Long Island beauty schools offer budget-friendly holiday glam starting at $24

Dreaming of getting glammed up with haircuts, blowouts, manicures and facials during the holiday season but think you can’t afford prices as high as Santa’s reindeer fly?

We’ve got a deal that will sleigh you.

If you’re willing to put yourself in the hands of Long Island beauty school students who are close to graduating into the professional world, you can get all these services for a fraction of the price of a commercial salon. The schools also do hair color, balayage hair painting, waxing and makeup applications.

"Everybody’s jaws drop when they come in," says Jeannine Vallone, admissions director at the Long Island Nail Skin & Hair Institute in Bethpage.

LIKE A SPA

Walking into the Long Island Nail Skin & Hair Institute is like walking into a professional spa; the venue is just two years old even though the school has been operating for close to 30 years. A light, airy waiting area offers plush seating. Beyond that is a treatment room for haircuts and blowouts, manicures and pedicures.

Down a hallway is a room of massage tables separated into individual cubicles by curtains, with dimmed lights and soft music playing while clients get hourlong facials starting at $27 that include some scalp and neck massage.

Students who have been practicing for months in classrooms on mannequin heads and hands and on fellow students work on clients who call for appointments just as they would in a professional salon. They are supervised by instructors.

"It gives the students hands-on learning, working with the public," Vallone says. "Sometimes the clients follow the students after they graduate."

One recent weekday, client Samantha Seidl, 20, an Adelphi University student from Carle Place, was lying on a massage table getting a calm skin facial. She was covered by a sheet and blanket as student Cayleigh Horan, 23, of Syosset, smoothed her skin.

Seidl says she heard about the services from a neighbor who also used to go to the school. Why does she come? "It’s cheap. Really cheap," she says.

‘DON’T BE AFRAID’

But the quality of service belies the price, clients say.

Doreen Grimes, 64, of West Babylon, who works in the banking industry, gets a wash, cut and blow every few months for $24 at Brittany Beauty Academy in Levittown. She says that would cost her at least $65 at a commercial salon.

One recent morning she came in with pictures of the short, spiky haircut she found on Pinterest while searching for haircuts for women older than 60.

She never knows which student she will get because they are constantly graduating. But that doesn’t concern her. "If they have a question, they ask the teacher and they come over and help them," Grimes says. On this day, she has student Christina LaRocca, 25, of Long Beach.

LaRocca has learned how to do cuts, color, perms, finger waves and roller sets, she says. "I worked in an office before," she says. "It was not my thing at all." She started at the school in April and will finish in March.

"I told her, ‘Don’t be afraid to cut, because it always grows back,’" Grimes says.

In a salon chair nearby, Carol Licari, 82, of East Meadow, was getting her hair colored. "I’ve been coming here for years. My kids always give me gift certificates to have my hair done," she says. "I give the new girls and guys a shot."

GIRLS' DAY OUT

Five friends from Blue Point come once a month for facials starting at $35 at the New York Institute of Beauty in Islandia, piling in the car to ride over together. They lie on massage tables in the treatment room, with piano music playing and the lights low.

"The people are fabulous, and it’s a good price," says Eleanor Taylor, 70, after her 50-minute treatment. "Are we glowing?" Other services at the 150-student school include makeup applications or permanent makeup, laser hair removal and body scrubs. The school also offers a specialty oncology program.

For the holidays, the school is selling gift cards for 50% off through Dec. 31 — for instance, for $50, get a $100 gift card that never expires, says Kellie Napoli, director of business development for the school.

Taylor’s friend Patty Gonzalez, 66, jokingly tries to stop her from giving away more details. "You know what’s going to happen when she puts this in the paper?" she says. "We’re not going to be able to get an appointment because everybody knows about it."