Check Out The Chic Nature-Inspired Design of Honeycomb Hair Lounge

With experience working in several different salons, Jillian Ripplinger focused all of her creativity and inspiration into opening her own salon, Honeycomb Hair Lounge.

“When I was in my 20’s, I wanted to travel and experience cultures, so I moved to Australia in 2019, and I was there for about nine months. I’ve had a longing to go there and throughout that time, I felt an immense amount of creativity and inspiration just from the culture and how environmentally friendly they were,” she says. “In my 30’s, I wanted to open a business so when I came home from Australia, I knew I wanted to open a salon that was inspired by nature.”

Ripplinger had originally imagined only opening a small space for herself and another stylist, but things didn’t go as planned. “When I was looking at smaller spaces, none of them were really what I was looking for,” she says. “Then, I ended up coming across this beautiful space in the Warehouse District in Regina. It was already designed beautifully, and although it was a lot bigger than what I had planned, it’s where we ended up.”

Personal Touches

Regina’s Warehouse District is made up of older and unique warehouse spaces with a lot of character, and luckily for Ripplinger, her space came pre- renovated. “The business that was here before us was a plaster company and they did a lot of different designs in the space to showcase their work to their customers, so we already had a well- designed space,” she says. “After that, it was a matter of making it work for us and for a salon; we painted the walls, added a sink area into what used to be a storage room, and a majority of the other renovations took place in the back, like our staff room and a private space that we rent out to a message therapist. The space had a great design already and we just got to add the Honeycomb touch to it with plants and minimalistic decor.”

As she was inspired by Australia’s nature, Ripplinger wanted a space that featured clean and minimal lines while also adding a bit of a feminine touch with flowers and greenery to make the space feel cozy and like home.

“My family has been a huge part of Honeycomb,” she says. “My parents are really handy and actually flipped homes before helping me with the salon, so they had a lot of experience with renovations. My dad had a lot of the handyman duties and I did a lot of the interior designing.”

DIY Details

Honeycomb Hair Lounge was also inspired by Ripplinger’s fascination with bees. “I’ve always thought that bees were very cute, and I know that they’ve been endangered from crop pollution,” she says. “Without bees we wouldn’t have some of the foods we eat and the flowers that we get to enjoy, so I just found that to be a really good starting point for a name and decor, which lead me to our design.”

“I think our “HC” wall, which is a wall that features cascading greenery over our logo is one of my favourite things in the salon,” she adds. “I made it out of a metal black ladder that I wove greenery through, and I change the flowers for every season. Our clients always compliment it, and it’s a really great place to take photos of our client’s hair. It’s one of the big focal points of our salon.”

Ripplinger also decided to include her old vintage bicycle into the design by hanging it over her sink area as a way to recycle and to serve as a reminder for herself to keep moving forward.

“Wine” Not?

One of the most fun aspects of Ripplinger’s salon is the coffee and cocktail bar that enables her and her team to serve their clients drinks during their appointments—all of which feature honey or flowers as another way to incorporate bees into her design. “I’ve worked in salons that offered wine, but I thought why not have something that’s a little bit more ‘boujee,’.” she says. “Clients often come in for two, sometimes three hours, so why not give them cocktails and really great coffee? When we got the space, there was already a coffee station, and we just took it to the next level by adding some floating shelves and a fridge. It almost felt like everything I wanted to have in the salon was already in this space.” “We host an event called ‘Neon Nights’ where we do blowdrys, have some music playing and have a bunch of neon lights and signs going. We serve cocktails and clients can come in with their friends for a girl’s night or to get their hair done before they go out, and it’s been really fun and successful so far,” she adds. “Having the bar is great for the clients but it also serves as a really great marketing tool because every time we deliver a beverage to a client, they take a photo and post it, so it’s a great way to get out name out there while offering a unique experience for each client.”