I’m Grateful to Louise Marie…

To Longhairs the Non-Salon I moved to Toronto after college and started to grow my hair long. I grew up with short hair and found it difficult to grow out but I was determined. One day when walking along Yonge St. I saw a sign that said Longhairs the Non- Salon and I vowed that when my hair got long enough I would go there. Not only because the place specialized in long hair but because it said it was a non-salon. This intrigued me very much as I don’t particularly like the salon experience. Salons for me tend to be places where I am easily intimidated because I don’t adhere to a glamorous lifestyle. I don’t usually know what to ask for and I don’t live with my nose permanently glued to the inside of a fashion magazine. All of these factors put me out of sync with the people that work and frequent salons. In desperation over the years, I would hop from salon to salon trying to find one that worked for me to no avail. The closest I came was finding a hairdresser who worked by himself in a very small space. Although it was intimate, I didn’t feel that I was not in a salon as the attitude and attention to my hair was the same ­ always chasing the most popular trend. When my hair started to get long I realized that I didn’t know how to properly take care of it. It was getting frustrating enough to want to cut it off, but I wasn’t going to do that. Instead, I called up Longhairs and booked an appointment. I found very quickly that the Non-Salon is just that. It is an intimate space decorated with sacred objects and customized products. Louise Marie Longhairs is not a fad agent or a style guru but rather a highly skilled hair technician who knows her stuff. She started telling me about the ingredients she uses and doesn’t use in her products right down to the plastic for her specially made combs. She looked at my hair and didn’t use any buzzwords but rather taught me how to clean it properly. Nothing was rushed and the whole appointment took about 3 hours. She cut my hair so that I wouldn't have to style it. She rarely uses a blow dryer. I knew I had found the non-salon for me! Now I go to The Longhairs Non-Salon about once or twice a year. My hair is pampered when I go there and it is healed from previous damage. It’s growing well and I can comb it when its wet without tearing it out. Louise Marie is all about hair and scalp health and she is a precision cutter. She caters to people who know who they are and don’t buy into the mainstream beauty myth. I haven't been to a salon since. I am very glad I found this place and I’m grateful to Louise Marie for helping my hair become long and beautiful. S in T