Miss Cordelia DeVere, as generous as always, brought me a cappuccino before we began to the all-too-fun task of creating a new color for her.  The window was open at my new station, the summer fog had lifted allowing the sun to light up the greenery out my window, the breeze a nice welcome in the heat of the afternoon.  She exclaimed joy at my short hair, and congratulated me on my new spot in the salon.

Inspiration percolated inside of me, as she spoke about wanting her hair richer, deeper in color to allow for the fadage.  As I conjured up her color combination, level 4, with some red violet, with some accents no doubt.   I applied slices of lightener with 9% developer.  We talked about what other artists are sculpting, painting, and her staging.  We talked about her thoughts on color. 

She is still making her creative, fun, and extremely sassy Gissy Dolls too.

It’s always a pleasure to create for Cordelia. The accent colors were candy apple with a couple of squirts of pimpin’ purple, and some orange.

She called a couple of days later, and said, “I just wanted to let you know, I love my #@*#%& hair!”

Here are some other Cordelia works of art. 

Yes.  A client did ask this very question the other day, albeit, with humor in her voice.  We laughed.  The question made me pause.  As a hairstylist I am asked many things, or am considered many things, some of which are spoken and not spoken.  Sometimes I am seen as a magician, who performs daring acts of color combinations, or haircuts that make one take a second look. No, I don’t pull rabbits out of hats, and I don’t disappear in front of the mirror, or make lines disappear on the face. But yes, I can make someone look thinner with a haircut. 

It’s all about shape of the head, and of the haircut.  Whattype of hair, the texture, the condition, and the clients willingness to let go of the concept “more hair is better”, are all elements to consider before I cut.  Different line designs accent different features, or facial shapes, or they can completely drag them down. 

In general, when someone has a broad, square shape face, I am going to go in and soften the face by cutting a nice, layered hair cut, how short the layers are depend on, again, how much hair a person has, or texture.  I am not talking about bulky, fat layers, but square layers, more shaped around the face.  The length can be mid length, or shorter, again depending on hair type and texture.  If shorter length is desired, I would go in and do round layers quite short, leave some hair in front of the ear, but shorter above the ear, leaving some hair on the neck.  In front, I tend to cut asymmetrically.  It works to offset a long, and or broad face.

If a client has a round face, I would tend to want to elongate their look, and take hair away from thier face, by creating a oval shape in the perimeter.  Then graduate into round layers, and a bit more movement  Again, this is very general.

If a client has a heart shaped face, I would tend to do bobs, shorter, more dramatic looks, unless they prefer length, too long is too much of a drag on the face, but some women want it anyway.

Although, I don’t do face lifts, or weight reduction, a great haircut can make a dramatic change in someone looking more alive, taller, more chic, and definitely thinner.

http://creativecommons.org/Yogi’s photostream

I’m convinced that cutting my hair off is not only allowing me a certain kind of freedom, but evokes a discomfort for some clients, and the hope of freedom for others.  I knew when Savanna left, I would cut my hair.  Something about her leaving the salon, and moving to the UK that set in motion a personal change within myself, an affirmation that when one person changes-everybody around them does as well.  The minute some of my clients have entered the salon and they see me, they gasp, do a double take, blink a few times, the words tic-tac across their forehead, “No, you didn’t, did you?”, like clouds moving across the sky. 

My change affects them, whether they like it or not.  Their reality has shifted, and I see how they struggle to find the old me to relate to, searching for our connection, as if it lies in the hair.  As if that weren’t enough, my new cut reveals the grey hair I’ve been coloring for a long time for reasons of fun, beauty world infused ideas that grey hair just makes people look old, and I’m a hairdresser after all.  Some clients inquire if I’m going to keep it grey, asking, “You want to show the grey?”  As if to say, why would you want to.  Some people jump into defending their color and why they do it, and my grey hair clients, say why fight it, let it be.  There is plenty of conversation in the chair about why women should color their hair, why it’s nice on some, but not everybody.  So who decided when and if it is okay?

Frankly, as a hairdresser it is absurd to possibly turn away hundreds of dollars, if not, thousands, by setting the example of how a woman can grow their grey hair out.  And, I am aware that to encourage clients to show their grey hair goes against most beauty industry professionals out there.  But truth be known, after 26 years of doing hair, I can operate my buisness as I see fit.  I want clients to see what they look like without color, at least once in their life.  Why not?  Then they can make a concious choice based on what they see and experience.  Then color can take on a whole new meaning.  Is it for fun, or is it stale?

I stopped coloring my hair because of the maintenance, and I felt ready to see the real me.  What do I look like at 48, and as my acting coach use to say, warts and all?  The freedom of cutting the dead, dark hair off, made me happy, and yet vulnerable.  I wanted to see what I had underneath all the dark hair, and have my look on the outside mirror the change going on inside.  I don’t always love the way it looks, but I didn’t the other way either. 

Some clients look at my hair, and say, “Wow, I want to do that!  Can I do that?”  Their tired of being slaves to color for all sorts of reasons.  They are terrified to see themselves without hair color.  They say, “You’re leading the way. ” I don’t know about that.  What I can say is that I feel completely at home with it, and I love how bold it is, both energetically and visually.  Although, I have never felt I needed hair to make me look feminine, shorter hair does move into the sterotype of the older and less feminine realm.

And yet, this shorter, new, grey look makes me feel better.  I wish this feeling for every client, every person.  Right, or wrong, fashionable, or unfashionable, I love it.  Every woman needs to decide for themselves what is right for them, regardless of what others say.  If your hairdresser is stuck on you coloring your hair, than I would find someone who is willing to take you through the process.  Take the leap!

Photo:  http://search.creativecommons.org/mag3737’s photostream

http://search.creativecommons.org/Magic Lantern Shows’ photostream

http://search.creativecommons.org/angusf’s photostream

“So, what do you love about your hair?  What don’t you like about it?  And when did you last get your haircut?”  I asked to begin the consultation with Leslie, a new client. Through Squaw Valley Writer’s Conference in “07, I met a group of women writer’s from the Bay Area.  Some of us have remained in contact, some have read at the readings I’ve held at the salon, and a few have even become clients.  One of the writer’s that I had become a client, referred her friend Leslie.  Her curly hair was lovely, and way over due for a cut.  The longest layer on top reached to about her chin, sagging her beautiful face down

“I’m one of those annoying clients, who wants to keep some length, but feel it’s too heavy up here,”  she replied, pulling at her hair on top.  “I just got it cut six weeks ago.  That isn’t very long is it?”

“No, it isn’t, not for curly hair.” 

“I feel like always leave with the same haircut.”

“What attitude do you want your hair to have?”

“Ooh, that is a good question.  I’ve never been asked that.  Hmm.  Well, what do you think I have?”

“Long hair.”

“Yeah, I feel like I look like a hippie, but without the hippie.”

“Do you want to move into something a little more edgy?”

“What does that mean?”

“Edgy means to me a stronger shape.”

“What does that look like?”

“Okay well, let me get my hands in here.  I think if you brought the length up to shoulder length, then took this hair away from your face a bit, slightly off center, then layered out this top, we’d be getting somewhere. I want to round out it out, so that you don’t have a pyramid shape, and I’ll do some dry cutting.”

“Sounds, good.  Yeah, I’ve had the $30,000 pyramid quite often.”

“You are funny.” 

“Well, you come up with all kinds of names when you’ve had this kind of hair for a long time.”

She removed her glasses, which was as slight discomfort, because she could not say anything. And so we cut, and cut and cut.  I asked at one point I asked if she would like to put the glasses back on.  No, she said, she was enjoying not seeing.  Then product instruction, then I twisted the hair and diffused.  Her hair looked fabulous.  Bouncy, full, sassy.   

I unwrapped her, she reached for her glasses, and as we spun the chair around, she exclaimed, “Oh wow.  I love it.” She remained in the chair a bit, wanting to take in her image a bit.  We laughed about her looking for reflective surfaces to gaze in, on her way home.  We agreed it was a transformation.

http://search.creativecommons.org/photogirl7

http://search.creativecommons.org/Neil Carey’s photostream

What part of colouring hair is intuitive, and what is years of practice?  As I worked with a new assistant yesterday, she said she used to work with Logics haircolor, and where she worked before, they couldn’t look at a color chart.  They learned by knowing the boxes of color, the color level and tone.  As we talked, I realized I trained myself in haircolor, and that has it’s pluses and minuses, right?

Knowing levels and tones of haircolor without a chart is a definite must, because it is about training the eye to see color.  Some stylists have this gift, this natural ability.  Since I did train myself, and with practice, it is intuitive, and knowing what level and tone is second nature.  And, I still refer to a chart to get a visual strongly placed in my head, and it happens within minutes.

We are playing with Dia haircolor now.  I like it.  The range of tones, flexibility, and shine is wonderful.  The other day, I saw a new client for a weave and haircut.  I liked her, she seemed to respond to my ideas, and our communication felt on track and we articulated a plan.  She had a natural level 5, and she was heavily highlighted.  We decided to not go that light. So I highlighted her hair with slices of Blondor and 9%.   Then I went back through with a thin slice of light brown, with a bit of copper, and a bit of gold.  I like that you can add a squirt of this and a squirt of that.  I thought, after I shook the formula in the jar that maybe I needed to add more gold or natural to the formula, but I didn’t.  but I did at a toner for the blonde of Richesse 9.3, which undid the shine, I am sure.  Next time, I would see what the Dia equivalent would be. 

The color was beautiful, definite coppery lowlights, but not brassy.  The overall look had a zing to it.  I loved it, and she was happy.  The finesse of color formulating is to see what the gut says, and listen, or to follow through with what you worked up, and take a risk.  To me being a great colorist is not perfect formulation, but knowing how to get back when you’ve gone too far.  Some of it is intuition and some of it is practice.

When Jeanne first walked into the salon to meet me for an update on how her hair growing process is going, she was dressed in her gray uniform from work, with her hair in a Twistie.  I told her I would be right with her.  As I finished up the short, sassy haircut on my last client of the day, I could see Jeanne’s eyes peeking over the half-wall the cutting floor from the waiting area. Then, within minutes she was purring, barking, lusting after my client’s short hair.  Her cries of desire left me with the feeling that the “grow out” as a stance against the war was waning.

After I grabbed my bag, we head out into the sunlight, I could feel my skin, and all sensory neurons waking up, after a long day of being inside.  We embraced, I could feel the missing her right in the center of my chest.  As we ordered tea, and sat outside in front of Betty’s Diner in Berkeley, CA, we got to the hair topic right away.  Basically, she is having a hard time with it.  She is a short hair kind of woman, long hair doesn’t feel comfortable, or like an expression of herself.  Even more poignant of an action then, don’t you think?

We talked about art, and we agreed we need to keep the art going.  But do we need to let the world know about our art?  She doesn’t think so.  It’s kind of like painting in back of the cave.  Paint because you have to, and for nobody else to see.  Somebody else will come paint over your work.  It’s about the process, not the result.  Art for money?  That’s a whole other conversation.  However, there are times we feel more private with our creativity, and sometimes we feel we need to let others in. We agreed we thought many more people would be functioning adults, had they had their voice come out through something they had created.

By the end of our conversation, Jeanne was thinking, maybe she just needed a slight trim to give it some shape as her hair continued to grow.  I agreed.  I said that is not a haircut, and you wouldn’t be defeating the process.  Was it a plea for her hair, or about our connection.  She might be moving, and that would sadden me.  Maybe it saddened her as well.

We never did talk about the war.  It’s almost impossible to let my heart fathom what has gone on in Iraq, and what continues to go on.  Not to mention what may be happening soon in Iran.  My own nephew joined the Coast Guard a month ago.  In his eyes, it was the only hope for a desperate young man, needing to feel worthy.

I can pretty much guarantee you, the moment I let someone know I am a hairdresser, that I will inevitably hear a hair story.  But the one I heard the other day, came unsolicited.  I was at the hospital with my sister waiting long hours while she healed at an imperceptiblespeed.  During the day, I had made runs out to the nurses station for various requests, i.e., water, cotton swabs for the mouth, robe change, etc.  The last run out to the nurses station was complicated for me.  I was looking for a sign that it was okay to leave, and that my sister would be in good hands if I left.  The nurse Becky, upon seeing my awkward attempt at having her absolve my guilt, said, “No problem!  We will take care of her. In fact, we will check on her more since you are leaving.”

I said, “Oh good. I have got a 5 year old I need to take care of at home.” 

“Oh, no.  She doesn’t need you.”  You know, when I was five, I cut my hair and stuffed it in my father’s shoe, thinking he would never find it there.” 

“Really?”  I asked.  “Did you know I was a hairdresser?”

She went on to tell me her father found the hair, and they did cut the rest of her hair off.  (I would have liked to have seen how that story played out)

It seems to be a theme. Because when I returned home, I slept most of the night, and although it was hard to get up in the morning, I was excited to spend the day with my family.  We get to the park where a July 4th party is in full swing, put on by the city of El Cerrito, and I run into a friend, who’s daughter I get to finally meet.  The girl is beautiful, and her hair is cut as short as mine is now. My friend says, “She took the scissors to it yesterday,” as she motioned at the front of her daughter’s hair.  ”We cut the rest of it to match.”  Her daughter covered her head in embarassment.

I guess I better keep scissors out of hand’s reach of my five year old.

It came to me yesterday that as the world becomes more intense all the time, with people killing each other, starving in most of the world, and holed up in their homes craving touch, I had solution to the ills of human nature.  Brushing your hair.  Nobody is brushing their hair anymore.  When did it stop?  The stress goes right to the scalp.  In fact, I will start polling scalps and give you an update of how many people have tight scalps, and how many people brush.  I can guarantee you this, most people do not brush their hair.  I touch scalps all day long, and at least 75% are tight.

So, now we have tight scalp, and more people not brushing their hair because of hair color, hair products, and then we go to bed with unbrushed hair(yuck!), then we wake up and do it again.  More product, more air pollution, more stress, and no brushing, then back to bed again.  Then we do it all again.  I wonder what goes on for our skin too, resting on that yucky pillow case over and over.

The perfect anecdote is to BRUSH your hair!  Not only does brushing feel good, it relaxes every part of you, but all the toxins, and tension gets brushed away.  And as if that wasn’t sweet enough, the oils get brushed out to the ends of the hair, which mostly are dry.  The softness starts to permeate everywhere.  You can’t just use any brush…you have to check out the Mason Pearson brushes at www.masonpearson.com.  These brushes feel so good, and last a lifetime they say.   You will never need another brush, nor will you want one.  These brushes get right down to the scalp, without digging in, and without little plastics tips coming off.

While your at it, brush right down over our body, with your clothes on.  Brushing in downward strokes the arms, the sides of the body, your legs, your back, your legs, right down the feet.  You’ve never felt anything like it.

When you brush away your stress, you are tuning into your own body, you can feel your own energy again, you are tending to your self.  Isn’t this where world peace begins?  Maybe you will want to do it for someone else.  We wil have hair brushing parties…we will do it for our kids…

Over a bottle of Chardonnay and a seafood platter at the Martini Oyster Bar in Sonoma, three of us couples talked about everything.  We laughed so much my cheeks hurt, and my eyes watered.  One couple are a husband and wife team that are clients of mine.  I commented on the fact that Joanie is a dream client.  She is a client of Julie Schindler’s as well, she knew exactly what I meant.  Julie is a wonderful fashion designer and designs most of what Joanie wears.  They have known each other for a long time now.  And what we love about Joanie is her ability to trust in, and pull forth the best work of those who provide a service for her.  She loves to turn it over.  When I pull of the cutting cape and she goes to the dressing room to change, I wait to see the finished look.  She walks out looking stunning every time.  Why?  Because she dresses, and her hair always looks good.

There are people whom I have never seen dressed in their best, and yet they may wear great hair.  But then, some dress well, but never make changes with their hair.  We all agreed that the hair can undo it all, the hair is the crown and glory. It must come down to fear.  Fear of looking good, fear of not looking good, fear of change, fear of attention.  I know women who can spend thousands of dollars on a wardrobe, per season, who refuse to dress when they come into the salon. They wear sweat pants, and Ughs.  But not Joanie!  She is confident in who she is, she doesn’t need approval from anybody… but she receives more postive feedback where ever she goes.  When she walks into a room, people look, because everything is congruent.

Every designer I know works very hard, and deals with quite a bit of stress, every designer needs to find what they love in what they do, and not waste time doing all the other stuff.  Julie loves designing for Joanie because she is appreciated, and Joanie wears her clothes with ease.

Julie’s designs are fabulous!  Classic with a twist;  beautiful fabrics, lined slacks, interesting shapes, detailed finishing.  Julie has class, and provides quality fashion, for a modest price.  She unfortunately doesn’t have a website yet. The success of her business manifested through word of mouth.

I wished I would have brought my camera with me.

We had the clothes, shoes and jewelry, location, and a wonderful model.  Everything went as planned.  Racheal arrived on time, and we met up with Dee as scheduled.  Then the fog cleared, giving us some sun highlight in all the right places.  We decided to go with two looks, complete with dress, lipstick, and hair changes. I even needed to let go of the updo concept I had prepared, because what was happening with the hair in the moment was lovely.    

Shooting with Dee Conway was the most pleasurable experience I’ve had doing hair and make up on location. She has an amazing eye, she is flexible, she goes for what she wants with a light hand. She is creative with her direction, spontaneous, and unafraid to say what she is loving.  She could have walked off into the sunset with Racheal, clicking away.  I should have let her go down into the meadow.  Buy by then, Racheal was getting cold, we had shot for three hours, and I knew we had captured some beautiful images. 

Some things are worth doing, just to do it.  This shoot brought me so much pleasure, it was truly satisfying.  The vision of Racheal, in the woods, looking exquisitly beautiful made me teary eyed, and grateful for the opportunity to create beauty.  

 For more about Dee, photographer extraordinaire.  www.deeconway.com   

Thank you Dee, Racheal, and Cari!