Finding the Right Stylist
Choosing your hairstylist should be a serious decision, one that should not be made in haste or with indifference. Think about it; you're putting your trust in someone who will be working inches from your head with razor-sharp instruments and extremely hot curling irons. Your stylist will be mixing chemicals and haircolors to put on your head. Also consider this; the only person who touches a client as much as a hairstylist is the client's spouse or significant other. When I am massaging a woman's head at the shampoo bowl, I am touching her in a way that only a few other people have.
There is a special bond between client and stylist, sometimes a bond as deep as family. When a client's loved one becomes sick or dies, I'm the one they come to for a shoulder to cry on. When relationship problems arise, I'm the one they come to for advice. When a client's child gets named to the honor roll or recieves an outstanding report card, I celebrate right along with them. I share in their victories as well as their defeats. The stylist is right there on some of the most important days of a client's life....weddings, proms, formals, anniversaries. Some clients are loyal for years. They give theri stylists Christmas presents and birthday cards. To them, a perfect stylist is priceless. The stylist has many roles: therapist, friend, artist, and magician. The perfect stylist takes the ordinary and makes it beautiful. The perfect stylist brings sunshine to a client's rainy day. The perfect stylist takes damaged hair and makes it healthy again.
But what makes a perfect stylist? More importantly, how can you find the perfect stylist? What qualities should you look for? I think there are six factors that determine a stylist's worth. These six factors are: experience, creativity, personal style, technical ability, professionalism, and listening ability.
Experience is the most crucial factor. There has never been, nor will there ever be, anything to take the place of experience. The seasoned hairstylist has seen it all, has made mistakes, and has learned from them. Of course there are many talented stylists just out of school capable of giving good haircuts, but I would'nt even want to chance it. I would feel much more comfortable with a stylist with years of experience to draw from. Just today I had a client who asked me to fix a haircut she got from a recent graduate of beauty school. She thought the cut was terrible, although I saw that it was a very good haircut. It was just the wrong cut for this particular woman. The previous stylist tried too hard to impress the woman with her newly learned skills, and ended up giving the woman a cut she didn't like. The experienced stylist knows what styles go best for each individual person. Inexperienced stylists lack that level of refinement that only years in the industry can provide.
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