Premium Grade Hair » professional

How-to Choose the Right Round Brush for Your Hair Type

Amanda — Tue, 15 Sep 2009 02:25:54 +0000

The wonderful people at Spornette were nice enough to send us a bunch of hair brushes to test out, as well as a complete brush buying guide. Whether you want your hair sleek and straight or bouncy and full, it’s important to keep the different types of brush bristles in mind when you’re trying to achieve a certain look.

Spornette has been designing and distributing hair brushes for more than 50 years, so let’s just say they know their stuff! They gave us some tips for picking the proper round brush:

Fine hair – Staggered bristle length pure boar bristles

Medium to thick hair – Boar bristles and longer nylon bristle tufts

Thicker hair – Nylon bristles, and usually a ball tipped for gentleness

Besides texture, you also have to consider hair length. Spornette’s basic rule of thumb is the shorter the hair, the smaller the overall diameter of the round brush and vice versus. The reasoning makes perfect sense – if you style long hair on a small diameter round brush, you will be rolling hair on top of hair already gathered on the brush, therefore not getting the holding power/tension needed to effectively style hair.

We’ll be posting more styling tips from Spornette, but in the meantime check out their site here.

The Hair Book from Regis Stylists

Amanda — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 19:07:14 +0000

A new print and online publication called The Hair Book recently launched and features top Regis stylists giving their “in the trenches” insights, tips, trends, thoughts and professional secrets. The blog also features celebrity hair experts, how-to videos, peeks at star hair treatments, and more.

Both the print and online versions are helmed by editor-in-chief Polly Blitzer, founder of BeautyBlitz.com and former beauty editor of In Style.

This site is 100% PGH worthy, so check it out for tons of great info, all about hair!

Curlstylist.com – New Site for Stylists

Amanda — Thu, 07 May 2009 13:46:46 +0000

We just got word of a new website for stylists working with curly hair. It’s curlstylist.com and it is designed to help curly hair stylists with inspiration, education and real-world solutions. Because let’s face it, curly hair is more to handle than straight hair.

The concept for curlstylist.com came from Michelle Breyer and Gretchen Heber of naturallycurly.com, a site for curly girls. They saw a need for product and styling information for women and girls with naturally curly hair and created a thriving online community. Now they are branching out into the professional world of curls.

The new site will officially launch June 2009.

Source: Modern Salon

Blow Out 101

Amanda — Thu, 05 Mar 2009 19:53:00 +0000

How much would you pay to master the art of the blow out? $50? $100? What about $250?

Well, that’s how much the Oscar Blandi Salon in Manhattan charges per lesson. The salon was just featured in a New York Times article all about Blow Out 101.

Oscar Blandi started these monthly sessions last summer, in part for clients who were frustrated because they couldn’t recreate their salon-perfect coifs, and in part because the salon noticed a drop-off in blowout business, because, they speculated, customers were trying to save money by actually drying their own hair.

My thought on this is why not watch a couple YouTube videos and practice. I think $250 is way to much to spend on a blow out lesson…do you?

Here’s just one video I found on YouTube, but there are hundreds of others.

Photo: The New York Times

Work Hair

Amanda — Mon, 01 Dec 2008 21:44:00 +0000

I always want to do fun and exciting things with my hair for work, to add some spice to my week. Unfortunately, having thick, curly hair doesn’t allow for a lot of experimentation. My coworker, Denisse, came to work today with such a cute hairdo and I think its something I can actually try!

Now, Denisse has beautiful, shiny, straight hair, but I have a feeling her ‘do is something that can work on all hair types.

She put her hair in a low ponytail, leaving out a section which she wrapped around the ponytail holder. She keeps that section of hair in place using a mini-clip underneath her ponytail. The ponytail alone is such a great look! Denisse took it one step further by accessorizing with a pretty butterfly clip. Loves it!!

What’s your favorite work ‘do?

Big Hair For the Office

Amanda — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 21:17:00 +0000

I get into work today and my boss looks at me and says, “What happened to you last night? Your hair is all big and flipped over” (see picture of me to the left). The truth is I was in bed by 11 pm watching the olympics. (Go Team U-S-A!) We all know big hair is hard to tame but for meetings and interviews, it’s important to know how. BellaSugar did a great post today on professional hair and makeup. Here’s what they had to say:

Hair: Keep it Simple

- Wash and dry your hair the night before the interview. By getting that out of the way, you’ll save time the day of the big event.

- If your hair is long, consider pulling it back in a ponytail. This way, you won’t be tempted to absentmindedly fiddle with it.

- Even if you don’t use hair spray every day, a light dusting of it will keep flyaways at bay.

- Don’t wear a hat as part of your ensemble. If you need a hat to keep yourself warm, remove it before entering the building, and peek into a mirror to remove any traces of hat head. (We don’t really have this problem in Miami)

- Skip the flashy hair accessories.

- Keep your hair out of your face at all costs. Long bangs falling into your eyes are sexy for a date, but they won’t project a professional image. If you need to get them out of your face, using a simple barrette or bobby pin is a fine solution.