Adele Taps Into the French Manicure Renaissance for Date Night with Rich Paul

(Image credit: Getty Images)

published 11 February 2025

Last year, Adele warned us that once her residencies in Las Vegas and Munich wrapped, fans wouldn't be seeing or hearing from her for "an incredibly long time." She's mostly kept that promise in the months following her final show in November. But on Feb. 10, the singer made an exception to sit court-side with her sports agent fiancé Rich Paul at a basketball game between the Los Angeles Lakers and the Utah Jazz.

Naturally, the Grammy winner showed up in full WAG glam to watch Paul's top client—Lakers legend LeBron James—snag another victory this season. Her strawberry blonde balayage-highlighted hair was blown out with a deep side part. Her makeup emphasized her blue eyes with winged black eyeliner and warm peachy nude eyeshadow. Her brows were brushed up for a laminated effect and her lips were carefully over-lined beneath a shiny layer of gloss. But the detail that truly makes this look is her long, Carmela Soprano-coded French manicure.

A photo of Adele wearing a French manicure to sit court-side at a Lakers game with fiancé Rich. — Adele wears a French manicure to sit court-side at a Lakers game with fiancé Rich Paul.

Clearly, Adele got the memo: the most popular manicure of the early 2000s is back and trending. Here, the mother of one seems to be rocking a classic Frenchie with white tips and a bubble bath pink base—much like nostalgic French manicures Ariana Grande has been sporting throughout her Glinda-ified Wicked press tour.

Elsewhere, celebrities like Keke Palmer and Eva Longoria are taking the beloved nail art staple to new heights. In January, Palmer swapped out the standard white smile line for a black and green chrome finish at a Brooklyn Nets game. Last summer, Longoria innovated by adding a thin line of silver metallic polish underneath the white half-moon of her French manicure.

A photo of Adele pairing winged eyeliner and a strawberry blonde blowout with almond-shaped French tip nails. — Adele pairs winged eyeliner and a strawberry blonde blowout with almond-shaped French tip nails.

The key difference between French nails then and now is shape. Whereas Y2K French manicures were almost always short and square, today's take on the trend favors longer almond-shaped tips like those seen on Adele. But if you're looking for something even fresher, look no further than the nail crown manicure trend—a design that truly blends the best of both eras.

Shop French Manicure Essentials Inspired by Adele

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Hanna Lustig is a staff writer at Marie Claire, where she gets to gab every day about the topics she holds most dear: fashion, beauty, and celebrity. Hanna’s editorial journey began with formative internships at Elle and InStyle, where she was lucky enough to work for some of the smartest women in media while she was still in college at the University of Tennessee. Hanna then accepted a digital culture reporting fellowship at Insider, where she helped carve out a new beat dedicated to covering influencers. Those experiences later served her well as a staff writer at Glamour, where she developed a knack for spinning quick turnaround celebrity news and trend reporting into juicy feature stories. Some of her greatest hits include an earnest ode to the no-pants trend, this meticulously reported feature exploring the rise of endoscopic facelifts, this snappy take on the Chanel-designed fantasy of Sofia Richie’s wedding, this tribute to WAGs past and present, and this timeline of Katie Holmes’s life and career as told through her denim collection.

Diane Keaton once hung up on Hanna during an interview, but thankfully that mishap did not derail what has otherwise been a deeply fulfilling career writing for and about women. As one of Marie Claire's resident experts on style and culture, her current coverage ranges from exploring TikTok's contrast makeup theory and the return of the boat shoe trend to interviews with costume designers for hit shows like Nobody Wants This and The Penguin. When she’s not at work, Hanna can probably be found listening to pop music, talking to her dog, and gossiping with her best friends. For more of Hanna’s perfect opinions on pop culture, you can follow her on Instagram and X.

Shop French Manicure Essentials Inspired by Adele

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