The New Brazilian

Author Plum Sykes used the metaphor "going to Brazil" to describe those times when her character in "Bergdorf Blondes" was going to have sex with a guy. And while Brazil has been known as a wax treatment and a barely there bikini bottom, it now has a new connotation -- hair straightening.

The name Brazilian hair straightening or Brazilian keratin treatment comes from the keratin used in the process that takes all the frizz and kink out of your hair. Keratin, coincidently, is the protein that makes up your hair and nails.

Color, a Salon by Michael Boychuck at Caesars, offers the Keratin Complex Hair Therapy by Coppola, a treatment that claims to remove 95 percent of frizz and curl. The results? Soft and shiny hair. Well, so say the before and after pictures.

But before delving into the process, know that Brazilian straightening started out as a hot solution to frizz and curly hair. Then a frenzy went out about formaldehyde, the secret ingredient used in the treatment, and how some straightening treatments used 10 times the recommended dosage of formaldehyde to achieve stickpin straight hair. While keratin makes up one ingredient, formaldehyde is the true active ingredient.

Applying heat to the hair with a straight-iron creates a toxic gas when formaldehyde is involved. Stylists were cautioned to wear gas masks and latex gloves and perform the procedure in an area with ventilation.

At Color, formaldehyde isn't an ingredient in the treatment. The keratin company, Keratin Complex Hair Therapy, even issued a press release stating that its "product thermally replaces keratin back into the hair cuticle...We are not a Brazilian Straightening product and should not be compared to it."

So it's safe. So safe that stylist Donna Mendoza, who is in her third term of pregnancy, didn't wear a mask or ventilate the room to apply the keratin or straighten the hair.

The treatment took about three hours. It started with a clarifying shampoo to rinse out all the product from my hair. Then my hair was blow-dried -- without any product in it. The results remind you why you're getting this treatment in the first place. A ring of frizz surrounded my head, and I kept thinking how lucky I was that I didn't grow up during the 1800s when nothing could be done to make my hair look better.

Mendoza applied the keratin, a brown syrup that smells like coconut, in painted-on layers reminscent of the thin layers used to create highlights. Then she dried my hair again and used a straight iron to activate the keratin. After that came 72 hours of enduring what felt like a bottle of conditioner left in my hair and that natural oil buildup that comes with three days of no washing and no product.

But after the first wash, I could tell the difference with my hair. It felt softer and silkier. I could blow it out easier and faster. And day-two hair even looks better. Even though my hair doesn't hold curl the way it used to, I could pretty much get a blow-dried look without much styling.

The treatment lasts between three and four months. "(Your hair) just gets better the more you do it," Mendoza said. "You will still have wave but you shouldn't have to deal with frizz."

True, I don't have frizz. I do miss my curl.

Just about any type of hair can benefit from the treatment. Boychuck says that even color treated hair and dry, damaged hair will look better afterward. "It strengthens the hair so it doesn't matter how trashed it is when you start. It feels better than when you came in."

And feel better it does. You be the judge with the before and after pictures.

Contact Image Editor Susan Stapleton at sstapleton@reviewjournal.com or 702-387-2909.