‘Salon suite’ combines services under one roof

Anyone walking by the front of LUX, a new business on Washington’s square, will likely see someone getting a haircut on the other side of the large, fountain-facing window. But LUX is not just a hair salon.

At the moment, it’s a collection of hair stylists, nail technicians, a massage therapist and a physical therapist, all under one roof. The clientele has some overlap, but the businesses operate more or less independent of one another, each controlling their own hours, their own services, their own interior decor.

The concept — called a “salon suite” — was a longtime dream of LUX Owner and Hair Stylist Deana DeLong.

“It’s the idea of being able to be your own boss, carry the product that you want, do the services that you want to do,” she said. “You get to put your personality in each space … everybody’s creative sides are so different, and that’s so fun to have in a space.”

The result is not only a community of small businesses, but a convenience for clients. Because the services at LUX are so varying, visitors enjoy a degree of privacy about their reasons for stopping by, despite the entryway at the heart of downtown. DeLong said she was considering the addition of a family therapist, or aesthetician, for that reason, but said she was open to others interested in joining the team.

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Rather than providing specific kinds of services, she said she hoped to find other small businesses that matched the personalities already there, and fit into the broader themes of LUX.

“Beauty, wellness and spa, anything that fits into kind of that category, is important to me,” DeLong said. “The main thing is, I really want positive energy and good people in this space.”

The renovation process to set up the suites was quite extensive.

The ground-level business was previously a church office, with a wide-open floor plan, a handful of cubicles, and little else in the way of interior decor. DeLong personally spent countless long days at the building, tearing out carpet, knocking decorative holes in cement walls to expose the brick beneath, raising ceilings, restoring original floors, and making numerous other adjustments.

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In January, she and other salon suite members showed up and, over the course of five weekends, prepared the building’s east side for their businesses. After that came the much longer task of preparing the west side, where the suites are now. More recently, Earthly Blessings has moved into the east side of the building, adding a retail space there.

As for the suite side, it’s now a collection of rooms, each with its own four walls and lockable door. DeLong plans to convert a back-alley area into a courtyard eventually, and draw in a handful of other small businesses for the remaining rooms LUX has open.

She said she couldn’t be happier with how the project turned out.

“It was almost a clean slate,” DeLong said. “I literally came in with blue painter’s tape and started marking on the floor … When I say I’ve lived here since January, I have lived here since January. Every weekend, I’d come here and I’d tear down walls.”

Comments: Kalen.McCain@southeastiowaunion.com