You know that when a group of young individuals give up their Sunday to travel to London and enter a hair competition, their passion and dedication is nothing less than 100%
This weekend I was asked to join a team of judges to judge the assistants NVQ level 2 styling category, and NVQ level 3 cut and style category!
Its 11am and as I enter the Academy i'm faced with lots of youngsters eagerly waiting to start working on their models. Its a difficult job to judge a competition especially when you know the standard of work produced will be very high.
We have Saks salons attending from all over the southern region and the turn out is impressive.
Armed with my clip board and pen, its time to begin. Myself, Mandy, Lorna, Louisa and Danny now have the task of watching these talented individuals work. I am asking each assistant questions about their inspiration and styling to gain some input on their interpretation of their signature look.
With every seat in the house taken, hairdryers blasting away and the engineered sound of sprays fixing the hair together and adding shine, I can already see finding a clear winner is going to be very tough!
Before we know it, we are near approaching the finishing time. The assistants are given plenty of notice and all of a sudden, gowns are coming off and the total image is revealed! We spend the next 10 minutes finalising our scores before a few more photos are taken and we pack up to leave.
Sadly you will all have to wait for the winner to be announced in due course..... may I say it was a pleasure to be a judge for this competition and I sincerely mean it when I say everyone is a winner and has done themselves and their salons very proud.

Congratulations and best of luck.
Mario

Hi,

Its a 5 day blog..... try to keep up! its a great read!

Friday is usually the day that brings the week to an end. We all start to plan our Friday and Saturday nights out and try not to think about Monday morning too much! I on the other hand have had a busy week teaching trends at our London Academy and it is about 10:30pm Thursday night and I'm packing for a trip to Lisbon then Rhodes for the L'Oreal Congress and the launch of INOA early Friday morning!
This is a very special trip yet also a sad one as this is the last time I will be working with Tracey Gallagher (she is leaving saks after 22 years of service)! I am trying hard not to think about that too much and want to enjoy our last few days working together. She has taught me many things over the past 2 years and I am forever grateful for her guidance and input during that time.
So Its Friday morning and my alarm is screaming at me to wake up at stupid O'Clock (3:15am) lolI'm showered, packed and drinking a strong cup of coffee to keep me awake. Its now 4:15am and my taxi is waiting at the front door ready to drive me to Heathrow airport.
I arrive in good time and already I am feeling ready for another coffee!
Tracey arrives shortly after me and we re-shuffle the suitcase full of equipment and clothes ready to check it in. Once we are airside we have a quick look around the shops before we board.
The flight seems to have lasted all of 5 minutes as we both slept the entire flight. We land in Lisbon and straight away head over to the L'Oreal technical centre to prep our models that Tracey kindly cast the month before. We are met by Carla and later, Manuel who work for L'Oreal and are our translator and co-ordinator for our visit.

The prep all goes well but its now 9:30pm UK time and we are only just leaving to check into the hotel for dinner followed by bed time! Tracey asks for a G & T with our meal and to our surprise she is given a pint glass with ice and is then pured a 1/2 pint of Gin! Its another early start and we will be leaving at 5am to catch out next flight from Lisbon to Rhodes. I hope Tracey feels up to it lol At the airport we are surrounded by hairdressers all traveling to Rhodes for the L'Oreal Congress. We are greeted by more L'Oreal reps and handed a neat black wallet which contains all our hotel details, room numbers and boarding cards for the flight.... everything has been taken care of! Once again we are back on a plane listening to the safety brief before take off. I feel my eyes slowly closing and I'm hoping when they open we will have landed.


As soon as we touch down in Rhodes we are no sooner off the plane and looking for our bags and coach ride to the hotel. This is where we will spend the next 4 days getting everything finalized for the show on Monday.As we arrive the sea of people is overwhelming and we manage to fight our way through the food and drinks reception. We are meeting with some of the top professionals in the business and I'm so excited to be part of it all.
After a quick shower and a few more zzzzzzz! we head downstairs to meet with the shows producer, make up artist and clothes stylist. Its somewhere around 7pm and Rhodes is 2 hours in front so my body clock is starting to take a few more hits. After meeting with everyone we prepare to meet early the next day as we are not the only company on stage at the congress, we are 1 of 3 and everyone else needs to spend time finalizing their plans.
8am Sunday morning we are in rehearsal and having a lighting and sound check. Straight after we stop for a quick bite to eat before trying on the outfits and making sure we are ready to start work first thing Monday!
We are on stage at 10:30 am and the schedule is tight, we have 6 models to present on stage, 2 colours, 2 cuts and 2 styles! We have 1 hour 30 minutes which from previous experience I know isn't long. Rehearsals go great, Tracey and I have to speak to an empty hall to make sure our volume levels are correct, the models are sat in the right place and that they all know their cue and when to move to the beat of the music.
The girls are looking fab, confident and ready for show day! We on the other hand are feeling exhausted and are in need of a good night sleep if we want to be up early to start getting ready.Monday morning and its all systems go! We have showered and eaten, and now we are heading to our room back stage to start preparing the models for show time. Its frantic and even though Tracey and I plan ahead as much as possible time is starting to run out. We have to make a quick dash to the stage as we are introduced as the Saks Artistic Team before we begin our presentation.
After a quick wave hello we run back to the room to continue preparing.
Times up and we need to head back stage where we finally get our microphones and ear pieces fitted. Its the first time I have had all this high tech equipment. It allows me to hear how long we have been on stage and how long we have left, its brilliant.
We hear our intro music and finally head out and all I can see is flashing lights and dark shadows in the seats....we are facing approx 500 people!
Our first demo is colour. We are working from our new Autumn/Winter trends and Tracey is working a gorgeous contrast theme of colours while I choose a range of .2 tones. Models finished its time to recap and move on to the next demo. For our cut section I am working an 80's feel, with volume and plenty of texture in the cut, while Tracey's inspiration is from the Anti head shape as she cuts dry with clippers. I am back combing away and cutting blunt and a fate gasp echos in my direction and I think the audience thinks I've gone mad! (I assure you I haven't) Cuts complete we move to our session looks, I am crimping and using a combination of techniques for a working girl grunge look while Tracey's Gothic inspiration is taking shape beautifully. My ear piece tells me time is almost up, and finally our colour demos are back washed and dried leaving us just 5 minutes to finish them off. Its been a quick turn around of each section and the rehearsal definitely paid off!
As the final looks walk the stage the buzz and thrill of the whole experience is still feeling strong within me. We leave the stage and Tracey gives me a huge hug back stage which I'm feeling is a good sign of a job well done!
Luckily we are not booking to travel home until Tuesday afternoon, giving us plenty of time to tidy up, relax and enjoy the rest of the day! We sneak in to the afternoon show as I always love to sit and watch hair being created. We manage to speak to some of the guests and the feedback is excellent!

We have a huge night out with everyone including our models and a great time has been had by all!
Big thanks to L'Oreal Portugal, Carla, Manuel for looking after us.....
Tracey for being such an inspiration and also such fun to go away with and to everyone else involved.

Thanks for reading!!
Mario x

A message from Alison Dace

Well its a hello and goodbye from me for the moment. Some of you may know im off now to have my second baby, and will be on Maternity for a few months and I leave you in the very wonderful hands of the Saks Art Team. I will be back in March 2010 to continue driving Saks Education and the Art Team onwards and upwards, I will also be looking forward to meeting all of the potential new A Team members for 2010, if you feel you want an out let for your creative juices, to be part of a team that will grow you and build you to push your limits, The A Team is for you.

Your application form will be coming to your salons by the end of the year, fill it in and get it sent back. All the info is on that form, dates, times, places and what is expected of you. If you have any future questions in the meantime, contact kellymatthews@saks.co.uk

Keep a look out for the Spring/Summer Trends Launch in Feb 2010, where you will see the fabulous shoot, created by the A Team 09, and I cant wait to see the photographic images award shots, with that great prize, where we all go to a far far land, how exciting?????..

Also I would like to say a Big goodbye to Tracey Gallagher, she has been with Saks for 22years, and has been an amazing inspiration to all who cross her path, I will miss her dearly, and wish her all the best for the next career journey.

Big Kiss, and good Luck xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

So now its time for me to say ta tar for now, have a great Crimbo and enlightening new year, and I will see you when I return next year....

HUGS xxxxxxx
Alison