TheBroot blends up natural ingredients for healthy hair
We’ve all experimented with kitchen blender hair masks made of ingredients such as egg and avocado. What often starts as a smart idea, particularly when the economy is in a perpetual pinch, often ends up as messy and far from relaxing (the D.I.Y. Egg Bomb Hair Mask says it all).
Enter Bellacure nail salon entrepreneur Samira Asemanfar, who celebrates the grand opening of her all-natural hair treatment bar on Montana Avenue in Santa Monica this week. Dubbed TheBroot, as in “back to your root,” the salon specializes in blender hair masks made of a varied mix of just five fresh grocery store ingredients — bananas, eggs, mayonnaise, avocado or honey— plus natural oils.
Asemanfar came up with the niche beauty concept after thinking back to how she loved mixing hair masks in the kitchen with her mom as a child, but couldn’t find time to make the kitchen beauty remedies as she got older.
“My favorite was always banana and oils,” she says. “My hair felt strong and shiny all the time...[and] buying chemical-filled hair masks didn’t seem like the most attractive idea for my virgin hair.”
An ever-growing demand for natural products is the driving force behind her new business. “People everywhere are trying to find healthier alternatives for all aspects of their lives, and right now there are limited options for hair treatments that are chemical-free,” she says.
TheBroot offers five formulas, each of which targets a specific hair need, such as strengthening or rehydration. You can also create a custom mixture, then turn all the slopping over to a “Brootender,” who will blend the recipe on the spot and apply it. Relax under a dryer as the mask penetrates and ponder fun hair mantras framed on the walls that are intended to foster inner beauty. ( “Gray hair is God’s graffiti” and “Knotty and nice” are our favorites). After hair is rinsed, clients can choose from complimentary wet styling, in the form of masterful braiding or a chic bun, or opt to dry hair at a styling station.
To keep locks in the finest form, the salon recommends weekly treatments, which are sold individually for $35 or in discounted packages, from $95 for a series of three. Takeout treatments ($25) are packaged in cute glass Ball jars for down home appeal.
TheBroot, 1626 Montana Ave. at 17th Street, Santa Monica. (310) 230-5317 or www.thebroot.com. $35 per treatment (or $25 if you take one to go); also sold in packages of three, five or seven.
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