MĀE Salon Is a Queer-Friendly Space of Total Wellness

Aja Mae Ottero, the owner of MĀE Salon and Wellness and a master stylist, knows that the salon experience isn’t just about hair—at least not for clients. During COVID, she noted the impact irregular appointments had on the overall wellness of the people in her salon chair.

“The biggest thing that sat with me when I realized that we needed to do something different with the industry was clients saying, ‘You don’t understand, it’s not that my hair is not getting done and I feel undone. It’s that I have nowhere else to go where my family doesn’t call me, and my kids don’t bother me, and my partner doesn’t bug me,'” she says. She explains that the salon is a precious space for self-care and tranquility, undisturbed by the hustle and bustle of everyday life. Her goal is to make that sense of wellness linger long after the blowout fades.

But that realization came after more than a decade of professional experience as a stylist. Ottero attended the Aveda Institute’s 15-month program shortly after graduating high school in 2009, a sudden change in path for someone who wanted to be a neonatal nurse since she was two years old. Her pull toward beauty school was an unexplainable, silent knowing.

“I think I’ve found a space to impact people’s lives in an industry that’s not super corrupt,” she says. “(The beauty industry) is far more rewarding. I get to connect with people and impact (them) in such a larger way than I think I would have otherwise.”

Since graduating from Aveda, Ottero has been dutifully honing her craft. She’s worked at several Denver salons, taught at Aveda Institute, and even headed to South Korea for a year, where she styled hair and taught English. In 2020, she opened her own salon, Chemistry Hair Lab. This summer, Ottero underwent a salon relocation and rebranding, and MAĒ Salon and Wellness opened on July 18.

The new location is airy, light, and spacious with gold, rounded mirrors and eclectic patterned wallpaper in the bathroom.  Thoughtful additions like swings in the waiting area, a distinct lack of tabloids, and a tech bar show Ottero’s passion for cultivating a sense of tranquility in her new space.

“We need to start inventing different spaces where we are taking care of ourselves in new ways (from) what we are traditionally taught or what we were brought up on,” she says, explaining the motivation behind her salon’s untraditional vibe.

Ottero wants to introduce the idea of energy work to her clients. She’s a strong believer in using Reiki while cutting hair to release the physical energy that porous hair fibers hold. “If you’re about to chop six inches off your hair, there’s something internally bigger going on that you’re ready to leave all of this behind. What can we add to not just take that hair off, but what can we also remove energetic wise?” she adds.

She’s even dedicated two rooms for treatments like sound baths, meditation, and yoga—anything that promotes total wellness. Her goal is to hold multiple weekly events (think full moon ceremonies, arts and crafts classes, and Botox parties) that draw the community together for holistic health treatments.

“As a queer kid growing up, it’s changing a lot, which I love, but it wasn’t always a safe space, and for generations before us, it wasn’t always a safe space. I think that really drove my need to be aware of where people have a safe space to meet, safe space to show up, space to authentically show up,” she says. “I just really wanted to start having spaces where we are talking about it, and feeling better, and meeting the parts that hurt, and having community if we don’t have family that we lost due to coming out. I really just want to be a safe haven that people know.”

Photo courtesy of MĀE Salon and Wellness