Meet The Team

Two years ago, as the world navigated an unprecedented pandemic, 1-900 Bleach Me started the way many visionaries launch their biggest ideas: as an intimate conversation between close friends, scribbling down ideas on scrap materials, dreaming up how they could challenge the status quo.

Jeanise Aviles and Chansophalla Nop are renowned hair stylists and colorists, who’ve honed their talents for almost two decades of elite professional experiences, and artistic work that can only be born from living life fully.

Jeanise, a NYC-raised Puerto Rican and Chansophalla, a Bay Area-raised Cambodian, are two queer women who know what it means to triumph over adversity, and planted the seeds for 1-900 Bleach Me in a conversation about how they could best support each other in their careers. Hooks Nueva York, who had worked closely with the two at a previous salon as a front desk manager, met with the duo in the East Village’s iconic Tompkins Square Park, and 1-900 Bleach Me was born.

The pandemic only fueled Jeanise’s and Chan’s fire to create something authentic and new, starting with their bond as sisters who became business partners.

They realized the only way to transform the beauty industry - which can often exclude women who look like them - would be to start something of their very own, with the intention to make it a safe space for all.

Opening its doors in September 2021, 1-900 Bleach Me is a salon whose namesake blends the wild senses of humor of Jeanise and Chan with a playful aesthetic mishmash of ‘80s NYC art deco, ‘90s high-end minimalism, and the campy late-night ads of VHS sex tapes and phone sex operators. It’s East Coast-West Coast-Worldwide. And it all ties back to the duo’s nostalgic youth of watching their mother’s work hard and stay glamorous, bike riding, rapping to Lil Kim, and wearing hair color gels With raucous laughter filling every chair, customized cuts and hair color on every client, and jams on the speaker by everyone from Lil Kim to Whitney Houston to bitch tracks to only the best house music, it is an immersive, loving, and expressive experience the moment you walk in the door.

What’s more is the staff entirely comprises queer people of color - an intentional move for Jeanise and Chan, who know all too well what it’s like to work in stuffy environments where beauty can feel sterile and unattainable. Together, they form a passion for their work that is spiritual, a soothing, empowering effect that stays with the clients long after they leave.

As a space, 1-900 Bleach Me hits the sweet spot of the vibrantly cheeky, the fashion-forward, the experiential, and the artistic. It is also a home for all outcasts who want to be right in the middle. And just like Jeanise and Chan transformed themselves, they and their staff are dedicated to transforming you.

“The moment you call the front desk, the moment you hit the button on our website, the moment you walk by and look inside, I want you to understand that this is a place for everyone.”

Hellorrrrr!! Welcome to your interviewrrrr for 1-900 Bleach Me, the website edition!

Hellorrrr and thank yourrrr!

What did the first time putting your hands on someone’s scalp feel like?

I was maybe three years old. I had a Brooke Shield mannequin doll head in the ‘80s. My mother was a hairstylist, so of course she thought to get me that. For me as a kid with a mom and an aunt as hairstylists, I loved getting my own hair done. That’s where it all started. There’s pictures of me with perm rods and at home heat machines. I loved getting my hair done and cut and colored. I had purple cellophane in my hair as a child. My mom got me colored gels also and I’d put those those things all over my head. They were huge in the ‘80s and I’d use them all! I’d have a pot to use for a month and I didn’t have an accent piece. I used every color on every single strand. Always in excess. I loved that! Do it all! Why not? Also, do it little piece! Sometimes, that was all it takes.

I’d also cut my friends’ hair in high school, and I have no idea why they trusted me, but I’d use fabric scissors, and pull all of the hair all the way up and cut all the way across the time. And then, they’d have a fierce shag haircut. I didn’t really color my hair in high school. The first time I bleached my hair I was 21. I’m 42 now and I haven’t stopped bleaching my hair since. I was Ariane’s first bleach model actually.

When I finally decided to go to school, I called my Aunt Liz because she was working for Empire Beauty School. I didn't tell my mom because she tried to talk me out of it at first: “there’s no benefits, you’re going to be on your feet,” et cetera. But things have changed so much today and you create that for yourself and you don’t wait for people to give that to you anymore, which is amazing. I called my aunt and told her I was coming in that day, because I was in the lobby of my corporate job [at a top law firm] because I was in tears, and I did not want to go up. I finally was like “get you ass upstairs and call that cosmo school and ask for information.” That evening I went to the school and my aunt gave me $400 for my first kit, and I withdrew my 401K and I paid for school with that. I quit that motherfuckin’ job faster than I could say “fuck you.”

I had a job on Madison Avenue and it was horrendous. It was horrible hair and weird stylists not wanting to tell you what they were using. It was giving permanent assistant teas, which was like, not what I wanted. I needed to be behind the chair and I needed to learn from someone who was really fierce and fabulous. I was training with Sherwin Jones, who was the former international creative director from Vidal Sassoon. He is a beautiful Black gay man, and he taught me everything I know: from doing hair, to entertainment, to looking after myself, to taking me on wild vacations, and loving life. He taught me how to investigate hair and sharpen my focus. He was like a gay dad to me, and like 15 years later, he’s still a mentor to me.

What are some things you learned early on that are still part of how you do hair today?

It’s to engage with the client on a soul connection level, whether that’s by being available and listening and being cheerful, or creating a fun, comfortable environment to be in. To give comfort and provide a level of trust that is not often given in this industry. The fashion and the hair industry, if there’s a level of trust between the stylist and the client, that can make for a beautiful long-term relationship.

I know that you love Lil Kim, and I know you have other hair idols. Are there other examples of people or cultural figures you’re super inspired by?

I love glam, I love beauty, I love the entire ‘90s era. And it does include Nicole Kidman, and it does include Linda Evangelista. Linda rocked every hair color in the ‘90s as a model and turned it the fuck up! But, Kim, the Queen Bee? Every color, every shape, every style, and she killed it! She turned it the fuck out. She made it fashion for everyone! People wanted to be her, look like her, and when it comes to her hair and her looks, you can’t fuck with it. But really, my furthest hair inspiration going way back was Jim Henson’s Muppets. I’m going to be really honest with you - it’s about the Muppets for me. He created these wild body shapes and proportions, textured hair styles and colors, where everything and everyone counted, and everything goes. Even the outcasts were in the middle. It’s so amazing and none of the Muppets look alike! My favorite feeling is to look, dress, and feel like a Muppet. Their hair styles remind me of bleached hair. Also… how can I forget Barbie? I had over 100 Barbies as a child. My mom never let me modify any of my dolls unfortunately, so I couldn’t take their clothes off or chop their hair.

Speaking of the Muppets and outcasts who fit in, you started a place where that’s welcome.

Yes. There’s not ever just one type of person who comes in the door here, or who’s welcome here. There really isn’t. I have lawyers come in and have their hair bleached and colored, older women who have their hair bleached and colored, sex workers, teachers, children — all walks of life. There’s no age, size requirements, etc. It’s not too prestigious for anyone to not walk into. It’s very DIY — we put our blood, sweat, and tears into this. We’re not turning anyone away because of what they look like or what they’re missing, or they don’t fit a certain “type.”

Your desire to create an inclusive space derives from life experience, right? Could you say more about this?

Here, for instance, this is how I grew up. In the ‘80s in New York, I had queer parents who were young teenagers when they had me. My dad was 16, my mom was 18. They had to lie about their relationship dynamic in order to find housing. They had to lie about our family to get what they needed to get, because how can two young queer teenagers with a baby make their way? They had to lie so as not to be turned away from being able to provide for me and for each other. I feel very much like that. I don’t want anyone to walk in here and say “I really wanna get my hair done here, but I don’t have the money.” I wanna try and make that possible for as many people as possible. I don’t want to turn anyone away. I know what it’s like to be turned away because you look a certain way. I’m not writing anyone up for their loud earrings. I want the phone answered like a house phone. Some might say, “oh it’s not professional,” there’s enough love and respect with us and the clients in this house for you to feel like this place is made just for you, as soon as you walk in. The moment you call the front desk, the moment you hit the button on our website, the moment you walk by and look inside, I want you to understand that this is a place for everyone.

“You don’t have to be small or quiet. You can show up for yourself here, you can be loud. We’re very loud, and we want people to know we’re here. It’s a joyful place.”

I would love to hear about the first moments you knew you were going to transform people.

It started at a very young age; my mom loves looks. She has had many different looks and I was always so inspired and in love with my mother. She was my true muse. When you come from nothing, and you try to make something in this society - my mom’s a village girl - she came to America during the war in Cambodia, pretty much on her own. I knew from early on - I wanted to be as beautiful as my mom. I didn’t know we were poor, until I got older. But I knew she loved doing her hair and makeup because it made her feel really good. She was a full-time mother to five children and two cousins whose mother passed away young. She worked a lot, but she also made time to show up for herself. It was a powerful example for people who take on all these roles. I was surrounded by all these beautiful people full of grace. I’m not light skinned, you know? People would say things like “you’re smart and you’re funny,” and I internalized that because my mother was light skinned and the implication from others was that I’d never be as beautiful as my mom.

I didn’t discover that I wanted to do hair until high school. I wanted to do something artistic, and my mother said I should learn a trade if I didn’t necessarily want to go off to school school, like college. We didn’t have money. But I was like “fuck that, I’m an intellectual” At one point, I thought doing people’s nails, nannying, and cleaning were beneath me, if you will. Even people told me, “don’t do our jobs.”

You’ll see it now: if you go to a nail salon, there are people who are unkind to those washing their feet. That’s the most holy and intimate work. There’s something ritualistic and humble about that. It’s not just work to those washing the feet. It’s very special. People like me who’ve encountered things like that, we overcompensate by being grateful.

But also with hair, I wanted to give back and help people feel taken care of. Though at first I thought I’d just learn it, make some money, and then I’d go to art school and learn to write or something. But then I fell in love with hair, and I was like “oh, fuck, maybe pottery isn’t for me.”

I’m a translator - what you feel inside, you want outside, and I want to do that for you. We all know that the beauty world is so violent on people of color: they say you can’t bleach your hair because it’ll break right off, they say the color you choose won’t look good on your dark skin, they say your skin is too yellow, too red, too black. “You can’t have light hair, your hair is too dark, you can’t lift it.” That’s not real to me. Who told us that? I was trained in hair and color and cut, but I was trained in a very Eurocentric way, in Boston, and a haircut was $500.

There weren’t many people of color who would come in, as we know.

When I went to San Francisco, I worked for my friend Bao, who taught me how to do hair on people of color. He’s a Vietnamese immigrant. That’s where I really discovered, it’s not about money. But that I could be of service to people who look like me. Bao taught me how to have compassion for our hair, our skin. We did everyone’s hair and we didn’t limit ourselves and we didn’t charge a million dollars. What makes my hair different from Stacy or Brenda? We don’t do that here at Bleach Me. We work with clients based on what they need. We want to be accessible and we want you to feel great. Why not?

Who were your hair idols coming up as you learned how to engage with a more diverse client base?

100. We grew up where our icons were Foxy Brown, Lil Kim, Mya, Aaliyah. I paid close attention to what my parents listened to, which was a lot of funk, and people of color in the funk and disco scenes were super experimental with their hair. Look at George Clinton - how did he get all of that color in his hair?

The unique part of my upbringing was my parents were into showing us how fabulous people of color were. Even in my culture, it’s beautiful people dripping in diamonds and gold, and long, blue-black luxurious hair. What people see on TV though, is the young girl bloody, naked, and screaming because her parents are dead. It’s real and true, but no one told me about the beauty. They don’t show our true culture, they show the violence. I had to research the fact that our pagodas were covered in gold and that glamorous queens were just part of my culture.

Me and Jeanise are so obsessed with Lil Kim. No one could tell me that I couldn’t have yellow hair once I discovered her. If I do my hair black it’s a ritualistic act now.

My main thing is to let people know that you can have any kind of hair you want, and we’re gonna make it work for you. That’s on period.

Tell me about your relationship with Jeanise, and how that influences everything you do at 1-900 Bleach Me.

Jeanise is my business partner, but also my sister in creativity and in life. We lift each other up when we are tired. And I don’t just mean 12-hour workdays on your feet. I mean dealing with the ups and downs of every day, sometimes realizing that social change is slow, how we can be in 2021 and society can still be having the same conversations around needed areas of progress. Or when people say they’re going to do something and they don’t do it. When they say they’ll include people and they don’t do it. Your signs telling the public that you think Blak Lives Matter don’t mean any fucking thing to me. I need you to unlock that door, and get us in.

When Jeanise and I realized in 2020 that we could make our own house and we could make our own keys, we said, “you know what? Everyone can say whatever they want, but they’re not doing anything.”

I’m talking about the beauty world, down to film, down to social work. You might have this amazing nonprofit giving money to the Black Lives Matter movement and to children in underprivileged places, but your board members are still fucking white. I’m a teacher, but I’m not here to teach grown adults how to treat us.

I’m talking about how we can change that. I don’t want your $5. I don’t want you old ass coats. I want a seat. But the seat is comfortable and I’m like Goldilocks - this doesn’t fit, this doesn’t fit. After a while, I’m just gonna make my own seat. And I’m gonna invite my friends to the table. It’s been hundreds of years; they won’t relinquish their power. But we’ll make power ourselves.

It’s not just about clients, it’s about the people creating and working alongside us every day. It’s really important for us to let creative people in this industry know that there’s a place for you, and a place for your folks. You don’t have to be small or quiet. You can show up for yourself here, you can be loud. We’re very loud, and we want people to know we’re here. It’s a joyful place. We have sprinkles on the walls! I mean… if that doesn’t give you joy, we’re gonna work on that. It’s important for Jeanise and I to build a house for everyone.