to several places, I finally deducted that out here it’s called ‘shellac manicure’ and that’s why things were getting lost in translation… or at least that’s what I think happened but honestly, I’m still a little confused.
I called and made an appointment as Ambience doesn’t take walk-​ins. I ended up having to make my appointment a few days in advance at an off-​time because that’s all they had open and I guess they were super busy and booked up for earlier, more convenient times.
When it came time for my appointment I was expecting to walk into a madhouse, as nail salons often are when they’re busy, but instead was greeted with nothing by ambient music and a peaceful setting. Soft, running water, tranquil sounds, a warm greeting — as Frank Costanza would say, ‘Serenity Now’.
A woman came out and gently pointed me to their color selection on the wall for regular polish/​pedicure colors, and then a small, dingy bin with the no-​chip (I’m still going to call it that, so deal with it) color selection. They had quite a few regular polish colors to choose from, though the shades weren’t incredibly varied (lots of teeny bopper glitter things) and when it came down to it, there were really only 3 – 5 shades on the wall that I would ever consider for myself. The no-​chip selection wasn’t in the best shape and was honestly a pretty crappy presentation, but I did find the perfect color as well as a 4 or 5 others that I’ll take into consideration in the future.
When I was brought back to get my mani/​pedi services done, I could spy wide open areas set up like an art gallery with semi-​private offset rooms for manicuring and pedicuring. It wasn’t busy at all, but I appreciated their method of spacing out appointments so that the experience overall is really relaxing and stress-​free, which is exactly what I was looking for after living in Comcast hell for the past few weeks.
My pedicure and manicure took place at the same time, so they’re def on point with the multi-​tasking, and because of this I was able to get in and out with a perfect mani and pedi in just an hour (it might even have been a little quicker) but it never felt rushed or like I was cheated on services– for that alone they deserve 5-​stars.
I was lucky enough to get to sit in one of these Thai throne-​looking pedi chairs with a large wooden palace-​like structure built around it that’s dripping with sterling beaded curtains. I for sure felt way fancier than any person who wears leggings as pants should.
The nail techs offered me water and magazines while I the chair worked it’s massage magic, and one hour later I walked out $ 70 ($ 35 for each service) +tip lighter and with the most gorgeous no-​chip manicure plus pedicure I’ve ever gotten.