Category Archives: Style Predictions

Session Hairdressing Q&A On #HairHour

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I’ve got to say that I was looking forward to this weeks #HairHour – a Q&A with @SydHayesHair on session hairdressing. However, I was sort of gravely disappointed because Syd Hayes didn’t follow the normal Twitter chat convention of using the bloody #HashTag! In the end I had to poke around for Syd’s insightful and razor-sharp answers.

Twitter chats are usually far too frenetic to miss out the hashtags: use a tool like ‏tweetchat.com or ‏tchat.io, they make it much easier to follow and participate, and they automatically include the hashtag at the end, so you won’t forget.

When you use the hashtag everyone can enjoy your wonderful tweet and at the same time you are helping to promote ‏#HairHour – Spread The Love.

(BTW, that wasn’t a criticism aimed at Syd, just a general comment for anyone on #HairHour!)

Anyway, I thought I would gather the questions here and write My answers! If you want to read Syd Hayes’ answer, just click on the Tweet!

Q1: With the amount of stylists interested in branching into session work, what are your must haves to make it?

Talent is number one, fortitude and commitment follow close behind. And even though You are solely responsible for the hair, the ability to work within a creative team, and a bloody thick skin – you are going to get criticism; session hairdressing isn’t all fun. Yeah, it is!

Q2: What is it about session work that inspired you to pursue it as a career?

I’d been on very many sessions with Robert Lobetta as his ‏Junior at Ricci Burns – getting out of the salon was vital for my sanity. I must also mention Leon Hammé, whom I found extremely inspirational. Session hairdressing seemed a natural progression.

Q3: Being a salon director how do you how do you manage balancing your session and salon work?

One doesn’t need to be a salon director, session hairdressing is all about time management. Get yourself organised, being late is never an option!

Q4: Do you find the skills learnt in the salon are easily transferable to the session world?

Of course! It’s just that session hairdressing tends to be high speed, precision hair dressing – One never cuts a models hair during a session (maybe the odd fringe).

Q5: What qualities do you need to possess to survive and thrive in such a busy industry?

I totally agree with Syd Hayes, "Positivity and dedication! Be open to change in your work, adapt and adjust. Sometimes trying new things in a different way can work."

Also, the ability to watch, listen and understand. It’s not just a matter of keeping ones finger on the pulse of fashion, it’s more a matter of surfing the wave of fashion!

Q6: Where do you see hair trends going this upcoming season?

My styles predictions for 2015 posted on 18 January 2015 say: Finely highlighted with natural glossy highlights and lowlights mainly Blonde. Short bobs with a slightly 1980s to 1990s coupe sauvage-esque, dishevelled look that have a geometric precision that is out of place in today’s world. I was very happy with this prediction as it suits my style of hairdressing: a flowing precisionist hair-cutting technique! Precision cut short fringes.

Fashion Trends & Hair Styles Predictions For 2015

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Emma Stone’s shortish bob by Mara Roszak, @mararoszak – V.Nice

Before I start and as per usual, I just want to say, there’ll always be a wide range of key colour palettes, looks and hair styles in any season! I only highlight the fashion trends that have caught my imagination, that I feel will progress forward & blossom and will be of interest to my clients! I particularly feel that Emma Stone’s simple bob and Miley Cyrus’s short hair will inspire my clients!

Key Colour: ‘Finely’ highlighted with natural glossy highlights and lowlights. Blonde.
Key Length: Short – bob, shoulder to long – which is good … basically not much has changed!
Key Looks: Slightly 1980s / ’90s coupe sauvage-esque / dishevelled – with a geometric precision that’s out of place in today’s world. Very happy with this prediction as it suits my style of hairdressing: a flowing precisionist hair-cutting technique. Precision cut short fringes.

PANTONE 19-4052 Classic Blue – Love this in 2015!

PANTONE 18-1438 TCX Marsala – a reddish-brown – Big in 2015!

The reason I’m late with my ‘Fashion Trends & Hair Styles Predictions For 2015’ is because of my busy run up to Christmas …I’d usually post my latest trends and fashion predictions for 2015 early in December 2014! But it’s not just the work, I’ve been fascinated by what’s going on in Turkey and the Middle East …and we’re talking my obsession with Twitter here!

Anyway, I was walking through Zara’s (Windsor, Berks, UK) just before Christmas and saw a green-khaki flying suit – 1975 style. And I thought, ‘fuck me, it’s all come back! …I wonder about the 70s hairstyles, have they come back too?’ No.

Miley Cyrus (Photo : Getty Images: Alberto E. Rodriguez) 2015

All is Forgiven (Tout est Pardonné) – Stop taking your cloths off for publicity Miley, it’s bollocks. But then again, fashion is always a reflection of our society!

High fashion, haute couture, may seem to pronounce itself and be forward thinking, but there are elements of illusion, fantasy and myth in it! I was intrigued to see (last year, 2014, which is when I started these fashion predictions) that ‘Vivienne Westwood is Julian Assange!’ WTF?

Muhammad is a cartoon in Charlie Hebdo (je suis Charlie – yeah, we’re all fucking Charlie), but Vivienne Westwood (enemy of the state [sic] haha) is Julian Assange (who the fuck would want to be him?) – that is almost more shocking.

Vivienne Westwood is Julian Assange

This (Westwood/Assange) is all about egoism and nepotism (that’s the Fashion world for you!). The Massive ego of Julian Assange (WikiLeaks [online non-profit organisation] founder) fancying himself as a modern Che Guevara – a counter-cultural symbol, but stuck in the Ecuadorian Embassy, London because he doesn’t want to be extradited to Sweden, where he is wanted on sexual assault charges – so he needs a few extra bucks and an image boost! And the Vivster’s support for her fashion designer son Ben Westwood, who was involved with Assange earlier on. A Westwood inspired / supported T-shirt should add a few hundred bucks to the product! A non-profit organisation, my arse.

I was really disappointed in Vivienne Westwood when she actively promoted independence for Scotland (in 2014). For me, it was like a cheap promotional gimmick to get everyone talking about her fashion show. And it bloody-well worked, which was: So, Fucking, Annoying! Splitting up the United Kingdom would have been a total Disaster. However, ‘she’ couldn’t give a damn – just to say: Westwood was quite happy to accept her damehood – prostitution=money. However, I do support her right to free speech and I do love her fashion designs.

Vivienne Westwood – Paris SS15

As I’ve said before, Vivienne Westwood is a woman who wants to push a stick into the spokes of the system, the establishment, England, and watch the rider go arse over tit. Why? Because anarchy has made her a shed load of cash. Talking of which…

I watched a lovely little ‘Guardian’ video of John Lydon talking with the brilliant Polly Toynbee, where she says, “Russell Brand’s a bum-hole.” Massive GRIN. And Lydon says, “Russell Brand will make you all homeless,” and that “he’s preaching all this from the mansion.” …And that’s my point; people like Westwood and Brand, who are part of the establishment, preach their ‘resistance’ shit to the feckless from their mansions. Politics and Fashion are so intertwined – don’t think they are not connected.

…which is why I think the Look for 2015 will be an amalgamation of Les Misérables-esque, 1980s-ish New Romanticism and emotional hardcore.

And then there’s Sienna Miller – nuff said!

Written by Ian Robson
SlashHair the sex, politics, religion and philosophy of the fashion industry, from the perspective of session hairdresser & stylist Ian Robson. “When you look good, I look good.” Find Ian on Twitter. © SlashHair’s work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License, which means: quote me and steal my images, but give me credit by Linking Back.