The April Edit
Natalie Gordon Dunton | Owner, Pro Makeup Artist
Spring has officially sprung, and though we are busy with all of our beautiful Ave42 brides, with it being the very beginning of wedding season, we have quite a few other things to get excited about this month! As you may have already seen in our last edit, Ave42 is opening a second, West End location. But what you may not have heard yet is that our new location will also feature an extensions bar. We made our name with impeccable color, cuts, and bridal glam, and now, we are adding hand-tied extensions to our services list! While many of us dream of long, luscious locks, not so many of us are genetically blessed enough to grow them naturally, no matter how many biotin supplements we take. That’s why we are over the moon to offer some of the highest quality hair on the market to the Richmond community.
If you know us, you know we are all about preparation. In order to get ready for our big opening next month, we brought in celebrity stylist and extension extraordinaire (and November Cover Girl!) Melissa McNabb to show our stylists how it’s done. A leading voice within the extension niche, we are so, so lucky that our stylists got to learn how to install extensions from the best of the best. As beauty professionals through and through, we know the learning is never done in this field. There’s always a new technique, a new service, a new trend to learn, and we value education above everything else (yes, even our go-to deep conditioners!).
Because Ave42 Salon is committed to providing the very best education to its team, we brought in live models so our stylists could get the most realistic training possible. This month, we are featuring one of our extension course models as our April Cover Girl, as well as sharing all of the easy, breezy looks and trends we are loving this season. There’s so much to celebrate this spring, and we can’t wait to do it with you in the salon!
We are literally counting down the days until we get to open the doors to our West End location for the first time and provide the best, silkiest, strongest extensions to #Ave42 babes everywhere in the city. In the Ave42 spirit, we made sure our stylists are completely confident in their skills before they get behind the chair to do a new service. That’s why we brought in one of the best extension artists and celebrity stylists, Melissa McNabb, to teach the Ave42 stylists everything they need to know about extensions. And because we know that working with a human is quite different than practicing on a doll head, we also brought in live models to our extension crash course. Enter Hannah Grace, our April Cover Girl.
Hannah Grace is a professional model with a truly impressive number of shoots and campaigns under her belt. She walked for the fall/winter 2023 season of New York Fashion Week, and she’s a regular at Richmond Fashion Week and the Foster Beauty Fashion Show in Hampton Roads. However, she’s much more than an amazing model. Hannah has truly immersed herself in the Virginia fashion and beauty industries by coordinating and hosting various shows and events around the state. Hannah also shares the experience and industry know-how she’s picked up throughout countless commercial and editorial shoots with younger models through mentoring and workshops.
Hannah is truly a Richmond model to watch, so we could not have been more excited to welcome her as a guest in our extension installation class. Melissa McNabb, as well as the training Ave42 artists, installed custom Ave42, 20-inch Ellie and Laura wefts in Hannah’s hair, and we were truly blown away by the difference. One of the best parts of being in the beauty industry is giving women every last inch of the hair and confidence they deserve. We were so thankful that Hannah was able to help our stylists learn this sought-after skill, and we are also so happy to gift her the most luxurious hair around. Follow Hannah Grace at @_hgrace_ to see her stunning work and to see everything she gets up to next.
Caitlin Flessatte
Allyson Barkley
Amanda Smider
Marena Jones
Jennifer Daoulas
Jessica Greth
Heather Martin
Jessi Ceney
Solona McKane
Jaclyn Palazzolo
Jess Keefe
Rachael Krieger
Ashton Kite
Phoebe Hankins
Emily Craven
Lindsay Abbott
Jill Donohue
Jessica Smith
Cleo Dan
Erika Colleen
Meet our April Artist of the Month: blonding and updo expert Erika Colleen
While Erika is one of the newer stylists on the Ave42 team, she’s no newbie to the industry. Erika has been coloring, cutting, and styling hair for over four years in the Richmond area. Erika loves to create styles that really speak to the person wearing them, but her favorite services include blonding and creating updos. The thing she loves the most about her job is providing a sense of control for her clients in a world of unpredictability. No matter how chaotic life can get, there’s a few things you can always control, and one of them is hair. In addition to all of the other services she has under her belt, Erika is adding hair extensions to the list after our master class with Melissa McNabb. Erika truly excelled at learning the ins and outs of extension intallation, and we can’t wait until our clients experience her extension magic, too.
R + CO
Forget everything your mom ever told you about all-in-one products.
With a style of the month that accentuates natural texture, we are all about R and Co’s Labyrinth 3-in-1 Texturizing Shampoo + Conditioner + Styler this April. A style with such a devil-may-care attitude calls for a low-maintenance, effortless hair routine that will get you out the door in record time. And what could be easier and faster than a three-in-one product? The key to a chic French bob or lob is natural texture, and with conditioning polymers that gently bond to hair, this formula will give you the weightless volume and organic movement to make all of your messy bob dreams come true. A gentle cleansing formula that conditions and nourishes the hair while making it a piece of cake to style is the perfect way to ring in a season of easy living with the perfect messy French bob.
Our Favorite Makeup Look of the Month
Not every blushing bride is all about the blush. This beautiful bride wanted the perfect bridal glow without the pink, so we got right to work to create a radiant complexion and the perfect peachy nude lip. Makeup maven Natalie highlighted this Ave42 bride’s gorgeous hazel eyes with a subtle smoky bronzed look and polished her naturally thick eyebrows with a gel. To achieve this voluminous and glossy nude lip, Natalie used a combination of products. In the recipe: Nyx Slip Lip Pencil Creamy Long-Lasting Lip Liner in Nude Beige, Charlotte Tilbury’s K.I.S.S.I.N.G. Lipstick in Nude Kate, and Fenty’s Gloss Bomb Universal Lip Luminizer in $weetmouth.
Hairstyles To Watch This Month
With the new season come new hair trends, and there is one cut we’ll have our eye on all spring: the French bob. A trend that is predicted to dominate salon books and Instagram feeds alike, the French bob is a looser, more natural take on the classic bob. This cut is perfect for any texture Whether you are working with curls or straight strands—or any texture in between—the French bob requires minimal styling. Ave42 stylist Taylor Ellis created her own spin on the lived-in look French style is so famous for with organic babylights and a touch more length.
Thanks #ave42babes!
We’ll see you next month!
Any questions? Send us an email!