Real people, high-end hair

Everyone has seen them. Buzz cuts performed with all the finesse of a weed whacker. Highlights so chunky and unartful they could have been applied by a house painter. Bad hair is alarmingly easy to identify, which is why stylists who get it right inspire a sort of Lama-esque devotion, even if their clients are hundreds of dollars poorer for the experience.

When it comes to getting a cut and color, it seems there are only two options: Pay a small fortune and come out looking like a million bucks, or drop a couple of $20s and look it. A 'do that is both cheap and excellent seems impossible.

But it does exist, and in more places than you think, during cut and color training sessions at marquee salons. Minimally publicized, if at all, Vidal Sassoon, Louis Licari, Frederic Fekkai and other exclusive salons all run apprentice programs for fledgling talent, letting their students do reduced-rate practice runs on the public before allowing them access to the premium locks of their regular clientele.

So you won't get the cappuccinos, cucumber water and general bend-over-backward treatment showered on the rich during regular appointments. You have to spend more time and come to the salon when they tell you, not the other way around. What you get instead is access to first-rate services for a fraction of the price; premium salon services that ordinarily cost $100 to $300 average about $35.

The levels of skill and training vary by salon and student, but there is a safety net -- after all, reputations and careers are on the line. Training sessions are taught by the salon's best stylists and, on occasion, even the owners themselves, the benefit being that the instructor checks in with the students often and can step in to correct mistakes before an irreversible snip or color-induced fry sets in.

"When people first come, they tend to be a bit nervous because their idea of what we do might be slightly different from what we do," said Julian Perlingiero, creative director of the Vidal Sassoon Academy in Santa Monica.

"Think about school. Would you want to go to a medical school and have an operation? Hair is important to people. It's how they look, how they feel."

Top talent at bargain basement prices. I was more than willing to throw my head into the ring and test them out.

Vidal Sassoon Academy