Perth’s gender-neutral beauty salon

The beauty industry has seen a veritable explosion of unisex products in recent years from Rihanna’s Fenty to Harry Styles’ Pleasing — and now Perth has received the gender-neutral treatment.

Megan Solomon opened Self Care Salon in Maylands in 2020 to create a safe space, and a space to be pampered, for people of all genders, abilities, races, ages and body sizes.

“It’s definitely a very intimate space,” Solomon told Perth Now.

“So making that as comfortable as possible and asking people if they need anything else to make them feel comfortable…it makes it less intimidating…making your treatment menu gender-neutral in your consult forms, adding a pronoun option as well, telling clients your pronouns to make an open conversation and dialogue there.”

Soloman has more than 15 years of experience, but funnily enough, the impetus for the studio came about when she was a teenager.

“When I was about 19, I had a friend who was trans that hadn’t come out yet. So we used to have little private sessions at home where we’d play and discuss different treatments, basically let them explore their femininity in a nice safe space,” she said.

Self Care’s clientele has steadily grown thanks to word of mouth and being “explicit” about providing positive experiences for under-represented people, and now, even her staff seek out the salon.

When Solomon first opened, she ran a competition for a customer to win a treatment. About a year later, the very person who won, Talei MacBeth, emailed Solomon about the impact it had on them.

“They said, ‘I didn’t realise that studios like yours existed that were gender neutral’. And themselves being non-binary, didn’t think that it was a space for them even as a career option, but since coming in, they went and studied beauty therapy. And they asked if I would be open to giving them some work experience … and now they’re my staff member,” Solomon said.

“It’s the most rewarding, having someone in the space that understands the needs (of clients) on such a deep level.”