My sister had been raving about Gentle Touch for quite a while now. Honestly, I’d also noticed improvement in the volume and health of her hair so I was interested to know what she was doing differently. So I followed her to Gentle Touch a few weeks back to wash and blow out my natural hair. I’d hate to keep typing Gentle Touch, so for the purpose of this review, Gentle Touch will be shortened to GT. 🙂 GT is located on the same street as Downtown salon. There isn’t a parking lot per se, but about 5/6 cars can park in front of the building. GT focuses on making your hair healthy (‘virgin’/unrelaxed or ‘disvirgined’/relaxed hair) and they don’t provide any services that involve fixing extensions (they’d help you style and take them out though). GT also makes and uses their own products at their salons. We parked, got out and at the entrance to the building they had a security guard checking temperatures (ebola times and all). Once we were cleared, we went in. My sister had an appointment with Tobi (she swears this guy is the truth.. for hair lol). Anyway, she went straight to look for Tobi. I was still checking the place out, and honestly, it looks like the entire space could do with some TLC. Some of the ceiling coverings had fallen off and were discolored. However my sister mentioned the salon was going through a change of management so I kept an open mind. As we waited for Tobi to be done, someone approached me and was like “Oh, are you new here? We have a process for new people”. Apparently you fill out a form and there’s a consultation to understand your hair status and goals.
My hair before consultation My consultant was a very friendly and patient lady. We went through the hair questionnaire and she made recommendations for my hair. I also learnt that they have a Hair Institute where they train their employees, however, everyone else is welcome to take their classes for a fee.
New Client Questionnaire My hair after we cut it…pretty much looked the same after 2 attempts to blow it out! After the consultation, I happened to have the same lady attend to my hair. I got a wash, trim and ying yang treatment, and things were going well until it came time to blow out my hair. Now this process was a bit of a struggle! For some reason, my stylist couldn’t get it right and my hair just remained extremely puffy. I’ve never had this issue before so I wasn’t sure what exactly was going on. Plus, it was a little more unbearable than normal, so I just had her leave my hair as is and walked out.
Overall, the service was ok. There’s a dedicated cleaner cleaning up as stylists are wrapping up. I liked that I had the same person do my consultation and hair…she was very professional and cautious not to viciously pull my hair, however, I wish she knew how to blow out virgin hair. I’d recommend GT, however, my experience tells me all their stylists are not created equal (so you may have to try different people to see who you’d like to stick with in the long run).
Apologies for the poor price list pic but hope it helps someone! Side note – I also think their pricing info could probably be presented in a more professional way than this!
That’s the only relaxer I find good for my hair. Unfortunately I have trouble getting it in my area (Bariga Somolu, Lagos). Today, I got frustrated looking for it in all the shops I know of, including super markets to no avail. Last year November I went to trade fare International market, Tafawa Belewa, it wasn’t there; every other relaxer was available. Right now I’m making consultations to switch to another brand against my wish. I wish you could make it more accessible.
that means you have “disvirgined” hair! lol
Oh wow. I don’t think I can deal with natural hair.. Mine has tasted relaxer.