A Haircut With Nicole from Shear Genius

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This year, while visiting New York, my mom, of course, booked her annual haircut appointment with famed stylist Nick Arrojo, from the TLC makeover show What Not To Wear.   As I first blogged back in December of 2007, for years my mom has been absolutely obsessed with the hair guru and had long dreamed of booking a session with him.  So, for her birthday two years ago, the whole family got together and surprised her with an appointment with Nick during our annual New York vacation.  Well, Nick’s cut turned out so incredibly fabulous that my mom won’t even consider visiting the Big Apple now without also making an appointment with him.  It has become one of our annual New York traditions!  🙂  And, of course, this year was no different! 

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I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again – Nick Arrojo is absolutely AMAZING.  I don’t know what it is, but he must have some magic dust in that razor of his, because my mom’s hair always turns out absolutely incredible whenever he cuts it.  Sadly, we have yet to find a stylist in LA who can even come close to doing whatever it is he does to my mom’s hair.  Some people just have an innate talent, I guess, and Nick is definitely one of those people!  Not only that, but he has to be one of the nicest guys I’ve ever met.  He is a total sweetheart and he always makes my mom feel like a movie star when she visits the salon.  I honestly can’t say enough about the guy – he’s simply FABULOUS – and I can’t recommend booking an appointment with him enough!  Even at $500 a cut – which is truly outrageous – he’s worth every single penny!  Which is why I can’t believe that he’s no longer appearing on What Not To Wear.  For some incredibly odd reason, Nick was replaced this season by celebrity stylist Ted Gibson, who, in my humble opinion, is just plain BLAH!  And the fact that Ted is a former stylist of that little homewrecker Angelina Jolie only adds to my dislike of the guy.  UGH!  Even though, due to Nick’s absence, my mom no longer watches What Not To Wear, I can pretty much guarantee that no matter what happens with the show, she will still be returning to Nick for a haircut year after year.

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Oh, and here’s my mom’s new ‘do!  🙂  Unfortunately, it’s not the best picture of it, though, because just prior to it being taken, she got caught in the rain and her hair, like mine, does not do well in inclement weather.  🙁

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Those of you who read my blog regularly know that last year while visiting New York I was lucky enough to get my hair cut by Nick’s former assistant and Shear Genius Season 2 Second Runner-Up Nicole Obert and she did an absolutely amazing job!!!!  And while I really wanted to book another appointment with her during this year’s New York vacation, the Grim Cheaper talked me out of it.  🙁  I swear, why I listen to him I’ll never know!!!  LOL  Anyway, during my mom’s appointment, my fiancé, fellow stalker Owen, and I stopped in to Arrojo Studio so that I could say hi to Nick and Nicole and, let me tell you, Nicole gave me quite the talking-to!!!  She was very disappointed that I had not booked an appointment with her this year despite the Grim Cheaper’s many objections.  And, as fate would have it, Nicole just so happened to have an opening in her following day’s schedule.  So, I, of course, immediately snatched said opening right up.  🙂  Being that I had just gotten a haircut about ten days prior to leaving for New York, the Grim Cheaper was NOT at all happy about that decision.  LOL LOL LOL  He kept saying, “Didn’t you JUST get a haircut???” 

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So, bright and early the following morning, my parents, my fiancé, and I all headed down to SoHo so that I could once again get my hair cut by Nicole.  And, let me tell you, I had an absolute blast!!!! Nicole is so much fun to spend time with that I’m fairly certain I would book an appointment with her even if I didn’t like the way she cut hair, just so that I could hang out with her for an hour or so.  🙂  She’s really that much fun!  Like me, Nicole just recently got engaged, so the two of us spent a lot of time talking about wedding planning.  And, let me just say here that Nicole’s ring, which was designed by her fiancé and features a huge rock flanked by two butterflies made entirely out of diamonds,  is absolutely amazing!!!  I LOVED it.  Oh, and I just about died when Nicole told me that she had run into Cynthia Nixon, aka Miranda from Sex and the City, a few days beforehand on a New York City subway!  She said she immediately thought of me when she saw her.  Love it!  🙂  And how incredibly cool is it that CYNTHIA NIXON actually rides the subway???? Also LOVE IT!

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Nicole ended up cutting quite a bit of length off my hair and once again gave me a whole new look that was completely different from last year’s whole new look!  🙂  I find it incredible that she was able to create two such varying and unique haircuts the past two years when she really didn’t have that much to work with being that my hair was already short!   I honestly don’t know how she does it!  Needless to say, my hair turned out absolutely ADORABLE.  I LOVE it.  Nicole somehow always manages to make me look so much hipper and edgier than I normally do!  And, amazingly enough, while last year’s cut was pretty hard for me to style on my own, this year’s was incredibly easy.  I can safely say that it is the easiest-to-maintain haircut I’ve ever had in my life!  In fact, my new ‘do is so simple to style that my getting-ready time each morning has literally been cut in half!  So LOVE that!  I did have to purchase a new flat-iron because of it, though, much to the Grim Cheaper’s chagrin.  When I came home with it, he said “Wow, this haircut is the gift that just keeps on giving, isn’t it?”  LOL LOL LOL  But even though the GC is not a fan of my new ‘do, everyone else in my life is.  The compliments on it have been literally non-stop.  🙂  Oh, how I wish I could go to Nicole regularly.  🙁

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Before . . .

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. . . and after. 

I honestly cannot recommend booking an appointment with either Nick or Nicole enough!!!!  They are both incredible stylists and my mom and I feel so fortunate to have found them!

Until next time, Happy Stalking!  🙂

Stalk It: Arrojo Studio is located at 180 Varick Street in New York’s SoHo neighborhood.  To book an appointment with Nick or Nicole, you can call (212)242-7786.  You can also visit the Arrojo Studio website here.  Haircuts with Nick cost $500, but he often runs specials, announced via his website, where you can book them for around $350.  A haircut with Nicole will only set you back $68. 

New York, New Look!

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Last year, for my mom’s birthday, my dad, boyfriend, grandma, and I all chipped in to purchase her a haircut with Nick Arrojo, the celebrity hair stylist from TLC reality show What Not To Wear. My mom absolutely loves Nick, so her haircut was the present to end all presents. And, as my dad likes to say, we opened up a whole can of worms with that gift because now my mom expects an appointment with Nick every year during our annual New York vacation. 🙂 LOL So this year, on our first night in the Big Apple, we headed over to Arrojo Studio once again for a little extreme makeover, New York edition. 🙂

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I was SUPER excited to visit Nick’s studio this year as I was dying to talk to Shear Genius star and Arrojo Studio stylist Nicole Obert. Nicole had assisted Nick during my mom’s haircut last year and we both absolutely loved her. So when she competed on Shear Genius this past season my mom and I watched religiously and were absolutely floored when she came in second runner up! Even though I seriously doubted Nicole would remember me at all from last year’s appointment, when we arrived at the studio I asked the receptionist if he would have her come out so that I could say hi. Imagine my surprise when Nicole said she knew who I was AND that she had read the blog I wrote about her while she was competing on Shear Genius !!!!! How cool is that?????

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Nicole ended up assisting Nick during my mom’s haircut this year, too. (Nicole is currently an Arrojo Studio Stylist -cutting hair three days a week and assisting once a week.) We all had a blast chatting with her during my mom’s haircut . . . AND while chatting she happened to mention that she needed a hair model for her class the following morning and asked me if I wanted to do it!

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IF I wanted to do it???? Get my hair cut by Nicole from Shear Genius??? LOL Of course I did!!!! At first I felt kind of bad as I couldn’t let Nicole change my hair very drastically – I have to stick pretty close to how I appear in my acting headshots. So, unfortunately, she wasn’t given a lot of freedom to experiement with my hair. But I was SUPER EXCITED to get my hair cut by her, anyway! So, bright and early the next morning, I showed up at Arrojo Studio for a little Shear Genius! And I was literally pinching myself the whole time! 🙂

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Nicole was SO MUCH FUN to talk to and hang out with during my haircut. She is absolutely hilarious in person and had me cracking up the whole time. We discussed everything from styling hair to what it was like to be on reality TV to celebrity gossip. I was floored to find out that Jo De La Rosa (of The Real Housewives of Orange County and Date My Ex: Jo & Slade fame) comes to Nicole for a haircut whenever she is in New York. 🙂 So cool!

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My hair turned out INCREDIBLE!!!! Even though Nicole couldn’t really change my hair very much, I feel like she gave me a completely new look! She gave me a razor cut ala Katie Holmes’ bob (the one Katie had before she got all chop happy and hacked off all of her hair). I must say that I absolutely love my new ‘do and sometimes I can’t even believe it’s me when I look in the mirror. 🙂 I literally don’t recognize myself – but in a good way. 🙂 I look so very sophisticated, so very modern, so very “New York”! Nicole took me from “soccer mom” to “city gal” with several small swipes of her razor. I cannot wait to go back next year!!! Now if only I could style it as well as she did!!! 🙂 OH and I forgot to mention the cost of my haircut. Because Nicole was cutting my hair for an Arrojo Studio class, it only cost me $20!!! Yes, you read that right – $20!

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Before . . .

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. . . and after.

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Oh, and, of course, my mom’s hair turned out great, too! 🙂

I HIGHLY recommend stalking Nick and Nicole at Arrojo Studio. While Nick’s haircuts are pricey ($500), they are worth every penny. Last year my mom got stopped constantly by random strangers complimenting her on her hair. 🙂 A haircut with Nicole is considerably less – only $68. BUT on weekday mornings, if you volunteer to be a hair model, you can get a “shear genius” haircut for only $20!!!!! That’s less than Supercuts!!!!

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: Arrojo Studio is located at 180 Varick Street in New York City. You can make an appointment with either Nick or Nicole by calling (212)242-7786 or by visiting the Arrojo Studio website. You can also check out Nicole’s website here. To inquire about being a hair model, and getting a cut for only $20 by one of Arrojo’s many talented stylists, you can call the studio directly.

Go Team Nicole!

My mom called me in a complete tizzy last week screaming at me to immediately turn my TV onto Bravo. It turns out that Nicole, Nick Arrojo’s assistant who worked on my mom’s hair during her appointment with Nick last December, is currently competing on Season 2 of the TV show Shear Genius. Shear Genius is a reality show hosted by Jacklyn Smith in which hair stylists compete in on-air styling challenges in order to win $100,000 and a styling job for a photo spread in Allure Magazine.

My mom and I absolutely fell in love with Nicole during the appointment with Nick. She was completely down to earth and adorable and she really could not have been nicer. She had a really sweet relationship with Nick, too. Nicole has been doing great on Shear Genius and I really think she has a good chance of taking home the final prize! Until then my fingers are crossed! Go Team Nicole!

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: You can catch Shear Genius on Bravo, Wednesday nights at 10 p.m. ET/PT. Nick Arrojo’s studio is located at 180 Varick Street in the SoHo area of New York City. You can also visit the Arrojo Studio website here. I highly recommend making an appointment with Nick – he is truly amazing!

What Not To Shear – Nick Arrojo’s Studio in New York

I guess I come by my obsessions naturally – the apple does not fall too far from the tree as they say, because my mom has been completely obsessed with the show What Not To Wear for years now. She is especially obsessed with Nick Arrojo, the hairstylist from the TLC makeover show. She had been chattering for over two years about how much she wanted Nick to cut her hair – so this year for her birthday we surprised her with a haircut from Nick which we scheduled during our New York vacation. Needless to say my mom was SUPER EXCITED! She cried for about ten minutes after she found out.

Finding Nick’s salon was easy – I just did a Google search of Nick Arrojo and What Not To Wear, and his website – www.arrojostudio.com – popped up. Then I called and simply made an appointment. It was that easy.

img_0317.jpg Flash forward six weeks to our trip in New York – my mom was so excited she could hardly talk! I was a little nervous, as the receptionist had told me when I made the appointment that my mom would get 45 minutes with Nick. That didn’t seem like very much time and I was worried that the whole appointment would be rushed and my mom wouldn’t get the special attention I wanted her to have. I could not have been more wrong! We were at Nick’s studio for over 3 hours and my mom was made to feel like she was queen for the day. The appointment was not rushed in any way, shape or form, and Nick could not have been any more humble or down to earth. His assistant, Nicole, was fabulous, as well.

img_0321.jpg Overall, it was a perfect day for my mom, and an even more perfect birthday present. If you are a fan of Nick, I highly recommend saving your pennies and booking a haircut – you will not regret it.

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img_0412.jpg Oh and my mom’s hair turned out FABULOUS! She loves it -everyone loves it. The only downside is that now that we are back in LA she has no idea how she is going to find a stylist to maintain it. Guess we’ll just have to head back to New York!

Stalk It: Nick’s studio is located at 180 Varick Street in SoHo, New York. Their telephone number is (212)242-7786. I would recommend calling for an appointment at least a month in advance. A haircut from Nick will run you $500, but it is worth every penny! If you would like a less expensive haircut, you can get sheared by one of his trained stylists for a fraction of the cost.