I chose this salon because it is close to me and has such great reviews. I was glad that I was able to make a same day appointment and when I heard it was a 2 story salon I expected a degree of extravagance, but the experience definitely fell short. As soon I walked in my hair dresser Maria Mascio was there waiting for me. The front smelling intensely of nail polish remover. As she walked me to her room I noticed she was wearing sweats and thought, "that's not very professional work attire.." seeing later on that all the stylists wear whatever they want with no dress code. Which takes away from the professional ambiance of the whole place.
Her room was kind of messy. So it sort of felt like I was at someone's house casually instead of at a salon. I showed her pictures and explained to her that I wanted to go full blonde and to get it as bright as it can go while creating even color. (My hair is blonde on top and brown underneath (faded dyed black.) She said she could definitely do what I wanted. She then asked me if I did want the underneath of my hair dyed as well because the top will cover it so it won't even show. But I knew it would show. So yes I wanted it done (to get that full coverage I had put emphasis on.)
As she worked we chatted but her next client came to the doorway and started talking about her hair extensions. A friend of hers? It felt very inappropriate for her next client to be interrupting my session. Maria also left 3 times. The first time I didn't know why. The second time to wrap up some food? The third time to go to the bathroom. The last one was ok!but I've never been left like that by past stylists.
After applying the dye she walked me to the dryer and offered me soda or water, so nice! And swore she'd be checking up on me. But only did when it was time to take me back. As she washed out my hair she asked if I ever had highlights before. My hear stopped. Highlights was NOT what I wanted! I actually think highlights look tacky close to the roots and hate them for the most part. I wanted even color and thought that's what I was getting! She kept saying "It's definitely blonde!" In the classic way hair dressers put emphasis on certain results to distract you from their mistakes.
I took a look in the mirror and commented on the close-to-the-roots streaks. She said it would blend out after blow drying, but they didn't. She said that I couldn't have gotten what I wanted because she had to do parts at a time otherwise my hair would fall out. That I would have to come back 2-3 more times to get the result that I wanted. What a gimmick! Total BS, I sure felt played. If I had known she was going to purposely leave spaces of my original color in plain sight I would have not gone through with the appointment.
Her client/friend came back during the hair cut. This time she walked in and just plopped herself down. Staring at me and smacking gum. Then when I showed Maria what I wanted for my bangs again the woman interjected with "Let me see." It was all very obnoxious. Somehow my bangs came out stringy looking and she was going to send me out the door with frizzy fly-aways. I asked her for some more product to fix it and in the end I was still dissatisfied. I spent several minutes in the bathroom after trying to get it to look less frizzy with some water. If it just came out right the first time I would not have missed my bus because of it. (The next one not coming for another hour on a Saturday night!)
The cut was what I wanted but it wasn't styled well and the color felt like a scam. My bf commented on how the back looks dark like it wasn't even dyed. Great... Maria was very nice to me but I will not be going back.
***Post update. My bf called Maria and she agreed to fix it for free. She had given me her card saying to call her for whatever I needed but I figured it was for more paid sessions. Again showing how nice she is, let's see how it goes!