Daily Inspiration: Meet Devyn Grounds

Today we’d like to introduce you to Devyn Grounds.

Hi Devyn, it’s an honor to have you on the platform. Thanks for taking the time to share your story with us – to start maybe you can share some of your backstory with our readers?
I grew up between Baton Rouge and New Orleans, and I honestly can’t remember a time when I didn’t love hair. My grandfather used to let me put barrettes in his hair and then pay me with coins from his pocket. I learned to braid from my mom and the gymnasts she coached who babysat me, and I loved accompanying her to the salon. I always said I would work for her stylist, Gina, when I grew up—and after hair school, I did. My mom and grandmother still go to her today.

In 2018, after seven years behind the chair, I left Louisiana and moved to Atlanta because I wanted more for myself and my career. I started from the bottom again—assisting and caring for another stylist’s clients while she was on maternity leave. Then COVID hit, forcing me to adapt and become even more intentional about the relationships and experiences I created.

I then stepped into a major leadership role at Grow Hair Lounge. My responsibilities extended far beyond doing hair: I helped manage daily operations, shape the client experience, support and develop the team, and build the salon’s culture and reputation. That chapter taught me so much about leadership, business, communication, and the kind of environment I wanted to create.

When it ended, I took the leap and created Alchemy Haus. The first 24 hours were terrifying, but my clients showed up for me in a way I still can’t fully explain. It felt like all the love and care I had poured into them came back to me threefold. The name reflects transformation—recognizing the potential in what already exists and helping it become something even more powerful. “Haus” represents the community, creativity, and sense of belonging I want to build around that transformation.

Today, I work from a salon suite in Buckhead, focusing on establishing Alchemy Haus while protecting the experience and culture my clients value. I’m proud of my reputation, but I’m most proud of the relationships I’ve cultivated with clients and industry peers. Education is also a major part of my purpose, and eventually I hope to build an education platform, teach traveling classes, and collaborate with other creative professionals who share my passion, vision, and a little of my chaotic energy.

Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
It definitely hasn’t been a smooth road. Moving to Atlanta meant leaving behind the clientele and reputation I had spent seven years building in Louisiana. About a year and a half after moving, I became so unsure that I could make it in the industry that I stepped away from hair completely and supported myself by waiting tables.

Eventually, the salon where I had started needed help and asked me to return. I began with just one day a week, gradually adding more days and rebuilding my confidence and clientele. Three months later, COVID hit, bringing everything to another sudden stop.

I kept pushing forward, and as the salon grew, so did my role within it. Going from questioning whether I even belonged in the industry to becoming a leader within the salon was a huge part of rebuilding my confidence. During that time, I also became a Redken Artist, which became one of the most pivotal parts of my professional growth. Traveling, educating other stylists, and learning alongside educators I respected helped me find my own voice as a mentor, leader, and educator.

Over time, I could feel that chapter beginning to shift, but ultimately the decision to end it was made for me. Although the transition was difficult and unexpected, it forced me to decide what I wanted the next chapter of my life and career to look like. It also reinforced some of the biggest lessons i had learned along the way about trusting myself an and my intuition, maintaining boundaries, and being intentional about the environment i wanted to create.

Starting Alchemy Haus meant facing the fear of losing my stability, my clients, and everything I had worked so hard to rebuild. I was incredibly fortunate to have family, friends, and a partner who believed in me when I wasn’t entirely sure what came next. My partner gave me the space to figure it out without expecting me to immediately have all the answers, and her support made taking such a huge risk feel possible.

Then my clients reminded me that the strongest part of my career wasn’t tied to any particular location. It was rooted in trust and genuine relationships.

This journey has required humility, resilience, stronger boundaries, and the willingness to begin again more than once. Every difficult season has made me clearer about who I am, how I want to lead, and what I want Alchemy Haus to represent.

Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
I’m a hairstylist, colorist, extension specialist, and educator based in Atlanta, but at the heart of what I do is helping women feel like themselves again.

Hair can be such an emotional thing. Sometimes someone sits in my chair because she wants longer, fuller hair or a beautiful new color. Sometimes she’s spent years trying to grow hair that just won’t grow past a certain point. Sometimes her hair has changed after stress, hormones, aging, or hair loss, and she doesn’t recognize it anymore. And sometimes she’s coming to me after an experience that left her afraid to trust another stylist.

Whatever brought her to my chair, I want it to feel like a safe place to figure out what comes next.

I specialize in customized hair color, hair extensions, and solutions for thinning hair and loss of density. I’m probably best known for being extremely thorough, especially during consultations, because I never want someone to feel like she has to know the right terminology or walk in already knowing exactly what she needs. That’s my job. You can tell me what you’re struggling with, what you miss about your hair, what you wish it could do, or even just that something doesn’t feel right anymore, and we’ll figure it out together.

I’m not interested in giving every woman the same hair. I want to understand your lifestyle, maintenance level, hair history, concerns, and long-term goals, then create something specifically for you. Sometimes that means extensions for length. Sometimes extensions are really about quietly replacing density that has been lost over time. Sometimes it’s corrective or dimensional color. And sometimes the answer isn’t extensions at all.

That desire to have more options for my clients is what led me to AI Scalp, a newer density-focused service that helps camouflage visible scalp and create the appearance of fuller hair in areas of thinning. Hair loss and thinning can be incredibly vulnerable to talk about, and I wanted to be able to offer another option for women who may have felt like there wasn’t really a solution for them. Being able to combine what I know about hair, extensions, color, and scalp density allows me to look at the whole picture instead of trying to fit everyone into one solution.

I’ve invested heavily in education throughout my career and hold multiple certifications across color, extensions, and advanced hair and scalp services, but I’ve never thought of education as something you finish. I’m endlessly curious. If something could help me understand hair better or give one of my clients an option she didn’t have before, I want to learn about it.

That curiosity also shaped me as an educator. My brain naturally takes complicated information and translates it into something that makes sense to the person in front of me. I never want knowledge to become a wall between a professional and a client. I want you to understand what I see, why I’m recommending something, what your options are, and to feel comfortable asking questions.

I’m proud of the hair I create, but the thing I’m most proud of is the trust people give me. I have clients who have followed me through different salons, different seasons of my career, and some really scary transitions. I’ve also had the privilege of being behind the chair while they moved through different seasons of their own lives.

There’s something incredibly special about being trusted with a part of someone that can feel so tied to her identity.

So yes, I want you to leave with beautiful hair. But more than that, I want you to feel heard. I want you to feel safe telling me what you’re insecure about. I want you to understand your hair instead of feeling frustrated by it. And I want whatever we create together, whether that’s custom color, extensions, more density, or something completely different, to still feel unmistakably like you.

Just maybe a version of you that you’ve been missing.

What matters most to you?
What matters most to me is making people feel truly seen, safe, loved, and taken care of.

I believe hair holds energy and memories, both good ones and painful ones. Allowing yourself to sit across from another person and be vulnerable is one of the hardest things to do. When someone sits in my chair, they’re trusting me with so much more than their appearance. They’re trusting me with their identity, their confidence, their stories, and sometimes parts of themselves they don’t feel safe sharing anywhere else.

No matter what someone brings into my space, I want them to know I will always meet them with kindness, understanding, and love. I really do care, probably more than a service provider is supposed to, honestly. But how could I not? My clients and I experience life together. We walk through marriages and divorces, babies and illnesses, career changes, children leaving for college, devastating losses, and the heartbreak of saying goodbye to our fur babies. I get to witness people through every season of life, and somewhere along the way, many of them become friends and family.

People sometimes say working in a salon suite can feel awkward or lonely, but for me it’s been the complete opposite. Every person who enters my space has handpicked me, and in many ways, I’ve handpicked them too. There’s something incredibly special about creating a private space where people can exhale, take off their armor, and simply be themselves.

Of course I want people to leave with beautiful hair, but more than that, I want them to leave feeling lighter, more confident, and deeply cared for. Hair is the medium I was given, but connection and transformation are why I do this work.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.alchemyhausbydevyn.com
• Instagram: @alchemyhausbydevyn