Our fearless leader, Greg Decker, is in a special training this week with Kathleen Mattie, the Director of Testing for L’Oreal Professionnel and the INOA color line. This is the first time a salon owner has been invited to work behind the scenes with L’Oreal on their color line. Yesterday, he worked on 9 models with Kathleen, developing color formulas and learning the intricacies of the color line. L’Oreal has identified Azur West as a flagship color salon for their INOA brand, and Greg is training to be a regional expert for both Shu Uemura and INOA.

Azur West Artistic Director, Tony Sanchez, just returned from a five day “Master Class” at the Vidal Sassoon Academy in Santa Monica, California. Only 12 Artistic Directors from salons around the U.S. were selected by Vidal Sassoon to participate in this color and cutting class that helps to define the new hair trends and looks that people are wearing all throughout the country.

Here are some photos of a hot new hair trend that you can expect to see in 2011. Enjoy!

ABC’s Mirror Mirror and celebrity stylist Jason Backe filmed an episode at Azur West. Along with Backe, several of the Azur West staff was also there to help these ladies with their makeovers. Keep a look out for us in an upcoming episode! The new episode airs this Sunday, March 27 at 10pm on KTRK Channel 13. Check out the last episode here.