Today we’d like to introduce you to Lisa Weller.
Hi Lisa, so excited to have you with us today. What can you tell us about your story?
I’ve been a hairdresser for 25 years now I started in San Antonio at a local beauty school. I worked behind the chair at a salon on the north side for six years before I moved to New York City seeking to grow my skill level and work as an editorial stylist backstage of fashion weeks and on photo shoots. I made some amazing relationships during that time that open doors for me to be able to travel all over the world for the past 15 years doing hair for all of the major fashion weeks in London Milan in Paris for brands like dolce and Gabbana, Prada, Dior, Celine, Chanel, and Louis Vuitton just a name a few. In 2008 I moved back to San Antonio and opened Twirl salon. It was meant to only be a small boutique salon with just me and maybe an assistant and somehow it’s been open now for 17 years and has grown into a 19 chair salon with about 16 employees. After the pandemic, I got an opportunity to start working with some celebrity Hairstylists and have now crossed over into the red carpet world. I just completed my third Oscars and most recently assisting Mara Roszak with the now Oscar winning Zoe Saldana. I also worked at the Cannes film festival last year, as well as the Golden Globes Met Gala, the Emmys and the sag awards. I also recently assisted the amazing Adir Abirgel with Nicole Kidman on the cover of the cover of Vanity Fair. Somehow, in the midst of all of this, I’ve been able to command quite an impressive clientele here in San Antonio and also train my employees on how to do hair at the highest level. It truly is my passion taking girls who wanna learn and showing them everything that I have learned over these 25 years I know we are making San Antonio a more beautiful and happy place.
Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
Ha lol definitely not a smooth road. My first obstacle came in just trying to get the plumbing approved by the city so I could open my studio. What I thought would take three months ended up being nine months. It was a huge setback and very expensive had I known how hard it was going to be I may not have tried to do it. The other setbacks have come from people not being able to see my vision early on. I needed to work and make money before I could take that money and invest in what I knew could become what TWIRL is today. several employees that I trained for years left to start their own salons and that was definitely a difficult pill to swallow. I now look at it as more of a legacy that I’m leaving the city that so many great salons have opened because of the time I have spent with people training them how to be good hair stylists. I also attempted to open a second location in Austin in 2018. We were open for about two years and then the pandemic came and I decided that San Antonio was the place I needed to be full-time. The pandemic was also a huge challenge as a business owner, trying to navigate reopening and servicing servicing our customers safely and keeping my employees paid and taken care of. It was truly a difficult time for everybody in the world, but we made the best of it and actually the business grew during that time and we became better because of it.
Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
We are full service hair salon, but I would say we specialize in bespoke or customized hairstyles. I really believe in not cookie cutter looks but finding the best version of everyone who sits in our chairs. This requires a lot of training which we do every other Monday as a group to build our skills. I would say our hand painted highlighting technique that I developed keeps hair the healthiest it can be. “healthy hair is the prettiest hair” is one of our slogans, so we really try to keep people educated on what will give them the healthiest hair. I believe that you can’t create beauty unless it comes from a place of love, we have to love our craft, ourselves, each other, and our clients and out of that we create beauty. “love is beauty” is one of our core values, and I feel like that does set us apart. when you walk into Twirl, you will feel an instant positive energy and be greeted with a smile because everyone is truly excited to welcome you into our space. I do think we are known for that and that makes me so proud.
We love surprises, fun facts and unexpected stories. Is there something you can share that might surprise us?
That I graduated from Texas A&M with a nutrition degree.
Pricing:
- We are a high-end Salon with prices that range because of expertise levels. All of our service prices are set by the time it takes to do them.
- We offer free consultations and we also all share clients so we try to help the client find the stylist that is best in their budget who can do what they are looking for
Contact Info:
- Website: Twirl hair.com
- Instagram: @twirlsalon
