Hair emergencies are real, they are never convenient, and they are almost always survivable with fast hands and an honest phone call. This page exists so that at eleven at night, you already know exactly what happens next.
24/7
For retainer clients
10 min
To an honest triage
90 min
Manchester & Cheshire
0
Questions that don't help
Eleven pm, a supermarket box, a result somewhere between aubergine and emergency. The triage call decides what can be neutralised tonight and what needs daylight — and either way, you will be presentable by morning.
The invitation you accepted an hour ago, the camera wall that comes with it. A same-evening appointment builds a look that photographs clean on no notice — and the finishing kit stays with you for the morning.
A story is running, a statement is being drafted, and you will be photographed leaving the building whether you like it or not. Hair is the one variable that can be controlled by dawn. It will be.
Handled differently to everything else: slower, softer, at whatever hour the house is quietest. Dignity at short notice, for you and for anyone in the family who needs the chair more than they'll admit.
It seemed fine in their mirror. It is not fine. Corrective triage stabilises the damage the same day, makes it presentable, and maps the quiet weeks back to where you were — without a word to anyone, including them.
Landing at six, dinner at eight, hair that crossed nine time zones in seat 2A. Ninety minutes at the airport hotel between the two has been done often enough to have its own kit configuration.
The sequence is the same at 2pm and 2am. Only the city changes the arithmetic.
The call
Retainer clients hold a number that answers at any hour. Everyone else writes to the usual address with the word 'tonight' in the subject — it is read with the urgency it implies.
The triage
Two photographs in good light and three questions. She'll tell you on the phone what's fixable tonight, what needs daylight, and what shouldn't be touched for 48 hours — even when that's not the answer anyone wanted.
The arrival
Manchester and Cheshire, usually within the hour and a half — the kit lives packed. London and beyond depends on trains and honesty, both of which you'll get immediately.
The work
However long it takes, at whatever address works. Emergencies have been resolved in hotel bathrooms, dressing rooms, one stationary car and a House of Commons office. The room matters less than the light.
The silence
No follow-up that could surface anywhere, no anecdote at anyone's dinner party, no invoice line that says what happened. The fee reflects the hour; the discretion is the same price as always — included.
Honesty before heroics
If the right answer is 'this waits until morning', that's the answer you'll get at midnight. Hair has chemistry-imposed speed limits, and pretending otherwise is how one emergency becomes two.
Presentable now, perfect later
Crisis work happens in two passes: tonight's pass makes you photographable and composed; the follow-up appointment, days later, makes it as if nothing ever happened. Both are part of the same fee.
The calm is the service
Half the job at 1am is the hands; the other half is being the one unbothered person in the room. She has done this for long enough that the panic stops at the door — yours included.
No questions that don't help
Why the announcement is happening, who the photograph is for, what tomorrow's headline says — none of it is asked. The only questions are about your hair and your hours.
Standing arrangement and retainer clients, as part of their terms. It is answered personally at any hour and has been used from four continents — sparingly, which is why it works.
No forms, no booking systems, no records you didn’t agree to. Write a line — or have your people write it — and Melissa will reply personally.
Or by introduction, through a current client