HAIR | Your Complete Guide To Great Hair And Beauty

When did you first realise that the world of hair colouring is where you belong?
When I started hairdressing, I was about 16 years old. I worked with a great colourist named Cathy; she inspired and taught me. She gave me the foundation (of colouring) and showed me how to colour hair the correct way. A year into my training, I realised that colouring was my thing. I felt I had a flair for it.

Tell us a little about Philosophy Hairdressing’s longstanding association with L’Oréal Professionnel?
As a business, I am free to choose whoever I want to work with and we chose L’Oréal Professionnel because it has, in my honest opinion, the best hair colouring products in the world. It makes hair shinier, healthier and glossier. Also, L’Oréal Professionnel is the first to come up with new innovations and products, be it a new bleach or red, as they do a lot of research. The imagery is also rich and stylish.

What is the biggest difference between Indian and international hair?
The biggest difference is that Indians have thicker hair. Also, the natural base of Indian hair is darker. It’s great to see that Indians are open to hair colour. India is fashion conscious and Mumbai, especially, is pushing fashion all the time. Indian stylists are full of ideas and they want to innovate constantly. So, it’s great fun to work with them.

What, in your opinion, are the shades best suited to Indians?
Reds, ranging from the dark plums, purple to the fiery reds, look fab on Indian hair. Across the globe, people want to go lighter with their hair shade. In India too, many people want to have highlights that are around three shades lighter than their natural colour. In fact, what the Indians love and what is common everywhere is the sun-kissed look. Even when I am teaching the sun-kissed hair colouring technique, not only the models but the students too love working on it and respond to it immediately.

What are the biggest hair colouring myths?
The greatest myth is that colour damages hair. However, it actually improves the conditioning of the hair. There are loads of products like L’Oréal Professionnel’s Richesse range, which makes the hair shinier than its virgin state. People also associate hair colour with scalp staining. But the process is an extremely clean one.

Some people also believe that hair colour looks unnatural. However, if you have decent products like the ones available at L’Oréal Professionnel, along with a well-trained colourist, the hair will look completely natural.

What is a hair colouring sin?
It is bad to use colour unprofessionally and to go too far away from your natural shade. I always recommend that you go two to three shades away from your natural hair colour, else it won’t suit your complexion or eye colour. Hair colour is meant to make a person feel more confident and sexy, and look more beautiful. Also, instead of block colours, I prefer breaking the colour into few meshes; it looks more realistic.

What are Philosophy Hairdressing’s future plans? Can we expect to see it in the Indian market?
We would like to expand our business in the UK to around ten salons. We want to control the standard of what we do and be perfect. After these ten salons, we would like to gradually set a new benchmark in training — produce things like training DVDs or applications for iPods that would help students to train, using future technology. I am also looking at hairdressing hardware and using our experience to make things work better.

We don’t have any immediate plans to open salons in India. I love the country and the people here. It inspires me a lot, not just in hair colouring but in my life, generally. Our plan is to come here and, hopefully in the future, launch some educational DVDs on how to colour hair and teach as many people as we can.

In fact, if L’Oréal Professionnel wants to sponsor a salon, we could be here! With the brand becoming increasingly successful in India, that could happen. There is a strong demand for quality, and being associated with or branded by L’Oréal Professionnel is a thing of pride. It gives a celebrity status!