Did you know that all hair extensions are not created equally? Since the rise of popularity around the world for human hair extensions, there have been some shady practices to actually obtain the hair needed. Too often we’re unaware of the journey that hair has taken to get to our salons.
At Olivia Christensen Salon, we are dedicated to making sure our clients only get the best. For us, one of the most important parts of our business is making sure we know where your hair comes from. We import our hair from various countries depending on our client’s texture, density, and color. And we carefully blend our extensions into our client’s hair – which is generally unmatched in the hair extension industry.
Today, let’s dive into the various types of hair used for extensions and how you (as a consumer) can know that you’re getting real human hair extensions.
Where Do Hair Extensions Come From?
A Refinery29 piece of journalism came out in 2018 exposing the fact that too often hair extensions are taken from disenfranchised women who have their hair cut for sometimes as little as $2-$3 as payment.
But even with hair that has been sourced responsibly, many famous hair extension brands are from China – and they can’t guarantee authentic, full-cuticle human hair.
The problem is that you simply can’t mass-produce human hair extensions. There isn’t enough donated hair to keep up with the demand. That’s why many large-scale brands claim that they use human hair, but really they use synthetic hair with a silicone coating.
And dealers have figured out plenty of ways that they can ‘fake’ hair extensions to make you think they’re real.
One of the cheapest ways to source human hair is called ‘fallen hair’ and it’s hair that’s been collected from drains, hair salon floors, and hair brushes. The hair is collected and combed before being processed with chemicals, coated with silicone and even combined with synthetic or animal hair.
But our level of quality human hair isn’t something that you can fake.
We Promise Quality
How can we guarantee that you’re getting the best hair? Because we make the effort to always know where our hair extensions are coming from. We make sure that we work with trusted hair dealers and that we always know how the hair is sourced and we source our hair from Western and Eastern Europe.
It’s so important to make sure that the hair we use is fair-trade. That the women have willingly parted with their hair and that they’ve been fairly compensated for it. The most important thing for you to worry about as a consumer is that you’re working with a salon that knows where they get their hair from.
And more often than not, you can trust a salon over a company selling clip-in or ‘mass’ produced extensions because as we mentioned, it’s impossible to mass-produce human hair. You’ll be able to tell if you have quality extensions because of how they feel and look to your touch. Real human hair extensions should be able to be styled however you style your hair (heat styled, blow dried, etc) and they should last around 1-2 years.
At Olivia Christensen Salon we can promise that you’ll always be receiving quality hair and quality hair extensions. Not only do we make sure that we’re always sourcing the best, but we also take the time to mix our hair extensions by hand.
Each strand of your hair is unique. Rarely is someone’s hair all one color, but instead, it’s a blend. One of the best ways to make sure your hair extensions look natural is to match the natural blend of your hair. We often combine 2-3 colors in each strand.
These unique color patterns are designed to match your natural hair identically, giving you a full, beautiful head of hair. And with Olivia Christensen Salons, you can be sure that you’re always getting the best. Our extensions start at $1,500 and can go up to $6,500.
If you’d like to book a hair extension consultation with Christina Oliva and start your hair extension journey – find an appointment here.