Wanna break your hair off? Do you want a line across your hair where it just snaps right off? Do you want your hair to be more frizzy? Well here's how to achieve such a look!
TIE YOUR HAIR BACK WHILE IT WET!
Everyone is doing it! For all you lazy people this summer that wanna straighten some curl. Or maybe it's just to hot to blow dry! Let's get to some serious hair breakage! Comb that dripping wet hair back into the tightest pony tail holder you can find and wrap that puppy around so tight that your eyebrow touch your ears!
Seriously though.. Here's why this is BAD! Your hair had a hydrogen bond in it that is broken when your hair is wet. This is why when your hair is wet it seems longer. Wet hair is also in a more fragile state. It's stretchy. Next time your hair is wet and you are coming through it.. take one of those hairs that you shed and stretch it! eventually you can stretch it to the point that is will snap. The ammount of stretch that your hair can handle is determined by your texture and damage. This is called your elasticity. When your hair dries that bond hardens and your hair "shrinks".
So what happens when you tie it back wet is this... Your hair is trying to shrink but the pony holder is holding it in that unnatural position. Science does it's job shrinking the hair back up causing your hair to break because the tension is too great. You get hundreds of broken hairs. Some by the root causing frizz and some by where the holder was. This is true for barettes and clips as well.
Remember, your hair is delicate!
Tuesday, August 10, 2010
Wednesday, August 4, 2010
Michelle St Darling.. now with VIDEO!
Sunday, July 18, 2010
Cheap/Natural ways for your hair to look it's best!
As some of you may know I recently quit working at Pimps and Pinups salon. I felt my time there needed to end. I have now embarked upon a journey of self. I'm FREELANCING! And honestly, it's terrifying! I'm renting a chair in a salon a few days a week then the rest of my time I can do my own thing. I'm still trying to find the groove as all of this change happened extremely suddenly. So I thought it fitting, in lew of my penny saving needs, to do a blog about some cheap ways to make your hair feel nourished and healthy without breaking the bank!
There are several fantastic things I LOVE for feeding your hair!
1. BEER!! No, drinking it doesn't help silly! Beer has vitamin B and natural sugars that tighten your cuticle! There are two ways you can use beer in your hair.
a) as a rinse - After shampooing and conditioning you pour the beer in your hair and lather around then rinse. It'll add shine and body.
b) as a styling lotion - keep it in a spray bottle in your fridge for up to a week and a few spritzes will help with body!
I know what you're thinking.. the SMELL! Yes, you want to choose a beer with a lighter smell. And once beer is dry it doesn't have much of a smell!
2. Coconut oil - I can't even tell you how much I LOVE coconut oil! You can buy it at any health store. I use this stiff for EVERYTHING and it lasts forever! If your hair feels dry you can run some of the coconut oil through at night and sleep on it.. Or you can slick your hair with it and wear it to the beach to help nourish it in the sun. The suns heat will open your cuticle and allow all the good stuff in coconut oil to penetrate your hair! I also use it as a moisturizer for my skin!
*If you have skin conditions! Coconut oil can help! It restores the natural chemical balance of the skin. It's great for psoriasis and dandruff! **
3. Lemons - Lemons are great on several levels. Not only is the citric acid great for getting out built up product, chlorine and toxins in your hair. It will also help getting dead skin off your scalp. And the vitamin C will nourish you hair and scalp helping it look shiny and vibrant! I suggest shampooing as normal than sqeezeing the lemon through your hair and working through for several minutes. Rinse with warm water than condition as normal. If you don't have actual lemons, the bottled juice is fine!
4. Tea Tree oil - Tea Tree is great for thinning hair or for scalp issues! It will help by unclogging blocked pores and folicles and help stimulate the scalp! I suggest putting a few drops in your shampoo!
5. Homemade Hair Masks - There are SOOO many great natural things you may even have around your house that you can use as a fantastic hair mask. A few bases can be beaten Egg white, Yogurt, Avocado, and milk. Too any of these you can add sandlewood, honey, thyme and rosemary.
So if you are tight on a budget don't stress on breaking the bank on yourself this summer. Although we all love the luxury of pretty packaging sometimes these natural remedies are the ones that work best!
Skin Care TIP: There is a really great skin care and make-up blog that has this great LEMON trick for your face! I've done it and my skin felt and looked more amazing than the expensive stuff I'm used to using! Here's her video for the lemon trick and check her out at
There are several fantastic things I LOVE for feeding your hair!
1. BEER!! No, drinking it doesn't help silly! Beer has vitamin B and natural sugars that tighten your cuticle! There are two ways you can use beer in your hair.
a) as a rinse - After shampooing and conditioning you pour the beer in your hair and lather around then rinse. It'll add shine and body.
b) as a styling lotion - keep it in a spray bottle in your fridge for up to a week and a few spritzes will help with body!
I know what you're thinking.. the SMELL! Yes, you want to choose a beer with a lighter smell. And once beer is dry it doesn't have much of a smell!
2. Coconut oil - I can't even tell you how much I LOVE coconut oil! You can buy it at any health store. I use this stiff for EVERYTHING and it lasts forever! If your hair feels dry you can run some of the coconut oil through at night and sleep on it.. Or you can slick your hair with it and wear it to the beach to help nourish it in the sun. The suns heat will open your cuticle and allow all the good stuff in coconut oil to penetrate your hair! I also use it as a moisturizer for my skin!
*If you have skin conditions! Coconut oil can help! It restores the natural chemical balance of the skin. It's great for psoriasis and dandruff! **
3. Lemons - Lemons are great on several levels. Not only is the citric acid great for getting out built up product, chlorine and toxins in your hair. It will also help getting dead skin off your scalp. And the vitamin C will nourish you hair and scalp helping it look shiny and vibrant! I suggest shampooing as normal than sqeezeing the lemon through your hair and working through for several minutes. Rinse with warm water than condition as normal. If you don't have actual lemons, the bottled juice is fine!
4. Tea Tree oil - Tea Tree is great for thinning hair or for scalp issues! It will help by unclogging blocked pores and folicles and help stimulate the scalp! I suggest putting a few drops in your shampoo!
5. Homemade Hair Masks - There are SOOO many great natural things you may even have around your house that you can use as a fantastic hair mask. A few bases can be beaten Egg white, Yogurt, Avocado, and milk. Too any of these you can add sandlewood, honey, thyme and rosemary.
So if you are tight on a budget don't stress on breaking the bank on yourself this summer. Although we all love the luxury of pretty packaging sometimes these natural remedies are the ones that work best!
Skin Care TIP: There is a really great skin care and make-up blog that has this great LEMON trick for your face! I've done it and my skin felt and looked more amazing than the expensive stuff I'm used to using! Here's her video for the lemon trick and check her out at
Tuesday, June 22, 2010
Toners and Undertones- an introduction to the color wheel
You remember art class in school right? That fun little color wheel which you forgot because you thought wasn't important. Well, it's time to revisit it my friend. I know you've all gone and browsed through the hair color at your local drug store. You see colors call warm brown and ash blond. What does all this warm and cool buisness mean? Hello, color wheel....
Color is classified at warm and cool colors. The red, orange and yellows are warm colors. The green, blue and violets are cool colors. When you see someone with really beautiful rich golden brown hair it's because there are some warm undertones in that brown. And blondes that seem to not have any warmth in their hair... that's probably due to some cool toner.
How it works is this. All haircolor has undertones to it. Naturally people tend to have undertones that swing one way or another. Warm or Cool. This is dependent a lot of the time by what color your skin is since your hair color is just melanin from your skin. That's right! Did I totally just blow your mind or what. Your hair color is the same stuff that makes you tan! Or in my case not tan. :D To combat these sometimes unwanted tones we have to look back at our color wheel. Whatever is across from the color you have neutralizes it. So say your hair is a really red brown and you want it less red. We'd put in a bit of green. Yellow is canceled by violet. And Blue cancels Orange. Color theory in a nutshell.
So what about toners. I briefly mentioned the toners in my last blog about lightening. As you may recall hair lightens all the same! It always goes to those warm tones. We combat this by using toners. Toners are a more pastel version of this warm and cool colors. But here's a example of what they can do.
It's our jobs a stylists to be able to recognize and control these tones in hair. Generally our color lines come in more detail then your box brand generalizations of ash or warm. Ours come in number and letter combinations that help us determine how much cool or warm and what type of coolness or warmth we need to personalize your color.
Color is classified at warm and cool colors. The red, orange and yellows are warm colors. The green, blue and violets are cool colors. When you see someone with really beautiful rich golden brown hair it's because there are some warm undertones in that brown. And blondes that seem to not have any warmth in their hair... that's probably due to some cool toner.
How it works is this. All haircolor has undertones to it. Naturally people tend to have undertones that swing one way or another. Warm or Cool. This is dependent a lot of the time by what color your skin is since your hair color is just melanin from your skin. That's right! Did I totally just blow your mind or what. Your hair color is the same stuff that makes you tan! Or in my case not tan. :D To combat these sometimes unwanted tones we have to look back at our color wheel. Whatever is across from the color you have neutralizes it. So say your hair is a really red brown and you want it less red. We'd put in a bit of green. Yellow is canceled by violet. And Blue cancels Orange. Color theory in a nutshell.
So what about toners. I briefly mentioned the toners in my last blog about lightening. As you may recall hair lightens all the same! It always goes to those warm tones. We combat this by using toners. Toners are a more pastel version of this warm and cool colors. But here's a example of what they can do.
It's our jobs a stylists to be able to recognize and control these tones in hair. Generally our color lines come in more detail then your box brand generalizations of ash or warm. Ours come in number and letter combinations that help us determine how much cool or warm and what type of coolness or warmth we need to personalize your color.
Sunday, May 2, 2010
Once you go black.... (stages of lightening)
It's true. Black is permanent. Period. Even semi-permanent... nonsense! I have a feeling I will be referring back to this blog many times in the future.
I've said it over and over and over... They should NOT be selling hair color over the counter. Hair stylists are trained in how to use these chemicals. YES PEOPLE! CHEMICALS! People coming in with black dyed hair wanting to be blond had better be prepared spend a lot of money doing so.
Let's just get into it. All hair color goes through the same stages of lightening. But not always at the same speed depending on the density of the hair and the amount of melanin (color molecules) in the hair. Artificial dye molecules are even harder to break. Here is how it breaks down..(for my hairstylist friends.. yes, I know there are more the 10 here... I wanted to demonstrate how gradual the transitions can be)
Let's get this straight right here... COLOR IS NOT OPAQUE!!! What is actually happening in your hair shaft when you color your hair is that the color molecules are being fiddled with. So once you color your hair... your natural color is GONE! Other molecules and chemicals have gone in there and beat your molecules up. Pulverized them! And replaced them with stronger angrier and tougher molecules. Now let's get back to the lightening issue...
Developer... aka. Peroxide. It comes in 5 volume, 10 volume, 20 volume, 30 volume, 40 volume, and I've seen it in flesh searing 50 volume for people with the skin toughness of a rhino. I'm going to try to dumb this down as much as possible. No offense. The volume or strength of each is related to how much lift, as we call it, that developer provides. So where a 5 and 10 volume are for semi-permanent and deposit only color a 20, 30, and 40 will create more lightening. 20 volume - one level of lightening. 30 = 2 levels and 40 - 3 levels. (you can achieve more levels of lift depending on what you are mixing with) That's the nutshell explanation.
Generally when you buy box color it comes with 20 volume. AND color won't lift color. So lets say you dyed your hair black a few months ago and you want to go blond. Your natural color is medium brown. So you go to your pharmacy and buy a box with a beautiful blond model on it and go home.. You squirt the crap on and wait. When you wash your hair your ends are still black or maybe slightly lighter but your roots where your natural was is what now? Orange! yup. 20 volume. You see why over the counter color is bad!!! This is much more complicated then you can possibly imagine. I didn't even touch on what undertones are or how porosity can affect results.
So what is actually happening in there then? The color molecules don't actually wash away when your hair is bleached. They are being dissolved. They break down smaller and smaller and smaller until more and more light passes through them and as a result we see blond. Darker pigment reflects light. There will normally be a slight to moderate yellowish tinge to hair because of this. This is combated with toners which are WHOLE other story but basically put another pastel color over the hair to neutralize that color a bit. But that, my friends, is for a future post...
So please, don't try this at home!
I've said it over and over and over... They should NOT be selling hair color over the counter. Hair stylists are trained in how to use these chemicals. YES PEOPLE! CHEMICALS! People coming in with black dyed hair wanting to be blond had better be prepared spend a lot of money doing so.
Let's just get into it. All hair color goes through the same stages of lightening. But not always at the same speed depending on the density of the hair and the amount of melanin (color molecules) in the hair. Artificial dye molecules are even harder to break. Here is how it breaks down..(for my hairstylist friends.. yes, I know there are more the 10 here... I wanted to demonstrate how gradual the transitions can be)
Let's get this straight right here... COLOR IS NOT OPAQUE!!! What is actually happening in your hair shaft when you color your hair is that the color molecules are being fiddled with. So once you color your hair... your natural color is GONE! Other molecules and chemicals have gone in there and beat your molecules up. Pulverized them! And replaced them with stronger angrier and tougher molecules. Now let's get back to the lightening issue...
Developer... aka. Peroxide. It comes in 5 volume, 10 volume, 20 volume, 30 volume, 40 volume, and I've seen it in flesh searing 50 volume for people with the skin toughness of a rhino. I'm going to try to dumb this down as much as possible. No offense. The volume or strength of each is related to how much lift, as we call it, that developer provides. So where a 5 and 10 volume are for semi-permanent and deposit only color a 20, 30, and 40 will create more lightening. 20 volume - one level of lightening. 30 = 2 levels and 40 - 3 levels. (you can achieve more levels of lift depending on what you are mixing with) That's the nutshell explanation.
Generally when you buy box color it comes with 20 volume. AND color won't lift color. So lets say you dyed your hair black a few months ago and you want to go blond. Your natural color is medium brown. So you go to your pharmacy and buy a box with a beautiful blond model on it and go home.. You squirt the crap on and wait. When you wash your hair your ends are still black or maybe slightly lighter but your roots where your natural was is what now? Orange! yup. 20 volume. You see why over the counter color is bad!!! This is much more complicated then you can possibly imagine. I didn't even touch on what undertones are or how porosity can affect results.
So what is actually happening in there then? The color molecules don't actually wash away when your hair is bleached. They are being dissolved. They break down smaller and smaller and smaller until more and more light passes through them and as a result we see blond. Darker pigment reflects light. There will normally be a slight to moderate yellowish tinge to hair because of this. This is combated with toners which are WHOLE other story but basically put another pastel color over the hair to neutralize that color a bit. But that, my friends, is for a future post...
So please, don't try this at home!
Sunday, April 4, 2010
If you cut your hair it grows faster.... and other things stupid people say.
I'm sure you've heard someone at some point in your life tell you that if you cut your hair it grows faster. Now lets think about that logically just for a second. Does that make any sense to you? It's just ridiculous!!!
The saying should be "if you cut your hair it grows healthier". Now that I can get behind. If you are growing your hair out you should absolutely be getting trims every 6-8 weeks. The reason: those pesky split ends! You have to remember that the ends of your hair have been there the longest. More wear and tear. They tend to be dry, frizzy, brittle and broken. The longer you let those split ends hang around the higher up your hair shaft it creeps. So even though you haven't gotten your hair cut in 6 months and you feel like it's getting long chances are you have a couple extra inches of damage that you wouldn't have had otherwise if you would have gotten trims.
Let's do the math....
The average persons hair grows about 1/2 and inch a month. So at 8 weeks your hair is about an inch longer. A trim should be about 1/4 of an inch giving you 3/4 of an inch of healthy lenght. So after 6 month you'd have about 2 1/4 inches of healthy longer hair. Now if you don't get trims your hair would have grown 3 inches but you'd probably have to get about 2 inches cut off because it felt like tinsel. Giving you one measly inch. I made pictures:
I hate when people come in and say they haven't gotten a hair cut in a year and they only want and inch off. Their hair feels absolutely terrible. And when you blow it dry it looks terrible too. I'm not a magician.
Another aspect of this stupid myth.. Yes, if you have short hair you will have to get it cut more. Not because it's growing faster. It just tends to loose shape after a month. 1/4 of an inch can make a neat cut turn into a sloppy one real fast.
The saying should be "if you cut your hair it grows healthier". Now that I can get behind. If you are growing your hair out you should absolutely be getting trims every 6-8 weeks. The reason: those pesky split ends! You have to remember that the ends of your hair have been there the longest. More wear and tear. They tend to be dry, frizzy, brittle and broken. The longer you let those split ends hang around the higher up your hair shaft it creeps. So even though you haven't gotten your hair cut in 6 months and you feel like it's getting long chances are you have a couple extra inches of damage that you wouldn't have had otherwise if you would have gotten trims.
Let's do the math....
The average persons hair grows about 1/2 and inch a month. So at 8 weeks your hair is about an inch longer. A trim should be about 1/4 of an inch giving you 3/4 of an inch of healthy lenght. So after 6 month you'd have about 2 1/4 inches of healthy longer hair. Now if you don't get trims your hair would have grown 3 inches but you'd probably have to get about 2 inches cut off because it felt like tinsel. Giving you one measly inch. I made pictures:
I hate when people come in and say they haven't gotten a hair cut in a year and they only want and inch off. Their hair feels absolutely terrible. And when you blow it dry it looks terrible too. I'm not a magician.
Another aspect of this stupid myth.. Yes, if you have short hair you will have to get it cut more. Not because it's growing faster. It just tends to loose shape after a month. 1/4 of an inch can make a neat cut turn into a sloppy one real fast.
Monday, March 29, 2010
Good Shampoo and conditioner and the haunting of Pantene
I have a personal problem with Pantene. Pantene has been messing with me since my very first salon job as an assistant in a middle class suberb of Detroit. People there thought they were treating themselves by purchasing the most expensive drug store brand they could find. Client after client showed up with their fried out waxy pantene coated hair. I had to clarify every single one of them.
I've felt like a parrot with this speach in the salon. I HATE store bought products. Here's my speech:
Store bought shampoos and conditioners are made by companies that make things such as floor wax and toilet bowl cleaner. Even the herbal, 'healthy', and organic ones are not made by people that study hair. Sure they may make your hair feel clean and not tangly. So why not just save your money and use them? Most of what I see in clients that aren't using a professional salon brand is that they are dry dry dry! And just because your shampoo says professional on it doesn't mean it is. Store bought shampoos are like detergents. They can be very abrasive and drying.
The major problem with being cheap about your products lays in conditioners. Aside from just plain not being moisturizing enough they use waxes and oils that just coat your hair. That may seem all fine and good when you rinse your hair and it feels slick and easy to comb through. But that doesn't mean it's conditioned. What's happening is you are sealing your hair off from any nutrients and moisture. Over time using these products your hair becomes more dry and brittle. Ever notice when you get in the shower and it takes a few minutes of the water running on it before it really feels wet. Yeah, coated!
So what should you get that won't break your budget?
Well first of all since you are used to using crappy product you've probably been using too much. Professional brands tend to have a thicker richer lather and go a bit further. Be smart about choosing your shampoo. Buy stuff that is for your hair type. (thick, coarse, dry, fine, colored ect) Most brands have something that will fit into any of those combinations. If you are someone that wants organic there are a ton of brands out there that are now that are fantastic. (Kevin Murphy and ABBA are my two favorites right now) If organic doesn't matter but price does there are some brands that are on the more cost sensitive side. They are not as cheap as store bought but they also won't leave your hair feeling like tinsel. (Try Redken, Bed Head, or MOP)
If money is no object and you want to be completely spoiled try Kerastase, l'oreal serie, Rene Furterer, or Phytologie.
Remember that advertisments are designed to get you to buy things. I've worked on photoshoots and lighting and photo retouching gives hair completely unrealistic expectations. Those people have fantastic advertising teams.
About a month after quiting the pantene infested salon I was at an outdoor festival. Some lovely people were handing out sample bags of Pantene shampoos and conditioner. I politely declined. Later in that day I had run into the best friend of an x-boyfriend. We were having a lovely conversation when just then some stranger thought it would be funny to throw one of those little satin pouched Pantene bombs into the crowd of people and directly into my face. I blinked for a second not knowing what had just happened and glanced at the ground to find.... clenching my fist and shaking them at the heavens I screamed "CURSE YOU PANTENE!" The old aquientence stepped slowly away from me. I'm sure in fear about my mental stability. To this day everytime a client says they "just use pantene" it feels like to me that they just hit me in the face.
I've felt like a parrot with this speach in the salon. I HATE store bought products. Here's my speech:
Store bought shampoos and conditioners are made by companies that make things such as floor wax and toilet bowl cleaner. Even the herbal, 'healthy', and organic ones are not made by people that study hair. Sure they may make your hair feel clean and not tangly. So why not just save your money and use them? Most of what I see in clients that aren't using a professional salon brand is that they are dry dry dry! And just because your shampoo says professional on it doesn't mean it is. Store bought shampoos are like detergents. They can be very abrasive and drying.
The major problem with being cheap about your products lays in conditioners. Aside from just plain not being moisturizing enough they use waxes and oils that just coat your hair. That may seem all fine and good when you rinse your hair and it feels slick and easy to comb through. But that doesn't mean it's conditioned. What's happening is you are sealing your hair off from any nutrients and moisture. Over time using these products your hair becomes more dry and brittle. Ever notice when you get in the shower and it takes a few minutes of the water running on it before it really feels wet. Yeah, coated!
So what should you get that won't break your budget?
Well first of all since you are used to using crappy product you've probably been using too much. Professional brands tend to have a thicker richer lather and go a bit further. Be smart about choosing your shampoo. Buy stuff that is for your hair type. (thick, coarse, dry, fine, colored ect) Most brands have something that will fit into any of those combinations. If you are someone that wants organic there are a ton of brands out there that are now that are fantastic. (Kevin Murphy and ABBA are my two favorites right now) If organic doesn't matter but price does there are some brands that are on the more cost sensitive side. They are not as cheap as store bought but they also won't leave your hair feeling like tinsel. (Try Redken, Bed Head, or MOP)
If money is no object and you want to be completely spoiled try Kerastase, l'oreal serie, Rene Furterer, or Phytologie.
Remember that advertisments are designed to get you to buy things. I've worked on photoshoots and lighting and photo retouching gives hair completely unrealistic expectations. Those people have fantastic advertising teams.
About a month after quiting the pantene infested salon I was at an outdoor festival. Some lovely people were handing out sample bags of Pantene shampoos and conditioner. I politely declined. Later in that day I had run into the best friend of an x-boyfriend. We were having a lovely conversation when just then some stranger thought it would be funny to throw one of those little satin pouched Pantene bombs into the crowd of people and directly into my face. I blinked for a second not knowing what had just happened and glanced at the ground to find.... clenching my fist and shaking them at the heavens I screamed "CURSE YOU PANTENE!" The old aquientence stepped slowly away from me. I'm sure in fear about my mental stability. To this day everytime a client says they "just use pantene" it feels like to me that they just hit me in the face.
Tuesday, March 2, 2010
Let me guess what haircut you want.....
I'm not the kind of stylist that is going to tell someone they should cut off their hair or grow it long. Sure we all have opinions, but I'm from the school of thought that our job as stylist is to try to make the clients happy first and foremost and not try to force opinions on them. Of course if someone comes in and wants something I think is totally wrong for them or that is just plain awful I will definitely tell them the reasons it won't work.
My biggest pet peeve is when someone I've never met sits down in my chair and says something like "What do you think I should do to my hair?" It's the equivalent of going into a restaurant and asking a waiter just to bring you whatever he thinks you'd like. I know he'd bring me fish. And fish I just think is nasty. Or maybe I have allergies. This guy has no idea what my palette is like. Get my point? I have no idea what your lifestyle is, what your interest are, or anything about you at this point. Of course I can always ask a million questions and get some direction, and usually these people end up being happy because they had no expectations or just plain didn't care going in. But hair is like a suit you have to wear everyday. It's part of your personal style. I hate seeing people walk down the street in beautiful clothes and hum-drum hair. It negates the little effort you put into yourself. So let's give it some thought....
Naturally we all DO care what we look like. We see other people and advertisements. We compare ourselves to each other. We look at others and are influenced by the things we see. So let's put all the input to good use.
PICTURES!!!! Almost everyone has a camera or camera phone. If you see something you like take pictures. Look in magazines. Anything you can find for resource material. Don't think you can walk into a salon and say choppy and expect a stylist to jump into your brain and know what you're definition of choppy is. Don't try to get into the terminology of hair cutting. Visuals are the best references. Even if you don't like the overall look of a cut but like some parts of it. You can bring in 3 totally different haircuts. A good stylist will sit and talk with you about what you like about each one. Discuss lenght that you are comfortable and the amount of styling you are willing to do. We can work together on what will work for you. I tell every client that brings me pictures how great it is. So don't be apologetic about bringing pictures.
Find a good stylist. Generally a $20 haircut will look like a cheap haircut. When stylists are more expensive it's usually because they've had additional training. I'm not saying this as a rule. If you have a stylists that charges $20 for a kick-butt hair cut then by all means stay with them! But chances are, if they are that good, their prices will inflate. But trust me, from life experience, you do get what you pay for in most cases. If you are having trouble finding someone you like, ask someone. Ask friends. Ask people on the street.
Lastly, is the issue about product and styling. Ask your stylist to give you tips about styling. Watch how they style your hair. Ask what products they're using and why. We really do want you to look good and be happy with your hair. What kind of people would we be if we didn't. We want you to be able to style it for yourselves. You are our best advertisement!
My biggest pet peeve is when someone I've never met sits down in my chair and says something like "What do you think I should do to my hair?" It's the equivalent of going into a restaurant and asking a waiter just to bring you whatever he thinks you'd like. I know he'd bring me fish. And fish I just think is nasty. Or maybe I have allergies. This guy has no idea what my palette is like. Get my point? I have no idea what your lifestyle is, what your interest are, or anything about you at this point. Of course I can always ask a million questions and get some direction, and usually these people end up being happy because they had no expectations or just plain didn't care going in. But hair is like a suit you have to wear everyday. It's part of your personal style. I hate seeing people walk down the street in beautiful clothes and hum-drum hair. It negates the little effort you put into yourself. So let's give it some thought....
Naturally we all DO care what we look like. We see other people and advertisements. We compare ourselves to each other. We look at others and are influenced by the things we see. So let's put all the input to good use.
PICTURES!!!! Almost everyone has a camera or camera phone. If you see something you like take pictures. Look in magazines. Anything you can find for resource material. Don't think you can walk into a salon and say choppy and expect a stylist to jump into your brain and know what you're definition of choppy is. Don't try to get into the terminology of hair cutting. Visuals are the best references. Even if you don't like the overall look of a cut but like some parts of it. You can bring in 3 totally different haircuts. A good stylist will sit and talk with you about what you like about each one. Discuss lenght that you are comfortable and the amount of styling you are willing to do. We can work together on what will work for you. I tell every client that brings me pictures how great it is. So don't be apologetic about bringing pictures.
Find a good stylist. Generally a $20 haircut will look like a cheap haircut. When stylists are more expensive it's usually because they've had additional training. I'm not saying this as a rule. If you have a stylists that charges $20 for a kick-butt hair cut then by all means stay with them! But chances are, if they are that good, their prices will inflate. But trust me, from life experience, you do get what you pay for in most cases. If you are having trouble finding someone you like, ask someone. Ask friends. Ask people on the street.
Lastly, is the issue about product and styling. Ask your stylist to give you tips about styling. Watch how they style your hair. Ask what products they're using and why. We really do want you to look good and be happy with your hair. What kind of people would we be if we didn't. We want you to be able to style it for yourselves. You are our best advertisement!
Sunday, February 28, 2010
New ways to rant and rave... Hello internet!
I decided to start this blog as a way to inform and maybe sometimes vent. I spend so much time telling so many people the same things about what they are doing wrong to their hair that I sometimes feel like a parrot. So there will be tips and education galore here!!
A few years ago I started answering questions on Yahoo Answers and I was appalled by some of the responses. I pride myself on knowing as much about the science of my profession as possible. I also find sometimes clients have a hard time expressing what they want to their stylists and their vision gets lost in terminology. I hope to address in this blog some of these issues. I will also give stories of accounts, good and bad, and why things worked and didn't work.
I will probably throw in some personal adventures that are happening in my life such as performance stories, my costume making woes, and drool worthy web sites I frequent and fantasy shop on. (filling a shopping cart like money was no option and dreaming what it would be like to be able to press that checkout button)
Thanks for stopping by and stay tuned......
A few years ago I started answering questions on Yahoo Answers and I was appalled by some of the responses. I pride myself on knowing as much about the science of my profession as possible. I also find sometimes clients have a hard time expressing what they want to their stylists and their vision gets lost in terminology. I hope to address in this blog some of these issues. I will also give stories of accounts, good and bad, and why things worked and didn't work.
I will probably throw in some personal adventures that are happening in my life such as performance stories, my costume making woes, and drool worthy web sites I frequent and fantasy shop on. (filling a shopping cart like money was no option and dreaming what it would be like to be able to press that checkout button)
Thanks for stopping by and stay tuned......
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