Van Michael Salon — Local services in Atlanta

My stylist made me wait for an hour, got the wrong service, left with temporary dye that I had to wash out myself, and there is very little visible difference in my hair:

I have been a Van Michael customer for the past year, have visited multiple locations, and had a great experience with the new talent program before. I signed up for a New Talent Balayage, and went in for a consultation the day before my appointment. The consultation went well and I was able to describe to my stylist what I wanted: burgundy/red violet highlights, that blended into my roots so it won't have a hard line while growing out. At the same time, I haven't had my hair colored before this experience, so I followed the stylists lead and brought a picture of the color and highlight pattern that I wanted to the appointment the following day.

The next day for my appointment, my stylist ran long with another customer and initially asked me if I could come in a half-hour late. I was okay with that, but when I came in thirty minutes after my appointment time, they had me wait another thirty minutes inside the salon, a total hour total for my service to start. Then, after a discussion and showing my inspiration photos again, we started the service. I paid for a balayage, which I like the look of in the past, and my stylist gave me foils instead. These highlights go straight to the root, and are not what I wanted as they will grow out in a line which is something I wanted to avoid.

This treatment was a special Aveda treatment that lightens hair with ammonia and not peroxide, and is only applicable to people with virgin hair. I was excited for this product because it was my first time coloring my hair, and I didn't want to use traditional bleach that would eventually make my (naturally very dark) hair orange eventually. However, this product or application didn't work at all for whatever reason, and instead of having burgundy/red-violet highlights, I had barely noticeable brown-red foil highlights throughout my hair which we had to go outside to notice at all.

At this point, my stylist realized that this was not what either of us wanted and took me inside and proceeded to semi-permanently dye my hair purple. Again, semi-permanent dye was not part of my plan, and I would have preferred to actually have my hair colored permanently, which is what I paid for. But at that point, I wanted to leave more than anything else. My hair also did look much closer to what I wanted it to look like after the semi-permanent dye, but when I went home and washed my hair a day of two later, I realized it was because there was still a lot of dye left in my hair (not rinsed well at the salon). After my first home wash, in natural lighting, my hair didn't look as if it had been colored at all. I felt like I paid for a whole service just to receive a blowout.

Naturally, I wanted to talk through my experience. When I called a day or so after the service, I was told that the manager would give me a call back, which I never received. Overall, I was not able to reach the color/look that I wanted, I was made to wait and extra hour and sent home with semi-permanently dyed hair, which I essentially rinsed out myself at home. This was a BAD EXPERIENCE. My stylist was good company, which was the only redeeming part of this debacle. I have had only good experiences at Van Michael before this one, and this is not the service I have...

I have been going here for years to get hair cuts with Walker and she is amazing. The reason for the one star has nothing to do with her. I went for a color appt and parked in the parking garage as usual, but there was a sign and barricade at the 2nd floor doors saying I needed to use the stairs behind me in the parking garage. I went into the stairwell but there were no lights on down the next level so I decided it felt dangerous so I tried to go back but the doors were locked and I couldn’t get out there or any other level. I call the guys at the front desk and told them I was locked in the stairwell and I needed help. He said he was on the way BUT HE NEVER CAME!! I was freaking out locked I this stairwell. I finally made it through a labyrinth of halls that we long and scary until,I found my way out. I went to the desk and asked why they didn’t come help me and they just said “ oh, we didn’t know where you were”. Lie! They thought it was funny. I’ve never had anything like this happen and I was shaken and furious. As much as I love Walker I will NEVER go here again. All 3 of the guys at the desk were jerks and Should be ashamed to have left...

The first time I was 15 min late for my appointment with Mary and they made me reschedule and drive there the second time (which, technically, is listed in their policy, but would I call this exceptional service? Probably not.) Anyway, I thought if the haircut will be done really well, it will be worth the wait. All I needed was a basic touch up of split ends and a gentle gradual frame around the face - nothing difficult. When my haircut was done, my hair was a lot shorter than we discussed and I basically had a short haircut with bangs. Instead of gradually increasing length from the front to the back, there is just this weird chunk of short hair by my face on one side and one side is shorter than the other so it looks patchy and uneven. (I paid $150 for this haircut, so it was not a beginner-level stylist.) I decided not to do my ombré hair color there, don’t want to risk it because, quite frankly, this looks horrible. On the last picture you can see how she cut several odd “chunks” of short hair and ALL of them are a different length - none match the opposite side. Now I have to curl my hair every day, as this is the only way to conceal...