Letter from the Editor.(Brazilian hair-straightening; vanity)(Editorial)

Letter from the Editor: January '08

Vanity Cases

I was lounging on a friend's boat on a perfect day in August when the conversation meandered to hair. My friend Sasha showed off the results of a salon treatment

she'd just gotten. She said it was something from Brazil; she wasn't sure what, but she thought her hair had never looked so straight and shiny. I sat up on my towel. The treatment she was talking about was one we were investigating for Allure. We'd discovered that Brazilian hair straightening involved a solution that contains formaldehyde, a human carcinogen. I told her she had to

stop, and Sasha said she'd never have the treatment again. Someone else in the group accused

me of buzzkill, so we moved on to less dire subjects, like shoes. When Allure published our investigation on the growing popularity of the dangerous Brazilian hair-straightening treatment in the October issue, I expected salons to drop the service in fear, if not in shame. No such luck. In fact, Women's Wear Daily reported that some salons experienced such a spike in business that they actually added staff to handle the overflow. One salon owner in Los Angeles said that customers mentioned the Allure article when they requested the Brazilian treatment. This is insane. And the madness doesn't stop with hair. Growing numbers of women across the country are rushing to clinics to ...