The Glow Up: Why I Created San Francisco’s Most Unconventional Hair Appointment

After more than two decades behind the chair, I have a pretty good idea of what people expect from a hair appointment.

You come in. We talk about your hair. Maybe we cut it, color it, smooth it, treat it. I style it, you leave looking great, and hopefully your hair keeps behaving once you get home.

But over the last few years, I kept thinking about everything that happens around the hair.

The scalp underneath it. The buildup we ignore until something feels off. The condition of the hair before we color or style it. The way stress, heat, water, products and everyday life all show up eventually.

And I kept coming back to the same thought:

Why are we treating all of these things separately?

That question eventually became The Glow Up.

What Is The Glow Up?

The Glow Up is my version of a salon spa appointment.

It isn’t a facial. It isn’t exactly a head spa. And it isn’t just an Olaplex treatment with a blowout attached.

It’s a longer appointment built around giving your hair and scalp a reset, layering treatments intentionally, and giving you a little room to shut your brain off while we’re at it.

Depending on what your hair and scalp need, the appointment can include chelating, deep cleansing or scalp prep, professional hair treatments, LED light therapy for the scalp and face, a hair gloss, finishing treatments for the scalp, face and hair, and we cap all of it off with an incredible blowout.

We take into account the event you are prepping for when choosing the treatments during each appointment.

You will not just bounce out of the salon, you will be GLOWING!

The point isn’t to throw every product I own at your head.

Everything has a reason for being there.

Why I Created It

The idea actually started years before I knew exactly what I wanted to do with it.

I had a conversation with a woman who wore a hijab. She told me she wanted to experience that feeling women talk about when they leave the salon, that whole I just got my hair done and I feel incredible feeling.

But she didn’t cut or color her hair, and a traditional blowout on its own felt a little too blah.

We started talking about how salons needed some kind of crossover service. Something where you could come in and get the feeling of a full makeover without actually having to change anything.

That conversation stuck with me.

Then last year, when I eloped, it came back to me.

We were getting married at sunset, and I remember wishing I had something to do earlier that day just to treat myself. My hair and makeup were getting done for the wedding, but I wanted something more. I wanted an experience. Something I could do during the day that would make me feel taken care of and leave me feeling incredible before I went and got married.

And I thought about that conversation again.

There should be an appointment for that.

A lot of salon services are designed around fixing one thing.

Dry hair? Add a treatment.

Buildup? Clarify it.

Dull color? Add a gloss.

Scalp feeling off? Try a scalp treatment.

And sometimes that’s exactly what you need.

But I wanted an appointment where I could look at the whole picture instead.

Hair condition. Scalp. Buildup. Shine. Styling. How the hair actually feels.

Over the past couple of months, I’ve been testing out the professional treatments that would eventually become part of The Glow Up on my clients, and one thing has become incredibly obvious: when we take the time to prep and treat the hair properly, people notice.

Not just when they look in the mirror.

They notice when they touch their hair.

They notice when they wash it again at home.

They notice that it behaves differently.

The text messages have POURED in as a response.

“What was that treatment we did? My husband is complimenting my hair! Let’s do it every visit.”

Those reactions didn’t create the idea for The Glow Up. They helped me figure out what it should actually be.

Hair Health Starts Before the Blowout

We tend to judge our hair by how it looks at the end of an appointment.

And obviously I care about that too.

But some of the most important parts of a hair appointment happen long before I pick up a round brush.

Sometimes hair needs buildup removed before it needs moisture.

Sometimes the scalp needs attention.

Sometimes hair that feels dry isn’t simply begging for another conditioning mask.

And sometimes the best thing we can do is create a cleaner starting point before layering anything else on top.

The Glow Up gives me time to actually do that.

Why LED Light Therapy?

One of the biggest additions to the appointment, and admittedly the detail getting the most attention, is LED light therapy.

And I get it. A face mask that lights up while you’re getting your hair done isn’t exactly something we’ve traditionally seen in a salon.

But that’s kind of the point.

Red and near-infrared light have become increasingly popular in both skin and hair care. On the scalp, LED is used to support circulation and follicle activity and is being studied for its role in supporting hair health and growth over time.

Those are cumulative benefits. This isn’t a one-and-done miracle hair growth treatment, and I don’t want to pretend that it is.

But there are reasons to use it even if you’re only coming in for one Glow Up.

After one session, we’re supporting circulation to the scalp and creating a really nice finishing step after we’ve cleansed, treated and paid attention to an area that usually gets completely ignored during a traditional salon appointment.

And while your scalp is getting that treatment, it seemed almost ridiculous to me to stop there.

And Yes, We’re Treating Your Face Too

This is the part where I want you to open your mind a little about what a hair appointment can be.

You’re already sitting there for 30 minutes.

Why wouldn’t we treat your face too?

Red and near-infrared LED are also used in skincare to support circulation, calm the appearance of redness and inflammation and support the processes involved in healthy-looking skin. Some of the bigger changes people associate with LED, like collagen support and improvements in skin texture, come from consistent use over time.

But a single session can still leave skin looking refreshed, calmer and more awake.

And that matters to me because of what I wanted The Glow Up to be from the beginning.

I didn’t want you to spend a few hours taking care of your hair, have an incredible blowout, and then look in the mirror and feel like the rest of you didn’t get the memo.

The whole idea is that you leave feeling finished.

And this is another reason LED made so much sense for The Glow Up.

A traditional facial isn’t always ideal on the same day as a big event. Depending on what you’re having done, your skin might be exfoliated, red, sensitive or simply better left alone afterward and makeup may be the last thing you want to put on it.

LED is different.

There’s no peeling, scrubbing or extracting involved. It’s a non-invasive treatment with no traditional downtime, which means you can have your LED session, finish your skin, and still apply makeup afterward.

That was really important to me.

I wanted The Glow Up to be something you could actually do the day of the thing.

Before a big presentation. Before new headshot photos. Before a first date. Before dinner. Before a vacation.

You don’t have to disappear for two days while your skin settles down.

So after LED, you’ll have access to a small selection of Murad skincare products to finish your skin.

You choose what you want. You apply what you want. You skip anything you don’t.

This isn’t a facial, and I’m not trying to become your esthetician. I’m also not choosing a complicated skincare routine for you. I’ve simply put together a selection of finishing products so you can leave feeling fresh, hydrated and ready for whatever you’re doing next.

The goal is to walk out with your hair done, your skin feeling fresh, and the option to put your makeup on and go do whatever the hell you got ready for.

I’m just questioning why the salon experience has to stop at the hairline.

Hair salons have operated basically the same way for a very long time: you come in to change your hair, and everything else is somebody else’s department.

The Glow Up is me playing with that line a little.

What if you don’t want to change your hair?

What if you just want to take care of what you already have, sit back for a couple of hours, and walk out looking and feeling noticeably better than when you came in?

That’s the kind of salon appointment I wanted to create.

What If I Want the Longer-Term Benefits of LED?

This is where consistency matters.

One Glow Up is designed to be an incredible salon treatment with immediate benefits. You get the scalp and hair treatments, LED session, skin finishing and blowout, and you leave ready to go live your life.

But the benefits people usually associate with ongoing LED use, like supporting hair growth and density, collagen production and improvements in skin tone and texture, aren’t the result of one treatment.

They come from repeated use over time.

That’s also why I didn’t want LED to only be available inside The Glow Up.

If you love it, you can add LED light therapy to other salon appointments without booking the entire Glow Up every time. That gives us a way to incorporate it more regularly into your existing hair routine.

And if you’re really interested in LED for its cumulative benefits, at-home use may make even more sense. A quality home LED device lets you use it at the frequency recommended for that device rather than trying to cram an entire LED routine into your salon schedule.

If this is speaking to you and you want to chat more, send me a message and I’ll be happy to chat with you about your options.

Who Is The Glow Up For?

Honestly, I built it for the person who wants their hair to feel really good.

It can make sense before a wedding, photos, a birthday, a conference, an important presentation or a trip.

But it doesn’t have to be attached to a big event.

You might book it because your hair has been through a lot.

As part of a new monthly self care routine.

It’s the end of summer and you want a reset before the weather changes.

You might be using a ton of dry shampoo.

You might swim, work out frequently, wear a headset all day, use a lot of styling products or simply feel like your scalp and hair need some attention.

Or maybe you just want one appointment where somebody else has thought through the details for you. You just want to sit back and relax and leave ready to do what you gotta do.

That’s enough of a reason.

What I Didn’t Want This To Be

I did not want to create something overly precious.

I didn’t want robes, cucumber water and a service with seventeen mystical-sounding steps.

And I definitely didn’t want something that felt like you needed to be a certain kind of person to book it.

I wanted it to feel like Makers.

Useful. Thoughtful. A little unexpected.

The kind of appointment you could book before your elopement at City Hall, before presenting at a conference, before a big dinner or on a random Monday because your hair feels like shit and you want to do something about it.

A Different Kind of Hair Appointment

The Glow Up is probably the most unusual service I’ve created in more than 13 years of running my salon studio.

And that’s exactly why I’m excited about it.

It brings together a lot of things I’ve become increasingly interested in behind the chair: scalp health, hair condition, thoughtful product use, LED light therapy, better prep and the idea that a salon appointment can be about more than changing your haircut or color.

You can still come see me for a haircut.

You can still come in for color.

But now there’s also an appointment specifically designed for the days when you want to give your hair, scalp and yourself a little more attention.

The Glow Up is now available at Makers Make Parlor in San Francisco.

Don’t gatekeep me. Tell your friends!