Bromley girl's Taylor Swift hairstyle causes severe burn

Coco Brown, 15, from Shortlands, suffered a full thickness third degree burn at a Florida hairdresser’s, from chemicals being used to give her blonde highlights, her mother said.

The burn was so bad that Coco had to have skin grafted onto her head from her hip, meaning no hair will ever grow there again.

“It was definitely an accident,” said Coco’s mum, Samantha. “However, mistakes were made.”

She had left her daughter with a trusted hairdresser while she went shopping, but returned to find Coco’s head in the sink and the salon claiming she’d had an allergic reaction to the chemicals.

The family had gone to Orlando in April, where Coco’s sister Tabitha was competing in the world cheerleading championships, then to to Clearwater, where Samantha is from, in May.

Coco and her sister Tabitha were on holiday in Florida, where Tabitha had been competing in the World Cheerleading Championships (Image: Samantha Brown)

“I went to the salon to get highlights because I’ve never had highlights before,” said Coco – herself a cheerleader with the Unity Allstars in Sutton.

“I was trying to copy Taylor Swift’s haircut.”

She described herself as a long-time Swiftie, so devoted she could not pick a favourite song.

“I like all of them,” she said.

Samantha agreed to pay for the highlights as a birthday present.

“It was a stylist that we’ve known and used in the past,” she explained.

“It was someone I trusted and who was experienced. There’s no way that she intended for Coco to sustain the chemical burn that she did.”

Coco Brown described herself as such a devoted Taylor Swift fan that she couldn't pick a favourite song. She went to get highlights in Florida to look more like her hero (Image: Samantha Brown)

For this reason, and because of a planned lawsuit, the family are choosing not to identify the salon. They hope the salon’s insurer will handle compensation.

The stylist asked Coco, who attends Glebe School, when she had last been swimming, but then reportedly did no tests to see how her hair would react to the bleaching chemicals.

“She didn’t strand test me or patch test me,” Coco alleged.

After her hair was treated and wrapped up in foils, it became very hot.

“My hair was burning and it was smoking,” said Coco. “It was very painful, like chilli sauce, and the hairdresser told me that they were smoking.”

The stylist told her it was an allergic reaction, she said.

But after removing the foils and washing Coco’s hair, she then repeated the process, putting on a new lot of chemicals and foil on the rest of her hair to finish the job.

But they got too hot as well and had to be removed after just 15 minutes. When they removed, those parts of Coco's hair were already lifted (lighter)

After returning to the UK, Coco Brown was diagnosed with a full thickness third degree burn to her scalp (Image: Samantha Brown)

“When I came back, Coco was in the sink and her hair was wet and they were getting some milk to pour on her head,” said Samantha.

“The stylist said to me, ‘I have no idea what’s happened, I think she’s had some kind of allergic reaction’.

“At the time I didn’t question it. It was only afterwards that I started to think, if she thought it was an allergic reaction, why did she do it again a second time? That makes no sense.”

After returning to the UK, they went to their GP, who confirmed it was chemical burn and gave Coco a week-long course of antibiotics.

But Coco’s injury only “deteriorated” and they were sent to the children's burns unit at Chelsea and Westminster Hospital.

Coco had to undergo a skin graft operation, which will leave a patch of her head bald for life (Image: Samantha Brown)

There, said Samantha, it was confirmed that Coco had suffered a "full thickness burn". 

“When they were cleaning the burn, they were cutting the hair off,” she said. “That was when her scalp literally separated from her head.”

For weeks after that, said Samantha, “We were back and forth to the burns unit every other day, having her head wrapped in bandages and having the wound treated.

"They said she would have to have skin graft surgery.”

Thanks to her skin graft, “Her burn is now fully healed,” said Samantha – “but she will be forever bald on that side of her head now.”

Coco's mum Samantha said that when burn specialists in London began cleaning the wound, her scalp came away from her head. She ultimately needed a skin graft (Image: Samantha Brown)

She said she was incredibly proud of Coco’s bravery.

Whereas many teens may have wanted to hide away, she has started a TikTok channel calling her burn ‘Burt’.

Some of the videos on her channel - @Coco.and.Burt - have been viewed by more than 150,000 people.

“Life is hard enough when you are an autistic teenage girl, but to end up partially bald at 15 and be so vocal and open about it is just inspirational,” said Samantha.

“Coco hopes that by sharing her story she can stop others getting a full thickness, third degree burn at the salon like she did.”