Before I begin, may I apologise for my "before" shots - I'm afraid the only decent pictures that I have of my hair are a couple of months old! I'd completely forgotten about taking any pictures of my old hair at all... one of these days, I might be organised. This is the first out of two posts about my hair cut experience; this one is showing you my hair, and the second one will be showing you the salon where I had it done and what happened whilst I was there. I figured that if I'd put this all in one post, it would be very long!

A couple of weeks ago, I decided that I'd had enough of my hair. It was long, thick, cumbersome and not especially flattering. It was also lacking shape and definition, and all in all just an overgrown mess. I sat and moped about it for a day or two before getting up off my backside and doing something about it. Figuring that I might as well kill two birds with one stone, I decided to try and find a salon that would give me the hair cut I wanted and would let me review their salon at the same time. When me and Martin were in town last weekend, we went into The Light in Leeds to see a film (X-Men: The Days of Future Past if you were wondering) and came across Allertons, a new salon/store that had opened only a few days before. They were actually closed at the time, but when I went to look at the menu that they had outside I realised that they did hairdressing as well as beauty treatments. With that in mind, I got in contact with Nick, the manager and he managed to squeeze me in for my hair cut with Dean Rose at very short notice. So, on Thursday morning I excitedly made my way into Leeds, and one much-needed hair cut later...





This is the result! As you can see, I had quite a bit cut off - somewhere around 6-7 inches. I wanted a blunt long bob, but with some layers cut in; this picture of Lily Melrose was what I showed to Dean. I had originally wanted to go a little shorter, but Dean wisely advised against it and I'm so glad that I listened to him! I wanted a hair cut that was pretty low maintenance (Although as Dean pointed out there's not many people who want high maintenance hair!), that didn't necessarily need straightening for it to look good. With this hairstyle, I can let this dry naturally and just encourage the natural wave in my hair by scrunching it and applying some of my beloved Bumble & Bumble Surf Spray. I did this yesterday when I went to York for the opening of the new Zatchels store (More on that another day), and it still looked great. As he blow dried it, he showed me how it would look a bit straighter, before going in and styling it for me with gel, curling tongs and a light covering of hair spray to keep it all in place. This is easy enough for me to replicate at home - yes, even me, the one who is hopeless with hair - and already I've found that it's so much quicker and easier for me to style. The only thing that I have found is that I can no longer tie my hair up, but then I never did anyway due to my hair being so thick so I can't say that I will miss that aspect. I'm very, very happy with my hair and would recommend Dean Rose and Allertons 100% - I think that I've finally found both a salon and a stylist that I will always go back to! Considering that previously I'd never been a fan of getting my hair cut, having never been given the results I wanted, this is a big thing for me. Stay tuned for the second post, where I will be telling you more about Dean and Allertons!