I am my mother’s daughter in that I change my haircolor like I change my nail polish—frequently, and often impulsively. Mom has gone from silvery blonde to auburn striped with gold, to berry-dipped burgundy. Every time I see her, she’s testing ROYGBIV* with bravado. Hence, it’s only fitting that I have plucked every hue from the universal color wheel and coated my locks in it, results be damned.

      I’ve been magenta, cherry and fire-engine red. I’ve sported beige blonde, ashy blonde and blonde streaked with pink. I’ve gone blue-black, chocolate and skunk-y, chunky blonde and black. But now I wanted to acquire that perfect blonde (in my eyes)—a blonde that would mirror the beauty inside an abalone shell or surrounding a shimmering pearl.

      To achieve this tonal ideal, I visited Cutler Salon, Redken’s hip flagship salon in SoHo, and sunk into the comfy chair at the station of stylist Rachael Bodt. I formed an immediate liking to Rachael. She has a silky mane of chocolate-mousse-colored hair, a spunky attitude and a guilty taste for reality television—just like moi . She also had a bauble on her finger that resembled the exact color we wanted to achieve on my hair. It was destiny.

      After discussing my lack of direction in NYC (I’m a recent transplant and found myself wandering on Broadway—not West Broadway, on which Cutler resides—what a mess!), we discussed a direction for my hair. My naturally mouse brown (5N in haircolor terminology) mane needed a serious lift to start. Then, Rachael explained, she would paint my tresses in a multitude of shimmering tones that would play off each other to give me that multifaceted, coveted abalone look. In short, a double process with a kick. “What’s so special about a double process unless you push different tones through it?” Rachael asked me rhetorically.

      Rachael retreated to the Redken Color Lab to mix and marry varying hues of Redken Shades EQ. Upon her return, she described how she was going to transform me into a shimmering, silvery blonde goddess: “We’re going to paint on two tones—blue-violet and ruby—in panels. Don’t worry; they’re diluted with clear to make the results subtle. Then, we’ll apply a beige-blonde over the entire head to make the hair look like creamy vanilla.”
      As Rachael painstakingly painted my strands, we discussed the currently hot trends in SoHo. “I’m seeing a lot more golds—darker blondes and brunettes are looking to warm up their color,” Rachael told me. “And highlights are still really big, but they are more monochromatic. I’m creating a more natural look by lightening up the ends and keeping the areas near the root a darker shade. This usually takes two or three different colors to achieve. You’re not seeing screaming color when I’m finished. It’s more subtle.” She cited supermodel Giselle Bundchen as the muse for this look.
      As I processed, Rachael clued me in that she had just received a visit from Bravo TV’s cast of Make Me a Supermodel. The models-in-training needed makeovers, and Rachael was assigned doe-eyed Aryn, whose brunette mane needed a dose of oomphf. “I wanted to make her more polished, more glam,” Rachael explained. Her prescription was some copper gold kicked in on the ends and rich, chocolate tones around the root areas to seal the deal. Though Aryn got booted from the show shortly after my visit to the salon, her hair sure looks great! Even the show’s host, supermodel Nicki Taylor, loved Rachael’s technique so much that she came back to get her own tresses finessed!
      By the time I was done, I felt like a queen. (See the shimmering results, left.) Rachael had tended to my every need (including a sour stomach at one point) and my hair was a glistening representation of pearlescent beauty that even an abalone—or a chic supermodel—would envy.

*Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Indigo, Violet (the color spectrum)

I admit it. I’m a beauty hound. I sniff out the latest trends in the professional “cares”—you know, hair care, nail care, skin care, body care. And don’t forget makeup! I’m all over that, too.

As fashion and beauty editor for Creative Age Publications, I get to indulge my inner and outer beautynista on a daily basis. Is there a new long-wearing lipstick on the market? Let me see how many sips of Diet Coke I can take before it wears thin. New body butter promising baby-soft skin? That’s music to my ashy elbows’ ears…er, skin. Vibrant haircolor that’s also nourishing? I hear the beauty angels singing! It’s a tough job, glossing up my lips, lotioning up my body and brightening up my tresses—but hey, someone’s gotta do it.

So I figured, what better way to communicate all this beauty madness than blog it? I’m going to love sharing my adventures in “beauty sifting” with you, my fellow beauty industry professionals. New treatments, new education, new products, new trends—I’ll sling it to you here, blog-style.

So, welcome! Let’s put our noses to the ground and zero in on the coolest, most cutting-edge professional beauty scoops out there—starting now!

Seize the Gray!

A few years back, I became obsessed with turquoise blue. To be truthful, I still am, but back then, I just couldn’t get enough of painting my fingernails in shimmering shades of aqua. However, I kept stumbling upon a rather large problem (for me, at least): Every blue polish I found had a pearlescent tint or flecks of glitter. You couldn’t find an opaque, turquoise polish anywhere. Sure, I found baby-blue creams, but they simply couldn’t satisfy my need for a thick, full-coverage, turquoise lacquer. I mentioned this in passing to CND co-founder Jan Arnold; it turns out she was on the same page and had already been dreaming up the perfect blue hue. A few months later, voila! One of my favorite lacquers to date came to market: CND’s Hot Pop Blue from the Hot Pop collection.

Well, here I am again, this time jonesing for an opaque, slate-gray polish. Watching the current trend of celebs flashing nails in inky black or lacquers so dark they verged on the deepest midnight (think OPI’s mega-hit, Russian Navy), I kept thinking, “I just know gray polish is going to hit it big soon.” But just as I couldn’t find aquamarines without twinkle, I couldn’t get my hands on a heavily pigmented, flat-gray polish.

Until now. I’m happy to report that, once again, the polish manufacturers and I have been telepathically communicating: Grays are the hit color for spring. OPI’s soon-to-be-released India Collection contains Moon Over Mumbai, a delicate dove-gray that goes on like a dream. Meanwhile Essie Cosmetics “calls it a ‘gray’” with two versions of this subdued noncolor: the light and dusky Great Expectations, and Body Language, a sublime blend of pink and gray (which founder Essie Weingarten deems this season’s “new neutral”).

I love all of these soft heather tones, but I’m absolutely savoring the bolder, slate-gray Recycle from China Glaze’s spring Eco Collection. This cool number is like no other and is certain to win over the hearts of your trendier clients.

I suggest you keep all of these grays on hand; the light ones offer a stylish alternative to pale pink creams and putty, and the slates will offer a great go-to for your fickle style mavens.

See you next time! Don’t forget to write!