Sharlene Lee is the leading hair salon queen down under, ruling Perth’s beauty scene with her empire, Circles. But now, my brain is going around in circles at the astronomical cost of hair extensions. The obsession with long, thick, Instagram-worthy hair has gone beyond vanity—it’s a full-blown financial commitment. I swear, the cost of hair extensions is one of the reasons Gen Z and younger still live at home. How can they afford rent when their hair alone is setting them back thousands of dollars? Forget student loans; fake hair might be the real reason behind their debt.
Do I look like an angry bird, in my Aston Martin?
The Real Cost of Hair Extensions
Let’s break it down. A high-end hair extension service can cost anywhere from $2,000 to $5,000, sometimes more if you factor in maintenance. And let’s be honest, hair extensions require a ridiculous amount of upkeep. You don’t just throw them in and forget about them. You need special shampoos, conditioners, brushes, regular salon visits—essentially, a whole new lifestyle. All that just to keep up with the illusion of thick, luscious locks.
The new methods of applying hair extensions, from tape-ins to microbeads, make the process less damaging—so they say. But at the end of the day, you’re still gluing or weaving something foreign onto your scalp. Your real hair? It suffers. The weight of the extensions can cause breakage, hair loss, and even bald spots. And don’t get me started on the nightmare that is removing them. If you think your hair will look like a fairytale after a year of extensions, think again. It’ll likely be thinner and more damaged than ever.
Natural hair in Italy.
Fake Hair, Fake Beauty
I walk down the streets and see young women with ridiculously long, thick hair cascading down their backs. And I know. It’s fake. The glued-in wefts, the clip-ins, the sewn-in bundles—it’s all a mirage. The beauty industry has completely redefined what it means to have ‘good hair.’ Natural hair is no longer enough.
But the biggest irony? These same young women are destroying their real hair just to keep up with this unattainable beauty standard. The cycle never ends. They get extensions, their real hair suffers, so they need more extensions to cover up the damage. It’s a never-ending loop of dependency, fueled by influencers, celebrities, and, of course, salon owners cashing in big time. Sharlene Lee must be laughing all the way to the bank, cruising around in her new Mercedes while young women are scraping together their savings for their next set of extensions.
The Angry Bird Eyebrow Epidemic
And don’t even get me started on the fake eyebrows. The microblading trend? It started out as a promising solution for sparse brows, but somewhere along the way, it turned into an epidemic. Now, young women are walking around with angry bird brows—thick, overly arched, and looking permanently surprised. The worst part? It’s expensive and semi-permanent. If the technician botches the job, you’re stuck looking like an Instagram filter gone wrong.
When did natural beauty become such a crime? Why are we all so obsessed with looking like Snapchat versions of ourselves in real life?
It’s not just hair and eyebrows; it’s lips, cheek fillers, Botox—it’s an entire industry preying on insecurities.
My Hair Extension Horror Story
Seventeen years ago, I did hair extensions. I was pregnant and thought, ‘Why not?’ It was a disaster. My hair looked terrible, and the damage was unreal. My natural hair never recovered. It’s thin, fragile, and struggles to grow. Would I love long, thick hair? Absolutely. But at what cost? I refuse to go through that nightmare again.
Many women think they’re investing in beauty, but really, they’re just signing up for a cycle of addiction. Once you start, it’s hard to stop. The damage forces you to keep relying on more and more extensions, and before you know it, your real hair is nothing more than a memory.
The Brides Corpse Aesthetic
Look around. The beauty industry has created a generation of young women who look eerily artificial. It’s like a never-ending Halloween parade of exaggerated features—pumped-up lips, tattooed brows, fake hair, over-contoured faces. Where is the authenticity? Where is the individuality? It’s all blending into one big, homogenous, overly-filtered nightmare.
I understand wanting to enhance features, but when enhancement turns into total reconstruction, something is seriously wrong. There’s nothing wrong with wanting to look good, but at some point, we have to ask: what are we really enhancing? Confidence? Or just more debt?
Is It Worth It?
Before you sit in that salon chair and hand over thousands of dollars, ask yourself: is it really worth it? Will this make you feel better about yourself, or are you just feeding into an industry designed to make you feel like you’re never enough? Hair extensions might give you the illusion of glamour, but at the end of the day, they’re just that—an illusion.
And if Sharlene Lee is out there, I’d love to ask—how does it feel driving that Mercedes, knowing it’s been funded by fake hair and shattered self-esteems? Because from where I’m standing, the real winner here isn’t the woman with long, thick locks. It’s the salons profiting off insecurities.
The Takeaway
Real beauty isn’t found in a salon chair or a hair extension bundle. It’s not in microbladed brows or filler-filled lips. It’s in embracing what’s naturally yours—flaws and all. The next time you think about dropping thousands on fake hair, remember: you’re perfect as you are. And your bank account will thank you too.
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