Cortex Hair Studio

PIC's taken directly after service provided by salon 3 days .... not 5 months later as manager reply likes to imply. I have nothing to gain by posting a bad review/ I know bad reviews always sound bitter, so I hate to leave them. But, I have never experienced hair damage like this in my life, and I just want to save someone going through the same awful experience. I just moved to Virginia Highlands area, and was looking for a new salon. With all of the positive reviews for Cortex, I decided to give it a try. I decided to go in for a cut just to test the waters and meet the stylist before I let her work on my platinum blonde hair. She was nice, cleaned up the damage from extensions and processing hair, and gave me a good cut. However, I was concerned that she might not have the experience needed to take my blonde down to a more natural color. So i decided I would ask the manager if they thought that she could preform services I was looking for. The manager guaranteed me that she would be able to safely work with coloring my hair. I shared that I am used to spending 500/visit on my hair and would spend any amount to make sure there was no further damage. Manager again assured me that the Stylist would be "Great at this" referring to coloring my hair. With this recommendation, I made an appointment to come back for my color. huge mistake. The process seemed like it was going fine - after I was rinsed off, I asked the stylist how my hair held up, because I knew it was damaged from being blonde. She said "Good - hardly any hair came off in the bowl". I would come to find out that this woman had ZERO integrity and completely lied. As you can see from pictures, she burned off a huge portion of hair. She styled around the mishap, charged me her whole fee, and accepted my 20+% tip. When I got home I thought something looked off, but no one likes how other people style their hair and put it up in a ponytail until I could wash it the next day. After washing it was so clear that something was wrong. All of the hair on the right side of my face was missing about 3 inches down from the root! Just gone!!!! I am amazed that anyone would have so little integrity and class. Not only did she ruin my hair, and lie to me about it... but then she billed me. I have never in my life been treated so horribly by a salon. I just wanted to share this story so that you can be cautious when choosing this salon for coloring. It could cost you 3 years of damage grow-out + the insult of paying them to destroy your hair. UPDATE: I see the owners reply here and it is laughable. I took my time in posting this review because I wanted be be fair and unemotional. It did take me a lot of time to come out and speak about this, but as I said in my original review - I hate posting bad reviews, but i just did not want anyone else to have the negative experience that I had. I have time stamps from when the photos were taken and they were taken directly after my visit - any Iphone provides time of photo taken so this is just further evidence that there is little integrity here. The owner himself comments below that they took before photos of my hair- and they did take them. But, they REFUSED to take the after pic's!!!!! Probably because they did not want any one to see just how bad my hair looked after they were done!!!! This damage did not exist before I came to the salon. I have no reason to lie about this --- obviously a business trying to cover up and save face does. Clearly I am not getting anything from lying..... but a business trying to cover up their ineptitudes by blaming the victim will always have to pipe up and defend their actions.

Love Brandy and John. Both are fabulous people and great at their jobs!

Emily Newman is an outstanding stylist. There is no one else who understands what to do with this head of *very long* hair as well as she does. It’s a 30 minute drive for me and 100% worth it. Not to mention, Emily has a way of making everyone she meets feel like a long time friend, so the time spent in the chair is always filled with great conversation. Cortex Studio has consistently offered a friendly, attentive, relaxed and clean environment for every visit over the last 4 years. *Given the current state of affairs, it’s worth mentioning that I’m also impressed with their efforts to have responsible COVID-19 protocols in place as well.

This has been my salon since I moved here in 2014. After doing my research, and making the first visit, I knew I'd found the place for me. Friendly and welcoming staff, and Emily is the best! When Emily was off for a bit Olivia stepped in and delivered/proved the same high standards I've come to enjoy here at Cortex. If you want an educated, professional, collaborative stylist, then, Cortex is the salon choice for you!

I have been seeing Emily for nearly 7 years., and it's been the best 7 years of haircuts! She is simply wonderful! Not only is she a wizard with the scissors, she also gives amazing advice. No matter what kind of hair problem I've been looking to solve, or cut I'm interested in trying, she's been there to provide excellent guidance. I cannot recommend her highly enough!

I am so happy to have found Cortex and Emily in particular.  I have short hair and its a bit wavy, so it really needs someone who knows what they are doing.  Emily nails it every time! I am now so loyal that I will move my own schedule around to make sure she cut it.  I also love how friendly everyone is there.  Such a good find in Virginia Highlands.