Who Doesn’t Love a Work trip?
Stepping off the plane at Madrid airport we were hit with an intense dose of vitamin D that we didn’t know we had so badly needed. After a remarkably uneventful first flight since the world shut down, we had made it out of the country! But this trip is strictly work and no play (if you believe that you’ll believe anything) Chloe and I had a highly coveted invitation to attend Revlon Professional Front Row Summit in Madrid, Spain followed by the International Hairdressing Awards.
We Are Partying With the Best Salons in The World
After checking into Europe’s largest hotel, the Madrid Marriot Auditorium, we scoped out the facilities, in awe of how huge this place really was, it felt more like an airport than hotel. We found ourselves with a bit of time to chill out at the roof top pool, casually sharing the water with some of hairdressing’s most prestigious names before our first invitation that evening.
We were whisked off to an entertaining first night with the UK attendees at Platea Madrid a cavernous theatre-meets-restaurant venue that hosts live entertainment whilst serving food from some of the best chefs from the culinary world. We enjoyed all this whilst getting to know the other hair stylists from all different salons across the UK and Ireland. This is my favourite part of these events, making new friends and catching up with some old faces.
We Are ready to learn
The summit began in an enormous auditorium where we met our MC for the event, the enormously talented Miguel Garcia Cotado. We had immersive discussions and presentations of the changes we have witnessed within the industry, what to expect going forward and how to adequately plan for this. Another of our favourites was the fashion forecast where we were presented with the fashion predictions of 22/23 we both found this really exciting and immediately began planning how we can be ready to offer this in the salon. We finished the days learning with a jaw dropping premier runway show by Revlon Professional Ambassador Mark Leeson and his fabulous team.
We Are Part of A World First
A surprise part of our experience at the Front Row Summit was a world first, using an interactive app and everything we’d learned, the 1500 attendees were invited to co-create of a brand new colour, Revlon Professional’s Colour or the Year 2023. This will be revealed next year and we are SO excited! Leaving the auditorium on a high we then spent the evening enjoying a beautiful cocktail dinner with our Revlon friends old and new and we danced the night away till the early hours.
We had a free day the following day so we headed into Madrid city centre where we enjoyed some retail therapy and roof top tapas at El Corte Ingles that has a stunning view of the whole city.
That evening we scrubbed up for the purple carpet International Hairdressing Awards. It was truly something to behold and an honour to be a part of, after years of covid restrictions meaning not only our industry shutting down, but these kind of events hadn’t taken place either; Its fair to say that the IHA bought them back with a bang. We enjoyed a sensory overload with some of the most incredible runway shows we’ve ever seen and cheered along some of the most inspiring hairdressing icons throughout the world. Of course we had to have another party to celebrate the IHAs and we were able to rub shoulders with some of our industry icons such as Errol Douglas MBE and Robert Masciave.
We Are Back to Bring You the Best
Its safe to say we where exhausted by the time our trip came to a close, in fact I had only managed an hours sleep before Chloe dragged me to the airport but we had the most incredible time. We came back pumped and armed with the tools to bounce back onto the salon floor bigger an better than ever.
PS Don’t forget to check out our blog on the things us hair stylists love and hate when it comes to appointments!
