Tame frizzy, unruly hair with Progressively Smooth!
Tame frizzy, unruly hair with Progressively Smooth! This is the time of the year when your Brazilian Blowout needs refreshed! The humidity is rising and no one wants to spend more time than necessary using a blow dryer. Brazilian Blowouts can take about 3 hours and cost up to $400. Framesi is the premiere color company that we use in the salon. They have created a new smoothing product! Color Lover Progressively Smooth! This is a product that you use at home and costs a fraction of the blowout cost.

This product is amazing!!!! Used over time it will smooth your frizzy curls and make your hair more manageable! This product works from inside the hair shaft to strengthen your strands as well as protect your hair color. Progressively Smooth used as little as 3 times will show you incredible improvement. You’ll see less frizz, more smooth ends and quicker styling time. It helps tame those stubborn grays too!
It is used on freshly shampooed and conditioned hair. Just a few sprays, work it in and then blow-dry. A flat iron is not necessary. It can feel a bit heavy if you use too much!
Progressively Smooth can also be sprayed on dry hair to tame frizzy flyways.

Once your hair reaches an optimal amount of smoothness you can use Progressively Smooth just once a month. This will depend on how often you shampoo your hair. One bottle should last almost a year! The suggested price is $40. Mention this blog and receive $10 off!
Check out www.Framesiprofessional.com for more info!
Covit-19 Reopening Plans
The opening date keeps moving, but we are ready as soon as we get the ok!
As a licensed cosmetology salon in Pennsylvania since 1993, we have always upheld high sanitation standards. Each hairstylist has been certified by Barbacide in the best practices of sterilization. Barbacide has been in the business of protecting consumers in the beauty industry since 1947. You may have noticed the bright blue liquid, Barbacide, that we keep our combs in. Barbacide will be used to sterilize everything in the salon. It can be used as a soak, spray or wipe. You will see it in the salon: at the front desk, stylist stations, shampoo sinks, and bathroom.
We understand your concerns, so we have outdone ourselves in preparing our salon for you! The safety of our staff and our clients is essential to us, so we have and will continue to:
- Clean and/or disinfect all surfaces and implements
- Launder and/or disinfect all capes, and towels
- We have removed any non-essential items from the salon
- Initiated contactless methods of scheduling and payment
- Acquired appropriate personal protective equipment to be used when necessary. We will wear masks and have extras if you need one!
- Discontinued the practice of hand shaking, hugging and other non-essential contact
- Re-trained our staff on essential infection control and hand hygiene practices
Feel free to ask any of us at any time about all that we do to provide for your safety.
Here are some more ways our salon, with your help, will be protecting you:
As always if you are not feeling well… please reschedule your appt.
During this time of social distancing we will be spacing appointment times so that there are no more than 6 people in the salon one at time. Our stations are always more than 6 feet apart.
We will only take appts, no walk-in appts will be honored.
We would like to keep the sitting area free of clients waiting to be helped. Please arrive on time for your appt and please don’t bring anyone with you.
Please bring your own beverages and reading material.
We will encourage you to wash your hands when you arrive and wash your hands before you leave.
There is not much need for you to touch anything in the salon.
Our credit card payment center will be wiped down after each use. If you can tap your card on our reader and not sign that would be most helpful. If you can pay from your phone, you don’t even need to touch anything.
Hopefully our Covit -19 Reopening will be soon!
Up Do or Down Do?
Up Do or Down Do? That is a great question!
There are so many wedding hair style choices and you have to choose one! Sometimes! We have brides that can’t decide, so they will do both! We’ll do one style for the ceremony and meet them in a few hours and do another style for the reception!
If you need to choose just one style here are some thoughts we’ve discovered along the way.
Generally, Up Hair styles will stay where they are pinned. Down Styles can change depending on your hair. We can’t do much about gravity, although we try!
The style you choose should make you feel beautiful and comfortable! If you normally never wear your hair up and it feels strange, then it’s ok to wear it down. Bridal hair doesn’t always need to be up to be elegant. This is why it’s important to do a trial and try both styles!
There are 3 main factors to consider when trying to decide on up or down. Hair length and texture, dress style, wedding theme and the crazy weather are a few things to think about to help you make your decision.
#1
Hair length and texture is a big one! If you have hair that doesn’t curl well, it’s a lot to ask of your hair to stay down and curly for such a long and maybe hot day. You need to be ok with the fact that it might fall a little bit. There are lots of tricks that we can do to make long, straight hair stay curled if that’s what you would really prefer. This is also good to try before the big day! If you have long hair, it’s nice to show it off, so wear it down! Short hair can look like an Up Do once we pin up the sides and add your hair accessories and veil. Hair extensions can help thin, fine hair look thicker for Up and Down Dos.
#2
Dress style and theme of your wedding is important. If you have a dress that has beautiful detailing in the back, it might be nice to pin your hair up to show that off! If you have a gorgeous back and want to show that off, pin your hair up! Strapless dresses can be less bare if you wear your hair down. Bohemian style wedding are great for long loose curls and braids. Vintage style weddings are perfect for low buns with finger-waves or long, loose curls swept to one side.
#3
The weather is always hard to predict, especially in Pittsburgh. If it’s going to be a super hot summer day, Up hair may be the best choice. If it’s a perfect hair weather day down is a great option. You can always decide that day if you want up or down depending on the sunshine or raindrops. This is another good reason to practice both styles before the wedding.
There is no rule set in stone but, Up is great for hot weather, unruly hair and it’s shows off your dress!
Down is great for cooler weather, hair that holds curl well and for strapless dresses to cover your shoulders.
These are all suggestions and there are exceptions to everything! It’s so nice because you can really do whatever you want! There are no rules! Plan your hair trial with an Up Do and Down Do and then the decision won’t be so hard to make.
What is a color correction?
What is a color correction? Many of our highlights and/or balayage colors are about changing what the client has had done before. Most color services are a color correction! We need to adjust the colors! Usually it’s a color or highlight that didn’t take well or has faded out to a drab, unhealthy looking color. We need to lighten some pieces and darken other pieces. Some clients just want a change! This is what we love to do!!!!
We get lots of questions about balayage and color costs. Most balayages are about correcting the previous color. Ever color is unique and requires different color processes. The process can vary greatly in product amount and processing time. The cost will vary accordingly. A thorough consultation will explain what we need to do, how long it will take and what the costs will be. We can only work within the limits of your hair and color chemistry!
Here are 2 of our recent clients getting color corrections. I’ve added what the process time and cost was for each. Haircuts would be an additional price.
Shannon’s client came in to the salon with her hair previously colored and her hair had faded to a red brown. Lia wanted a deeper color with balayage caramel colored ends. Shannon’s color correction plan was to give her a good base color first to tone down the red. (40 min. $50). Shannon then did the balayage (1-hour application, $120) on the ends with lightener (45 min. processing). Shannon then toned Lia’s hair (30 min, $45) so that the final caramel color was achieved. This is so pretty and looks alot more natural! 4-hour process! $215
Red-brown before, balayage, toner and super pretty after pic!
Harbor’s client had brassy, one-dimensional color and her darker roots were starting to grow out. She wanted a beige blonde that look more natural. Harbor did low-lights and highlights at the same time. ($120, 1-hour application, 30 min process). Tons of foils placed very close together. Hair is shampooed and a toner is then applied to blend everything together ($50, 20 min process). After blow drying, the root color still needed some blending. Harbor did another row of foils along Nicole’s part with a darker natural color to soften the root line ($40, 30 min process). In the next 4 to 6 weeks this client will continue to have highlights done to blend in her roots as they grow out. 3-hour process! This is an amazing transformation done in one visit! Nicole loves her new beautiful color and so do we! $210
Before! After with natural light! After with ring light! This is the perfect color correction!
Let us help you get the color you’ve always wanted!!!!!
Bridal Trials
Bridal Trials are not necessary but we highly recommend doing a practice round! We’d like your wedding day to be stress-free and relaxed! Our part in that is having a good hair plan ready to go!
Sometimes it is not possible if the bride is out of town and just can’t make it work. It is still a good idea to set up some time to talk to your stylist about your hair and the style you’ve chosen. There are lots of styling tips we can give you that will make the wedding day hair perfect!
A trial is important because then you will know that the style will work with your hair and that you’ll like it! So often we do the exact style the bride has chosen and she says it’s just not her! It’s not uncommon for this to happen. You never know until you try. The day of the wedding is too busy to not be sure about your hair!
The trial can be done at any time. Months or days before the wedding. Preferably it’s best to do as soon as possible. It’s nice to know ahead of time that you are all set! Some styles don’t require super long hair, so it’s good to know that you don’t need to grow it for months and not like it along the way.
At the time of the trial, we talk about what you like and go over our options. Bring lots of photos of hair styles that you like. I like to always try down and up styles. Most brides know right away what feels right.
At the time of the trial we can go over what’s best for your hair to prepare it for the wedding. When to shampoo, what styling products work best and any other tricks that we’ve learned along the way are important things to know!
I’m not saying that you are locked in to the style we do at the trial! You can always change your mind! It’s better though to only do one look the day of the wedding. On the day of the wedding it’s really hard to do a style and then take it down and try something else. I like to spray and tease and pin as we go so that it stays all day and night. If I need to take that down the teasing and spray can make the hair look frizzy and the hair can start to separate.
Once we’ve chosen your hairstyle the wedding day is a breeze! It’s nice to know that your hair will be exactly what you envision. It’s fun to check “bridal hair trial” off the list too!