The Loft Toronto is cultivating creativity through salon design

The Loft Toronto is getting creative with salon design.

In the Queen West neighbourhood where anything goes, hairstylists can get creative and truly push the envelope.

Dubbed by Vogue as “one of the coolest neighbourhoods in the world,” the bustling Queen West is where Sylvie Prud’Homme set up shop with The Loft Toronto in 2013. “Queen West is still kind of like that kooky neighbourhood where you can still be yourself and see what works,” she says, speaking fondly of the eclectic locale.

Creating a culture through design at The Loft Toronto

The Loft Toronto has a chic, vintage vibe and feels immediately welcoming with exposed brick and a funky wall collection of saucers and plates. The curated collection of antique furniture combined with sleek, modern finishes appeals to just about everyone: “I think that there’s still room for possibility and voice here. You’re not pigeonholed into being a certain way because of the neighbourhood dictating what that’s going to be,” explains Prud’Homme. The clientele spans all ends of the age spectrum. “We’ve positioned ourselves where we have a mid- to high-end range of products, and we have junior stylists to master stylists with price points where we can accommodate every single kind of client, regardless of demographic.”

Sylvie Prud’Homme on being your own boss

Opening her own salon wasn’t always what Prud’Homme had planned: “It wasn’t really something that I was ever interested in doing until I moved to Toronto. I love that Toronto is so busy but I was really feeling a lack of kinsmanship and that family aspect that I’d once felt, so that’s when I started thinking that I needed that back in my life. If I was feeling like that, then other hairstylists must be feeling that they needed that, too—that support system.”

Street style and cultivating creativity at The Loft Toronto

Being immersed in such a street-style-centric neighbourhood, it’s no wonder that the team at The Loft Toronto is so creative. “All of us individually have our own style, and I think that trickles down to our clients and what they’re looking for. In terms of street style, Queen West is the epitome of street style. You can have something from a really clean, concise bob to messy, dusty hair in pastel colours. We see everything here.”