Intro to natural beauty

A few weeks ago I joined Salon Vertigo, Ann Arbor's progressive, intelligent "green" salon. I joined because I love the staff, the funky general store-like atmosphere, and because the salon values natural beauty. I had been working at a salon that puts image first, health and environment second. Now that I'm at Salon Vertigo, I can promote natural beauty the way I had always dreamed of doing.

So what does it mean to be "natural" or "green?" You are invited to join me on a journey in which we'll attempt to define this question and address all the related questions. We will learn that the products we thought were more natural or safer than others may not be so great after all. We will learn that products we thought were horrible for our health are not so bad in moderation. We will learn that educating ourselves is the key.

So let's define natural beauty. I like the following definitions of natural in the Encarta Dictionary: conforming with nature, in accordance with the usual course of nature, present in or produced by nature, not artificial or synthetic. And beauty is defined as follows: the combination of qualities that make something pleasing and impressive to look at, listen to, touch, smell, or taste; personal physical attractiveness, especially with regard to the use of cosmetics and other methods of enhancing it.

So natural beauty suggests beauty that is created in harmony with nature. Those of us in the salon industry who believe in natural beauty try our best to find products manufactured with the health of our environment and our clients in mind.