This is truly every woman’s worst nightmare.
A Brazilian model is suing a celebrity-favorite Manhattan salon claiming that she went in for a simple conditioning treatment on her long, golden locks and wound up with a disastrously scorched, patchy head.
Myrella Ikeda, 33, was “smiling, happy, with beautiful hair’’ when she strolled into the famed J. Sisters salon on West 57 Street in October 2011, according to her Manhattan Federal Court suit filed Tuesday.
“Ikeda arrived at the salon anticipating that in a few hours she would have spectacular hair that would help launch a modeling career,” the $1.5 million suit says.
“But eight hours later, she left with physical and emotional trauma: her hair and scalp were burned, her modeling plans were ruined, and she could not show herself publicly.’’
In short, she looked like a “monster,’’ the suit says.
Ikeda went to the salon — a favorite of models such as Cameron Diaz, Cindy Crawford and Tyra Banks — to be prepped for photographs for a piece in the Brazilian magazine Malu.
But stylist Antonio Luis Rosa put a “natural organic product” — Naturlite White Lightening Powder — to hydrate her hair, and her head quickly began “stinging,’’ the suit says.
It felt like Rosa was “putting fire or rubbing hot pepper into her head,” the suit alleges.
She complained to Rosa, but he “spoke condescendingly, telling her that she was in a celebrity salon and should not worry,” the suit says.
As Rosa began drying her hair, Ikeda says she saw it “was falling out” and “very thin.”
Rosa continued to reassure her “this was normal,” but the aspiring model really freaked out when he began using a straightening iron on her bangs and more hair started to “fall, burnt and crumbled,” the suit says, noting, “Ikeda looked at the mirror and went into shock.”
The magazine feature was abruptly cancelled, the suit says.
A hair expert has told Ikeda it could be six years before her thin hair and chronically greasy scalp return to normal.
Salon co-owner Jonice Padilha told The Post she’s “very sorry’’ about what happened — and that she knows some of what Ikeda is going through.
“The same day we did her hair, I did my color, and I lost my hair,” she said.
“I don’t know if it was the product or if he left it on too long.”
The suit alleges Padilha called Ikeda a week later to apologize and claimed that Rosa “had been on drugs” when he did her hair.
Padilha reasserted that Tuesday.
But Ikeda’s woes are “not my fault,’’ Padilha said. “It was done in good faith. She was a friend of a friend, and we did it for free.’’
Messages left with Florida-based Organic Salon Systems, which makes the product, were not returned.
Rosa declined to comment.