Tina Llewellyn at Hair Asylum wins Mackay’s best hairdresser competition

Whether it’s tweaking the toner, adding ‘peek-a-boo’ blondes or cutting funky curtain bangs, Mackay’s best hairdresser as voted by you is determined to keep her cuts and clients fresh.

Tina Llewellyn is a self-professed “people person”.

Combine that with her passion to keeping things interesting and voila, you have Mackay’s best hairdresser.

Mrs Llewellyn said the secret was to never assume you knew what a client wanted.

“You have to always offer a change, you can’t just get in a bad habit of mixing up someone’s colour before you have a chat with them,” she said.

“You never know what someone is feeling.”

But the gravity of a bad hair day is not lost on Mrs Llewellyn who uses her 27 years of hairdresser intuition to ensure her clients are ready for those big shake-ups.

“You can usually tell when someone is ready for a change,” she said.

“Some people can come in and say I want a total change, but then you’ll go through the consultation and they might not be.

“You really have to make sure they’re ready.”

But even for those wanting “the usual”, Mrs Llewellyn is passionate about keeping things fresh.

“Just tweaking the toner slightly, or putting in a few peek-a-boo blondes underneath or even some funky curtain bangs, I think it’s important to keep it exciting.”

While some days could be challenging, Mrs Llewellyn said she wouldn’t want to be doing anything else.

Her first foray into the hairdressing world was when she was 16 years old and modelling for a friend in a Mackay hair show.

After the show, her friend’s boss offered her a job in the salon, an opportunity Mrs Llewellyn still feels “incredibly lucky” to have had.

Mrs Llewellyn said she managed other salons for a few years before finally opening Hair Asylum, her very own salon 18 years ago.

The salon still stands in the same place on Victoria Street with the catchy logo ‘We want to mess with your head’ imprinted on the glass walls.

She said while the job could be challenging, the wins more than made up for it.

“It’s just really rewarding,” Mrs Llewellyn said.

“When you can give someone what they want, the results are just awesome.”

Piper Formosa, Tina Llewellyn and Mackenzie Goodchild at Hair Asylum. Picture: Lillian Watkins

While keeping things fresh has made the salon a success, Mrs Llewellyn praised her staff and the atmosphere they created for clients.

“We’re always told how nice the atmosphere is in here, we all love to have a chat,” she said.

Mackenzie Goodchild has been working with Mrs Llewellyn for three months and said her boss was “just the best”.

“It feels like family,” Ms Goodchild said.

“It makes you love coming to work.”