Mallorye Crowell learned to braid when she was 10. Her mother, a cosmetology school graduate, taught her. Crowell’s mother always emphasized one point to her daughters: “Just look decent.”
But not everyone has the means to get professional hair care on a regular basis. Crowell hopes to help address this problem with a new initiative.
The Higher Salon, which launched Sunday, provides free hair care to women and girls through partnerships with local salons and stylists who donate their time and services. The salon aims to tackle gaps in access to hair care services.
The Higher Salon is part of The Higher Foundation, which Crowell founded and leads. The foundation provides financial assistance to support college students’ basic needs: food, housing, transportation — “all the things that a college student has to focus on in addition to the classroom,” Crowell said.
The salon fits right into this mission, just for a wider population, according to Crowell.
“I believe that hair care is a basic need, not a luxury,” she said.
Having clean, groomed hair boosts confidence for people of all ages, Crowell said. Not having it can hamper success, whether that’s in a classroom, a job interview or anywhere else.
“It’s tied to your confidence,” Crowell said. “It’s tied to your ability to thrive.”
The primary partner location where The Higher Salon is operating is Lux Studio Salon Suites on Lakewood Avenue in Atlanta. Every Sunday and Monday, The Higher Salon clients can access hair services there. About 20 clients will be served a month. To become a client, individuals should fill out an application on the salon’s website.
On Monday, the second day of the salon’s launch, rising third grader Layla Brown got braids done just in time for the beginning of the school year. Crowell detangled, washed, dried and braided the young girl’s hair over the course of about four hours.
Although Brown was a bit shy, while getting her hair done she talked about how she went to horse camp this summer and wants to make ice cream when she grows up. Brown’s older sister, Payton, got her hair done the day before.
A summer of swimming in the lake, but not consistently washing and combing, left the girls’ hair tangled, foster mother Lisa Callahan said. So, on Sunday and Monday, they drove to the salon from Bartow County, where it’s “really hard to find people” providing quality care for Black hair, she said.
The Higher Salon has roots in a Back-to-School Box Braids Program, an initiative last summer that gave foster children free braids for the start of the 2024-25 academic year. Demand continued after the program ended, which inspired Crowell to found the salon as a way to help meet Georgia’s need for accessible hair care services.
“Some foster parents just don’t know how to do their foster children’s hair,” Crowell said as she worked a comb through Brown’s hair.
For the salon’s pilot year, services are being offered only to female clients. After the year, Crowell and her partners will evaluate and make changes to expand toward serving all clients.
The long-term goal is to build a statewide network of salons and barbershops offering The Higher Salon’s services. Eventually, Crowell wants to have partners in every major city in Georgia to provide more sweeping access to free hair care.
“The amount of people that we can serve is really without boundary, because it’s based on how many partners we can get,” Crowell said.
Crowell leads The Higher Salon with Keneisha Spencer, a master cosmetologist, and Kanieceya Robinson, a registered nurse and youth mentor.
AJC Her+Story is a new series in The Atlanta Journal-Constitution highlighting women founders, creators, executives and professionals. It is about building a community. Know someone the AJC should feature in AJC Her+Story? Email us at herstory@ajc.com with your suggestions. Check out all of our AJC Her+Story coverage at ajc.com/herstory.
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