The Junction Salon

The Junction
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What we know about hair — and think you should too. Everything we’d tell you in the chair, written down. From people who do this all day.

The Consultation

What actually happens when you sit down.

Every appointment at The Junction begins with a real conversation — not a quick “what are we doing today?” A good consultation changes everything. Here’s what to expect and how to get the most out of it. Consultations are always free.

Your Goals & Inspiration

Bring photos. Even if you can’t describe what you want in words, a photo communicates it instantly. We’ll ask what you love about it — and what you’d change — so we understand the feeling, not just the look.

Your Hair History

Previous color, chemical treatments, how long ago, what products you use — all of it matters. Hair has memory. What was done to it months or years ago affects what we can safely do today, and it’s the first thing we look at before any color correction.

Your Hair’s Behavior

How does your hair behave on day two? Does it go flat? Does it frizz? Does it hold curl? We cut and color for how your hair actually lives — not just how it looks freshly styled in the chair.

Your Lifestyle & Routine

How much time do you spend styling every morning? Do you work out? Swim? Travel? The best result for you is one that fits your actual life — not the one that requires an hour with a blow dryer every day.

Honest Expectations

We’ll tell you what’s realistic for your hair — including how many sessions a goal might take, what it will cost to maintain, and whether the inspiration photo you brought matches your starting point. Honesty first, always. Every service and price is listed on our services page.

The Plan

Before any scissors come out or any color is mixed, we agree on a plan. You’ll know exactly what’s happening, why, and what to expect when you leave. No surprises.

“The consultation isn’t a formality — it’s the most important part of the appointment. Everything else flows from it.”

Color & Skin Tone

Why skin tone changes everything.

Color harmony is what separates a good result from a great one — and it’s one of the most overlooked parts of hair color. Your skin tone isn’t just a preference, it’s a guideline.

Cool Undertones

If your veins look blue or purple, your undertone is cool. Cool skin tones are complemented by ash blondes, cool browns, platinum, and blue-based reds. Warm or golden tones can make cool skin look sallow.

Warm Undertones

If your veins look green, your undertone is warm. Warm skin tones are flattered by golden blondes, caramel, auburn, and copper tones. Ash or platinum tones can wash warm skin out.

Neutral Undertones

If you can see both blue and green in your veins, you’re neutral. Neutral undertones are the most versatile — most color families work, and you have the freedom to go warmer or cooler depending on the season or mood.

The Color Wheel

Hair color is built on primary colors — red, yellow, and blue — blended into an enormous range of hues. Toners and glazes are used to neutralize unwanted tones: purple cancels yellow, blue cancels orange, green cancels red.

Levels & Lift

Hair color is measured on a scale of 1 (black) to 10 (lightest blonde). Lifting hair — making it lighter — requires removing pigment. The darker your starting point, the more sessions it may take to reach a light blonde safely.

Brassiness Explained

Brassiness happens when hair isn’t lifted far enough before toning, or when the toner fades. Orange means not enough lift. Yellow means lifted but toner has faded. A gloss or toner refresh is usually the fix — it’s included with every highlighting service.

Hair Maintenance

What happens between appointments matters.

Great hair in the salon is only half the equation. What you do at home determines how long your results last, how healthy your hair stays, and how good it looks on day five. These are the products we use and recommend.

Use Sulfate-Free Shampoo After Color

Sulfates strip color faster than anything else. A sulfate-free shampoo preserves your tone, extends your color’s vibrancy, and is gentler on the cuticle. Worth the switch even if you’re not coloring.

Wait 48 Hours After Color Before Washing

Color molecules need time to fully settle into the cuticle. Washing too soon — especially with hot water — opens the cuticle before the color has locked in and accelerates fading.

Heat Protection Is Non-Negotiable

If you use a blow dryer, flat iron, or curling iron regularly, a thermal protectant is essential. Heat damage is cumulative — it changes how the hair moves, how it holds color, and how it responds to future services.

Deep Condition Weekly

A weekly conditioning mask — even a five-minute one — restores moisture, rebuilds elasticity, and keeps your hair soft and manageable. Particularly important for color-treated, lightened, or curly hair.

Don’t Over-Wash

Most hair types do well with 2–3 shampoos per week. Washing daily strips natural oils that protect the hair and scalp. Dry shampoo between washes extends freshness without the damage.

Trim Regularly — Even if You’re Growing It Out

Split ends travel up the hair shaft. Waiting too long between trims means more has to come off to get back to healthy hair. A small regular trim is always better than a large corrective one.

Hair Glossary

The language of hair, explained.

Your stylist speaks this language every day. Now you can too — so the next time someone says “demi-permanent” or “double-process blonde,” you’ll know exactly what they mean. Filter by letter, or browse the whole vocabulary. Terms we offer as a service link through to that page.

A-Line Cut

Shorter at the back, longer toward the front. The geometry is clean and intentional — it frames the jaw and elongates the silhouette without a single wasted angle.

AirTouch Balayage

A painting technique that uses a gentle stream of air to isolate finer strands before color is applied. What’s left behind takes the pigment; what’s blown away stays natural. The result is a diffused, seamless transition that even classic balayage can’t quite match.

Ash

A cool-toned color profile built on blue, violet, or green undertones. It doesn’t just describe a shade — it describes a direction. Ash is what stands between a clean platinum and an unwanted yellow, between a smoky brunette and a muddy one.

Balayage

A freehand color technique where lightener or color is painted directly onto the hair surface. Creates soft, sun-kissed dimension with a gentle grow-out and a natural finish.

Banding

Horizontal stripes of contrasting color caused by overlapping pigment or uneven processing from a previous service. It’s one of the harder problems to correct — and one of the reasons a thorough consultation always includes your full color history.

Bang Trim / Fringe Trim

A focused trim to reshape, shorten, or texturize the fringe between full appointments. The difference between a fringe that reads intentional and one that just grew out.

Base Color

Color applied at the root area or all-over as a foundation before dimensional or creative techniques are added on top.

Bob

A haircut with staying power for a reason. It sits anywhere from the jaw to the collarbone, reads as clean and graphic as a blunt edge or as soft as a razored finish. Endlessly customizable — endlessly returned to.

Bond Builder

A professional treatment — like K18 or Olaplex — applied during or after color services to repair and strengthen the hair’s internal bonds that can be weakened during chemical processes.

Braid Out

A heat-free setting method where damp natural hair is braided and left to dry completely. Once unraveled, it produces defined wave patterns and expanded volume that no hot tool can replicate.

Butterfly Cut

Multi-layered with short interior layers and longer exterior lengths that cascade outward. It reads shorter from the front, longer from the back, and moves with every step. Best suited to wavy and straight hair that has enough weight to let the layers open up.

Canvas

The professional term for your hair in its current state — natural level, color history, structural integrity. Before any service begins, the canvas is read. Everything that follows depends on what it says.

Chelating Treatment

A deep-cleansing therapy that draws out mineral deposits, chlorine, and hard water buildup from inside the hair shaft. Not a clarifying shampoo — considerably more thorough. Often the step that makes the difference between color that performs and color that fights you.

Clarifying Shampoo

A reset. It strips away product buildup, environmental residue, and excess oil that everyday shampoos leave behind. Use it before treatments to ensure the hair is actually ready to absorb what comes next.

Color Correction

A service to fix or significantly change previous color results — removing unwanted tones, evening out patchy color, or safely lightening previously colored hair. Usually requires multiple sessions.

Contrast

The degree of difference between highlighted pieces and the surrounding hair. High contrast is bold and dramatic. Low contrast is subtle and natural-looking.

Cool Tones

Colors that lean toward blue, violet, or green — like platinum blonde, ash brown, or plum red. Complement cool and neutral skin undertones.

Coppery

A warm, light-catching color territory rich in orange and amber. It reads as bold without being theatrical — particularly at home on brunettes and natural redheads where depth keeps it grounded.

Crown

The highest point of the skull, where growth patterns, cowlicks, and natural rotations converge. How a stylist handles the crown determines volume distribution, part behavior, and where dimensional color placement makes the most visual impact.

Cuticle

The outermost layer of the hair strand — overlapping microscopic scales that open during chemical services and seal with care. A smooth, flat cuticle is what gives hair its shine. A compromised one is why hair feels rough and looks dull.

Deep Conditioning

An intensive treatment left to penetrate the hair shaft under heat. It delivers concentrated moisture and lipids to restore elasticity and softness — the difference between hair that moves and hair that behaves.

Demarcation Line

The visible boundary between natural root regrowth and previously colored hair. Softening it is one of the primary goals of modern color design — which is why root smudging and shadow roots exist.

Demi Foils

A partial highlight service — typically 6–12 foils placed around the face and part line for targeted brightness without a full highlight application.

Demi-Permanent Color

A color that deposits tone without lifting. Longer-lasting than semi-permanent but gentler than permanent. Often used for toning, glossing, or blending grey without full commitment.

Density

The number of individual hair strands per square inch on the scalp. It informs how sections are taken, how product is distributed, and how long a service realistically takes. Fine, medium, and thick are the categories — but most clients fall somewhere between.

Digital Perm

A thermal texturizing method using temperature-controlled rods managed digitally. It restructures the hair into soft, organic wave patterns — closer to a lived-in wave than anything resembling a traditional perm.

Dimension

The range of tones within the hair — lights and darks creating depth and movement. Single-process color is flat; highlights, lowlights, and balayage add dimension.

Disulfide Bonds

The internal cross-links that give hair its strength, shape, and resilience. Chemical services temporarily break and reset these bonds. Bond-building treatments like Olaplex protect them in the process — which is why we include it as standard.

Double-Process

When two separate color services are performed in one visit — typically lightening followed by toning. The hair is washed and dried between steps.

Double-Process Blonde

A full-head lift followed immediately by precision toning. It delivers a solid, striking blonde with no natural depth left behind — and no room for shortcuts. This is the most technical blonde service we offer.

Dry Cut

Cutting after the hair has been fully dried and styled into its natural state. It removes the guesswork — the stylist sees exactly how the hair falls, where it wants to go, and what it actually does before a single section is taken.

Elasticity

The hair’s ability to stretch under tension and return to its original length without breaking. High elasticity means the internal architecture is healthy. Low elasticity is the early signal that protein and moisture work need to happen before further chemical services do.

Event Styling

A dedicated styling session built around an occasion — editorial, formal, or milestone. Precision hot-tool work, pinning, and finish products chosen to hold without stiffness. The goal is hair that photographs as well as it feels.

Fantasy Colors

Non-traditional pigments from soft pastels to saturated jewel tones. They require a clean, pre-lightened canvas to read true — which means fantasy color is as much a blonde service as it is a color service.

Feathering

A freehand texturizing technique using shears or a razor to slice softly into the ends. It removes bulk from dense perimeters so that layers stop stacking and start moving.

Full Highlights

Foils placed across the entire head — nape to hairline — for a comprehensive dimensional shift. The difference between this and a partial is coverage, processing time, and the degree of all-over transformation.

Gloss

A clear or tinted demi-permanent treatment that adds shine, neutralizes brassiness, and refreshes color tone. Often used between full color appointments to keep color looking fresh.

Gold

A warm, luminous tone built on yellow and amber. It reflects light with intensity and injects a sun-drenched quality into both blonde and brown bases. The tonal opposite of ash — and equally intentional in the right hands.

Gray Coverage

The precise formulation and application of permanent pigment designed to penetrate stubborn white hair. Not all gray responds the same way — resistant grays, soft grays, and mixed growth each require a different approach. Coverage is the outcome. Formulation is the work.

Grey Blending

A technique that softens the contrast between grey and colored hair — making grey look intentional rather than grown-out. Grows out more gracefully than full coverage.

Hair Tinsel

Ultra-fine, heat-resistant metallic strands tied to individual hair roots. They move, wash, and style exactly like natural hair — and introduce a light-catching shimmer that no color service can replicate.

Half-Up Style

The top section lifted, swept, and secured while the rest flows free. The structure of an updo without the commitment — useful for everything from a work event to a wedding guest.

Highlights

Lighter pieces created by isolating sections of hair and treating them with lightener or color. Applied with foils, a cap, or freehand painting to add brightness and dimension.

Japanese Straightening

A permanent thermal reconditioning system that chemically reshapes the internal protein links of textured hair before precision flat-ironing locks it into place. Genuinely straight — not smoothed, not softened. A significant commitment that requires careful consultation.

K-Tip (Keratin Bond) Extensions

Individual strands tipped with a medical-grade keratin bond fused to natural hair with a specialized heat tool. They offer 360-degree movement that weft-based methods can’t match — and stay invisible because they’re applied strand by strand.

Keratin Smoothing Treatment

A semi-permanent service that seals the cuticle with liquid keratin proteins and high heat. It eliminates daily frizz, cuts dry time in half, and softens unruly texture — without making a permanent structural change to the hair.

Level System

Hair color is measured on a scale of 1 (black) to 10 (lightest blonde). Understanding your natural level helps predict how your hair will respond to lightening or color.

Lift

The process of lightening the hair by removing natural pigment. Different formulas have different lifting abilities — your natural level and hair history determine how much lift is achievable safely.

Lowlights

Darker pieces added to create depth and dimension — typically 2–3 levels darker than your base color. Can make hair look richer and more natural, especially blended with highlights.

Nape

The base of the neck, just below the occipital bone. In cuts, it requires precise perimeter tapering. In color, it’s the section that gets skipped — and the one that gives it away when it does.

Natural Level

The baseline depth of your uncolored hair on a 1-to-10 scale, where 1 is black and 10 is lightest blonde. It’s the starting point for every color calculation — and the reason two clients asking for the same result can leave looking completely different.

Ombré

A bold, high-contrast graduation from dark roots to light ends. It’s designed to be seen — a clear statement rather than a seamless transition. The defining characteristic is that visible shift, not the absence of one.

Overlap

The accidental application of color or lightener onto previously processed hair during a root service. It’s one of the most avoidable causes of breakage and banding — and one of the things precision application is specifically designed to prevent.

Patch Test

A small amount of formula applied to the skin 48 hours before a chemical service. It screens for sensitivities before they become a problem. Required for new clients and after any gap in service — no exceptions.

Pixie Cut

Short, sculpted sides and back with textured length on top. It’s a commitment that tends to surprise people — not with how much maintenance it takes, but how little, once it’s right.

Protein Treatment

A targeted reconstructive therapy that floods compromised hair with hydrolyzed proteins. It reinforces micro-fractures in the strand and halts active breakage. Not a substitute for a trim — but the thing that buys the hair time to recover.

Razor Cut

Sculpted with a straight-edge razor instead of shears. It produces tapered, wispy ends that give dense hair the lived-in lightness that shear-cut lines can’t create. Best on straight to wavy textures — on curly hair, it can encourage frizz rather than movement.

Rebalancing

The process of restoring balance and dimension to hair using a combination of highlights, lowlights, and glazes — often after color has become too uniform or too light.

Relaxer

A highly alkaline formula that permanently breaks and resets the internal structural bonds of curly or coily hair, leaving it straight. Unlike a smoothing treatment, this is a lasting structural change — one that requires consistent maintenance and careful aftercare.

Roller Set

Damp hair wound around cylindrical rollers, dried under a hood, and released into sculptural volume and smooth, lasting curves. The set that holds longer than anything a curling iron can do — and looks like it.

Scalp Detox

A clarifying therapy that removes product buildup, dead skin, and excess oil from the scalp environment. It’s the service clients often don’t know they need until they’ve had it — and then wonder how they went without it.

Scalp Massage

A rhythmic manual pressure sequence performed at the backbar during the conditioning process. It stimulates circulation, releases tension, and makes the rest of the appointment feel slower and better than it probably should.

Semi-Permanent Color

Color that coats the outside of the hair shaft without penetrating deeply. Fades gradually with washing, leaving no harsh regrowth line. Good for trying a new tone with low commitment.

Shag

Heavily layered with choppy ends, a casual fringe, and volume that lives around the crown. It’s a cut that wears better on day two than day one — which is the point. Particularly well-suited to wavy and curly textures that need a shape, not a structure.

Silk Press

A non-chemical straightening service for natural, textured hair — a precision blowout followed by flat-ironing that temporarily transforms tight curls into fluid, high-gloss straight strands. No permanent change. No structural compromise. Just the kind of finish that makes people ask what you did differently.

Single-Process

A color service done in one step — all-over color, highlights without toning, or a glaze. Simpler and faster than double-process services.

Sombré

A softer, lower-contrast version of ombré where color shifts within a narrow spectrum rather than from dark to dramatically light. It reads as a natural gradient — the kind of color that looks like it happened on its own.

Split End Repair Cut

A meticulous service where the stylist works through the hair in small sections, trimming only the fractured ends. The goal is length preservation alongside structural health — a different ask than a standard trim, and it takes longer because it’s more precise.

Strand Test

A preliminary check where a single hidden section of hair is treated with formula before the full service begins. It confirms color accuracy, processing time, and how much the hair can actually handle. The difference between a prediction and a guess.

Tape-In Extensions

Ultra-flat wefts applied by sandwiching a thin section of natural hair between two medical-grade adhesive panels. They sit flush against the head and stay invisible — the extension method most clients forget they’re wearing.

Taper

A classic barbering silhouette where length gradually shortens toward the margins — sideburns, neckline, temples. It cleans the perimeter without committing to a fade. The finishing detail that makes a cut look considered rather than merely cut.

Texture

The diameter of individual hair strands — fine, medium, or coarse. Texture affects how color is formulated, how it processes, and how long it lasts.

Texturizer

A mild chemical formula applied briefly to coily or curly hair to soften and loosen the natural curl pattern without eliminating it. It preserves volume while making daily management considerably less confrontational.

Tinsel Application

The precise tying of individual heat-resistant metallic strands to the hair root. Each one is placed by hand. The result is a light-catching shimmer that shows up in photographs before it shows up in a mirror — subtle until it isn’t.

Tone

The warmth or coolness of a color — golden, copper, ash, violet. Tone is applied with toners or glosses and is what makes color look finished rather than flat.

Toner

A demi-permanent color used after lightening to neutralize unwanted warmth and achieve a specific tone. Purple toner cancels yellow; blue toner cancels orange. Essential for achieving cool blonde results.

Vivid Color

Bold, non-natural hair colors — reds, blues, greens, purples, pastels. Best achieved on pre-lightened hair. Vivid colors require more maintenance and fade faster than natural tones.

Warm Tones

Colors that lean toward yellow, orange, or red — like golden blonde, auburn, or copper. Complement warm skin undertones and add richness and energy to the hair.

No terms under this letter — yet.

From The Edit

Longer reads.

Guides, explainers, and the occasional opinion — written by the people who do this every day at The Dillon.

Color

Cuts & Texture

Care & Maintenance

Ready when you are.

Put it into practice.

Now that you know what you’re looking for — let’s make it happen. Book an appointment or start with a free virtual consultation.

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