Britain’s love affair with hair

For a lot of women, a visit to the salon happens more frequently than they see a good friend. For some, the relationship with their stylist is one of the longest they have. On a single visit, they can spend far more than on lunch in a restaurant. All that time and money, not to say emotional investment... What is it that women find in a salon? Is it just a haircut or is there something more?

Inside Frieda’s salon, most of the women in the waiting area are doing that peculiar London thing of studiously ignoring those around them while appearing engrossed in the guilty pleasures of reading magazines they probably wouldn’t normally buy; the rest are on their phones, sending texts or e-mails. At some point, most steal covert glances in the mirrors to check out either the spectacle of a woman with her hair being pulled into a Medusa of giant rollers, or her neighbour submerged beneath layers of tinfoil like a mini version of the Bilbao Guggenheim. (A stylist tells me about one client who requests a seat in the middle of the salon, “just so she can watch everyone else”.) Apart from spotting the handbags (and there’s a veritable catwalk of them in this salon), the uniform beige gowns force attention to the primary reason that everyone is here: the hair on their head, its colour and/or cut. But that’s not to forget all the optional extras on offer in a top-end salon these days: a spot of lunch, or a pedicure, a head massage and a manicure.

In this temple to hair, there are numerous behavioural codes at play, largely to do with respecting one another’s privacy. The salon is the equivalent of the communal changing room. Once you felt vulnerable when stripped down to your grey underwear in the changing rooms of yesteryear; now you have your grey roots on show to the salon. This is the one place that knows precisely how unnatural a blonde/brunette you are. And most women under the age of 70 still don’t want to have grey hair. (God forbid that anyone should try to talk to a woman mid-metamorphosis, or even catch her eye.) The only chatter, just about discernible above the white noise of hairdryers, is the confidential patter between stylists and clients – if you wanted to eavesdrop, you would have to strain.

The atmosphere here is more akin to a hotel like Claridge’s, with discreet offers of refreshment from the staff, and an air of calm efficiency as stylists glide across the marble floors of the gleaming white studio. John Frieda himself may not have cut hair for 20 years, but his name has become synonymous with British hairdressing thanks to a small bottle of hair serum called Frizz-Ease that he launched in 1990. (He sold the haircare brands in 2002 for $450 million – £270 million – to the Kao Corporation.) It is this, rather than the iconic Purdey cut he created for Joanna Lumley, that has sealed his fame. The John Frieda brand, for whom he still works, has some 100 products on sale – enough, perhaps, to make you think we’re obsessed with our hair.

Kathy Phillips, a former beauty editor and founder of beauty range This Works, thinks the obsession is easily explained. The thing that makes most difference to your appearance is, “No argument, your hair. It is as they say, your crowning glory. It is far more transforming and a greater symbol of beauty and youth than anything else.” John Frieda, who grew up in salons, working for his father among others, understands this, and is erudite on the subject of the psychology of the salon.

Frieda’s starting point is women trusting their stylist. “If I counted the number of times a woman would say, ‘I only want a trim,’ and then after ten minutes she’d ask if I thought all her hair should be cut off... I always knew to be patient. It was only once she saw I could handle a trim that she would trust me with something bigger.”

Frieda has recently started running workshops in his London salons to teach junior stylists his way of cutting hair and “reading” clients. He describes a familiar, almost therapist-patient relationship between stylist and client. He teaches his staff to have the confidence to tell a woman that they should come back in two months’ time if they still want all their hair cut off. (He says those clients have usually just had a baby, or are getting divorced.) “Some stylists will chop your hair off, just because you’ve asked them to. I want mine to be sure it will suit them, and not do it because clients think it will change their life.”

Frieda is particularly animated when he’s talking about his hairdressing philosophy. “My father always said: ‘Treat everyone like royalty.’ Most importantly, I tell my stylists [some of whom have worked for him for over 27 years], ‘Know yourself and be yourself. Be comfortable and be mindful.’” At times, Frieda’s “hair philosophy” has a whiff of the ashram about it – and he freely admits to a passion for meditation and Eastern philosophy. Either way, it makes good sense.

Frieda also warns staff never to initiate a conversation (“If the client wants to be quiet, so be it”) and to always treat everyone like an individual. Nisa Iqbal, one of Frieda’s stylists, adds: “The relationship with clients comes with experience; you learn over time where not to trespass, and never to make someone feel guilty for not talking to you.” In Frieda’s salon, you can witness his stylists in the middle of a whispered confessional, or working in happy silence, or being a willing audience to some lively storytelling.

Whether they’re styling a woman who may be a dowager duchess, a Mayfair mother, or a girl about town, the stylists appear to bypass the class barriers that pervade other areas of life. Part paid help, part revered artiste, part friend, it’s a relationship that’s hard to pigeonhole.

Not all clients want friendship from the salon experience, though. For busy working women, it’s yet another chance to multitask, a tiny slice of indulgence that can be squeezed into the working day. Mariella Frostrup, a Frieda devotee of seven years and, appropriately, one of the country’s most famous blondes, explains: “I look forward to going to the hairdresser’s because it is the only time as a working mother that I ever get precious ‘me time’.” As she speaks, she is shuffling her notes, having her hair dried, servicing her BlackBerry and having a manicure.

Freelance journalist and ex-Vogue beauty director Anna-Marie Solowij, who has spent more time in salons than most, agrees. Solowij describes an appointment as a time “to seek sanctuary under the foils. I think of it as short-haul in-flight time – no one can get hold of you as you can’t hear your phone ring.”

The salon certainly has to double as office and a spa. “They used to be places where you’d waste hours of your time talking your head off to a complete stranger just to get your hair cut,” says Frostrup. Whether the client is lingering or sprinting, most salons aim to accommodate women’s disparate requirements, offering a spot of lunch or a manicure/pedicure; Aveda salons even offer yoga lessons. “It’s our boom area,” says Greg Horton, lifestyle business development manager at Aveda. “Women come to relax, then get their hair done, before a night out.”

It comes down to what women want in a salon. John Frieda’s formula is streamlined. “I just want women to look the best they can. I tell my juniors to remember that it’s emotional, just like when you’re looking at a painting and something jumps out at you. When you look at a woman, work out what needs emphasising, otherwise you’re just a draughtsman.”

Does the salon experience match up to this elsewhere in the country? At West Row in York, “Simply Salon TV” is playing on plasma screens, but there’s a different dynamic, with plenty of chitchat, and not a BlackBerry in sight.

The lure of this salon is clearly its friendly atmosphere as well as its on-trend hairstyles – in particular, Brazilian hair straightening, on offer at £250. A witty flyer asks: “How long will your Brazilian last?”

Rachel White, 39, the platinum blonde who runs West Row, says, “I know people want to talk to me largely because I’m impartial. It’s because I’m not family or friends.” Just as in salons everywhere, in one chair a woman asks uncertainly, “What would you do?” While in another, a woman stares at her reflection doing that familiar salon routine of gingerly fingering her face and peering closely at her reflection. The clients willingly provide justifications for how they’ve spent their time and money (which they all agree is “well-spent”), their reasons ranging from “continuity” and “self-esteem” to “professionalism” and “a lift to the spirits”.

White is the embodiment of the hairdresser as successful businesswoman (she’s spent 23 years working in salons) and an example of how their status has risen. Aspirational, creative, good with people, not necessarily ambitious academically but often entrepreneurially gifted, stylists are a breed peculiarly in tune with our times. “At school people would say, ‘Oh God, do your parents know you want to be a hairdresser?’ Like it was a terrible thing,” White remembers. “No one would say that now. I’ve made a business and I earn a professional salary.” And that business extends into all aspects of her life. She tells a story about visiting a client who had undergone chemotherapy at her home when she left hospital. “I’m not a counsellor, but I knew she wouldn’t want to come into the salon while her hair was growing back, and after years of cutting it, I also wanted to do what I could for her.”

On the Suffolk coast, at the Cut Above in the seaside town of Southwold, 30-year-old Scott Knights, the son of the owners, is in the thick of a morning of shampoo and sets. There’s something refreshingly unapologetic about his admission that, “Most of my customers are aged between 65 and 95” – especially given that he wouldn’t look out of place in a full-on urban salon.

Sprightly pensioners of a P.D. James ilk in beige quilted jackets and comfy shoes enter the salon in a steady stream throughout the morning. “I’ve probably only washed my own hair twice in 20 years,” confesses one client.

“This salon is my second home; Scott is like a son to me,” says another. Here in a small community where many properties are holiday homes, the salon is alive even in the darkest days of winter. Knights loves it: “I do actually get on better with the older customers. They’re so much more relaxed.”

The hairdos of older customers in provincial England could not be more different to the foil-wrapped golden tresses of moneyed Mayfair, but the sartorial and emotional fix it brings is just the same. In an appearance-obsessed age, it is going to take a lot to keep these women away from their hair salons, regardless of what’s happening to their tightened purse strings. If salons are temples to hair, then the stylists are surely their high priests, officiating with a pair of scissors and a bottle of magic serum.

John Frieda, London
Mariella Frostrup, 46, journalist and TV presenter
How frequently does she visit the salon? “Every week or every three weeks, for either a trim or a blow-dry, for the past seven years.”
Cost? Cut and blow-dry, about £140; highlights, about £140; blow-dry, from £50; manicure, £28.
How does she justify it? “It’s only ten minutes from home and it means I can look smart if I need to.”
Is it worth it? “At John Frieda I feel my privacy is respected, and I can be in for 20 minutes for a blow-dry if need be and not have to talk.”
John Frieda, 4 Aldford Street, London W1 (020-7491 0840)

West Row, York
Doreen Swain, 77, former civil servant and deputy head teacher
How frequently does she visit the salon? Every six weeks (“I colour it myself though”).
Cost? £49.50.
How does she justify it? “At a local salon, you pay money for a haircut you regret.”
Is it worth it? “Absolutely – my hair is a vital factor in my self-esteem.”
West Row, 31 Petergate, York (01904 629991)

The Cut Above, Southwold
Mrs Bougard, 66, retired B&B owner
How frequently does she visit the salon? Every week.
Cost? Shampoo and set, £15; colouring, £45; perm, £40.
How does she justify it? “It’s a highlight of my week.”
Is it worth it? “Absolutely. I would honestly rather eat baked beans than not get my hair done.”
The Cut Above, 61 High Street, Southwold, Suffolk (01502 724420)