How did you first get involved with this type of work?
I was 13 and I asked my dad for some more money and he said, “No, go and get a job.” At the time salons were the only place that would hire 13-year-old. So I worked every Saturday and then I used to do maybe one evening in the week, and work in the holidays like half-term sometimes full time.
I was good at it. By the time I left that salon I was 16 and I had my own clients who would come to me on a Saturday for a blow dry, or a root tint. It was really expensive salon so clients would see an expensive stylist then come over to me for a cheaper blow dry. “Go to Miriam, she’ll do it for a tenner.”
How did you learn?
I was working in retail while I did my A Levels and I really hated it. I wanted to go back into hairdressing so I found a salon and did my NVQ through an apprenticeship. After about a year and a half I ended up managing that salon, because I’m super bossy. During the apprenticeship I was being paid about £75 a week, and working a 48-hour week. An apprentice would get maybe £100 a week now. It’s not much money for the amount of work you’re doing but going to college for hair is not the best way to do it – you just get taught the very basic fundamentals of your NVQ, whereas if you’re in a salon you’re surrounded by different levels of stylists and you get taught different things, different ways of doing things that might suit you better than the uniform way you would get taught at college, and anyone that I’ve taken from college I’ve had to re-train. The standard that comes out of colleges isn’t high enough to get into a good salon, so an apprenticeship is better than college in my opinion.
*NVQ - National Vocational Qualification
**Apprenticeship - a program that trains a worker to become skilled in a particular trade. Apprenticeships combine hands-on work with classroom learning and are considered full-time employment.
What are some of the pros and cons of this career?
PROS: Within the hair and beauty industry there is really high job satisfaction because you do something with your hands and straightaway you see the result. For example right now doing your nails we’ll see the result in 45 minutes, or if I straighten or colour your hair the result is instant.
It’s quite nice especially when you feel good about what you’ve done and your client is really happy, because doing someone’s hair and nails is so personal it can really change somebody’s day or week. Especially if you have something done to your hair that you’ve never had done before and it completely changes how you look it can really change how you feel about yourself. And that’s a really nice thing to be able to do for somebody.
CONS: The cons are long hours, late nights, weekends, and not great pay in comparison to the traditional men’s trades like building, plumbing, electrician. Hair, nails, makeup, we don’t really get paid as well in our trades. However it is changing and a lot of places you can work on a self-employed or commission basis where if you’re good at your job and you put the work in you can take home pretty decent money. I’ve been free-lancing so I work for myself so there are times where I can do one client in two and a half hours, and make what I would make in 9 hours in the salon. So I walk out pretty chuffed with myself, just made £120 which I might not have made in a full day in a salon. It just depends how you work your diary and who you work for, finding the right salon and the right team to work with, and the opportunities that you might get with them. The pros of working within a company are that you get to progress up the career ladder – become an educator, do management, you go on courses paid for by the company e.g. a colour degree.
I’m about to go and start working a salon and the guy I’m working for is a session stylist so he goes to London and New York Fashion Weeks, does shoots for Vogue, so there are different opportunities that you could take if you’re in the right kind of network.
What’s the most exciting thing you’ve done?
My new job is going to be pretty cool. I worked on a cruise ship – that was quite cool but hard work. You live on the ship for free then earn commission. I did hairdressing, barbering (e.g. shaving) and teeth whitening as well. That’s also why I learnt to do nails – the hair side wasn’t very busy but the nail techs always were. Massage and nails are more sought after than hair on a cruise ship. That said, you get some guests who wait all year to get their hair done on the ship because they want a British stylist (the company who owns the spas on cruise lines is called Steiner, and they’re head office is in north London so nearly all their salon staff are British). And there are formal nights where you have to have a ball gown. Traditionally everyone would be in the salon getting their hair blow dried and put up.
In hairdressing you get to do lots of cool hair and meet people who are up for having different styles. I worked on the west end for a long time – you get to meet a lot of different people.
What do you think is key to your success?
My dazzling personality and I enjoy what I do. You have to get along with people, take pride in what you do, and be good at it. If your skills aren’t up to scratch you’re not going to get repeat business, but at the same time I know people that are not amazing hair dressers but they’ve got the gift of the gab so they can sell their clients on their personality. It’s harder to do it the other way around – it’s harder to be a really good hair dresser or nail tech and have bad interpersonal relationships. It’s like having a nurse with a terrible bedside manner even if she’s really good you’d rather have the nice nurse.
You have to be able to strike up relationships with people out of thin air and you learn to read people and kind of make judgements on what they might want to talk about, asking the right questions. Some people will just come in and say, “I don’t want to talk to you I just want to read my book.” Cool. That’s fine by me, I’d rather you be honest than the client sit there making awkward small talk feeling uncomfortable and unhappy. You can tell if they’re sitting in the chair thinking, “I want this to be over.” So you have to read people the best you can.
Do you like hair or nails better, and why?
Hair probably. I’ve done it for longer. Nails is quite therapeutic but you need so many tools and bits and bobs – there’s a lot that goes into it. But I can do a lot more hair with less tools.
Is hairdressing quite sciency?
Yes. Everything even down to the products that you put in your hair, you have to understand what they do. Especially with colour – colour theory. It’s maths as well cos you’re measuring in millilitres or weighing out colour so there is maths and science within it all. I enjoy that part of it. Some people find it difficult but I think once you understand the theory a little bit more then the practical side becomes a little bit easier.
Say if you wanted to go (from black) to blonde you have to understand the process it is going to take to get you there – you have to through levels – red, orange, yellow to blonde, and it also depends how much warmth your hair throws out naturally so it’s quite complex. You can’t just chuck a colour on! Equally going from bleach blonde to dark, you can’t just put a dark colour over blonde because there is no pigment left in the hair so it’ll either go green and khaki, be wishy-washy and patchy. You have to pre-colour the hair to add colour molecules or there is nothing for the new colour to attach itself to. You’d probably add something with a warm tone - a red or a gold because their colour molecules are bigger, leave that on for 10 minutes, wash it out, and then you can put on the desired colour.
What are your tips for young people who are interested in the industry?
I would say go and get a part-time job in a salon, and then if you enjoy it see if they do an apprenticeship, but I wouldn’t just do it in any old salon. I would try and go to Vidal Sassoon, Daniel Galvin or other big names because it starts you off at a prestigious level. From there wherever you go, on your CV your starting point is already a lot higher than if you did an NVQ at the local college. It’s like how having a degree from Oxford is better than East London. Aim highest first and then if you don’t have any luck work your way down from there, try Tony and Guy, Headmasters, Rush, chains that are still reputable. There are lots of independent salons that are very good but they have to have the reputation, even if it’s in the local area.
Would they take you without any qualifications?
Yes. They train you. That’s the whole point. You can go in at 16. You can finish school even if you haven’t got any GCSEs you can go in with no experience and they teach you from the ground up but you will then have to do your maths and English. I used to work at Headmasters and did a lot of the education there – I would train you on the hair side of things, but then when you went to the academy you’d need to do your maths and English skills. It’s better if you already have your Maths and English GCSE but you can still do it.
