Ventilationa in a hairdresser's / a beauty salon

1. Why is ventilation so important in hairdressing?
2. What ventilation is more suitable for a beauty salon?
3. Natural ventilation in a beauty salon.
4. Forced ventilation: intake, reverse and intake-extract installations.
5. Ventilation system design in a beauty salon.

If you are an owner of a hairdressing business and you want to be successful, first of all you must take care of clients' positive impressions and working conditions of your personnel.

Healthy microclimate in the premises is an obligatory step towards the success of your business.

Only appropriate ventilation can provide optimal air exchange to create an atmosphere of comfort in your hairdressing salon. In that case not only clients will be satisfied with the atmosphere and services but your personnel will work more effectively.

Why is ventilation so important in hairdressing?

All hair care products, hair colours, nail polish and gel for manicures and so on contain a great number of chemical substances, whose fumes affect the health of both clients and personnel. And if the air exchange is not sufficient, the scope of harmful particles grows. Concentration of such fumes can cause dizziness, nausea, allergy and quite a lot of other serious illnesses or chronic problems.

Besides, even the premises "suffer" without appropriate ventilation: humidity stays inside, windows get wet, dampness and mould appears. It has been proved that it is necessary to perform renovation of the premises ten times more often and sometimes even capital repairs, if there is no appropriate ventilation.

What ventilation is more suitable for a beauty salon?

So, one of the first steps to be made is the choice of the correct ventilation system for your premises.
Ventilation in the premises of hairdresser's can be of two types:

• natural
  
• forced

Natural ventilation in a beauty salon.

Natural ventilation is when the air gets inside through the holes in windows, doors, and roofs. Very often windows and doors are opened for ventilation in hairdressing salons (there are no windows in basement premises). As a result, several problems arise.

1. There is a threat of catching a cold for clients and personnel.
2. In a winter period an owner spends much more on the heating and in a summer period they spend more on conditioning.
3. The majority of modern premises are air proof enough (plastic windows and doors, cold-proof fronts and so on), that is why natural ventilation is next to impossible.

Forced ventilation: intake, reverse and intake-extract installations

Forced ventilation is ventilation when special installations are used. There are different types of ventilation depending on the principle of their operation: intake, reverse and intake-extract.

Intake ventilation systems are designed for supplying fresh air and they can work effectively only in small premises. And in this case it is mandatory that all air ducts are operative and powerful enough. For a hairdresser's it is not a very good variant as the focus must be on the removal of processed air and fumes from chemical substances.

The principle of reverse ventilation installations is the following: they work for intake and extract in turn. It means that in order to simultaneously get fresh air and remove processed one it is necessary to have at least two installations in one premise. If only one installation is installed and switched over from intake to extract (automatically or manually), the humidity will not be removed from the premises and this is one of the main goals of ventilation. All the humidity during extraction will be accumulated inside the heat exchanger and will be returned into the premises together with the intake air. Moreover, these reverse installations usually have lower real efficiency factor though manufacturers indicate the one up to 91%. However, this indicator is real only at the peak point of operation.

An intake-extract ventilation system (a link to the model line) is one of the best for ventilation of residential and industrial premises. In beauty salons such installations operate effectively for simultaneous intake and extract without mixing air flows. If you care about the energy efficiency of your ventilation, it is necessary to think of intake-extract ventilation with heat recuperation.

The principle of operation of this system is the following: processed warm air is heated up by the intake cold air through the copper heat exchanger. As air flows go simultaneously along different channels, heat recuperation happens constantly and consequently the efficiency factor is stable. Such ventilation decreases the costs of public utilities. It happens because in winter you do not have to open windows and lose warmth when you let fresh air into the premises and in summer it preserves coolness.

Ventilation system design in a beauty salon.

The main task of a ventilation system in a beauty salon is the supply of necessary volume of fresh air, removal of processed air and regulation of humidity level. As soon as you choose the necessary type of a ventilation system, you must think carefully about the designing scheme.

Do not panic immediately if you have never encountered such things. Our highly professional specialists in the sphere of ventilation will help you to choose the most optimum solution for the best result.

When designing a ventilation system in a beauty salon it is necessary to take into account:

• premises layout (area, lightning, number of rooms and their functional purpose)
• number of personnel and visitors
• working equipment in the premises (hair dryers, drying equipment, lamps and so on)

First of all it is necessary to pay attention to a salon's area and the location of the premises.
For example, if you have a basement premise, there will inevitably be dampness and even mould and fungus can appear without fresh air circulation.

It is also necessary to take into account premises layout and their functional purposes when you plan ventilation systems. It will prevent odours circulation and concentration of harmful substances emissions (polishes, hair colours, oils and so on) within the premises of special purpose, lounge rooms, waiting rooms and administrative premises. 

Then, the next important issue is the number of people who work for you. It will help to choose optimum power of a ventilation system which will provide sufficient air exchange.

And surely you must take into account the list of services that you provide (for a hairdresser's it is necessary to have ventilation with a big extract channel and for a solarium the supply of fresh air is very important).
According to the state engineering norms the volume of air exchange in hairdressing salons is calculated depending on the area of the premises, its height, which are multiplied by corresponding multiplicity factor in accordance with the number of working places.

S*h*k, where k is a coefficient which depends on a number of working places.

It is also recommended to choose such ventilation whose installation does not damage the interior of the premises. Especially it is important if these premises are rented. Why should you suffer extra costs if you can install intake-extract ventilation in two hours without any structural damage?