22/07/2025
40 years and counting!! 🤩
Paul was recently watching a re-run of Live Aid and realised, it's officially been 40 years since her passed his hairdressing exams at Alan International.
A year before his exams, he'd just come back from Operation Lionheart (the biggest army exercise since WWII). Where he was out there showing 'Ivan the Terrible' exactly what they were made of!! 💪
He'd joined up to pay his way through college and somewhere between the Spartan APC and the OP, he decided I was going to become a hairdresser.
What a switch — from camo to cutting hair. But somehow it all made sense.
The morning after he passed those exams, he was hanging — recovering from more than a few scoops. Hungover, emotional and watching Live Aid roll out across the TV screen... And then it hit him like a brick the last night events.
He had just lost my dad not long before. And the weight of it all came crashing in.
40 years earlier, he had helped liberate Little Bergen-Belsen. Same part of the world as Exercise Lionheart. Same German barns etc just a different kind of battle.
There Paul was, not in uniform this time but still trying to serve in his own way.
Over refreshed and over emotional he had one of those moments in front of his tutor. Edmund Dobney. He didn’t say much. Just held on to him, stroked his back, let him cry it out. That moment — that small act of kindness — stuck with Paul for life.
Looking back over these four decades in the British hairdressing world — it’s been a proper cocktail of beauty, brilliance and bo****ks. 🙌
Back then, haircuts weren’t always high fashion but they gave people something real: confidence, security, identity. Then came the new guard, for Paul the Buffalo movement was what he hanged his coat on. Ray Petri styling all these types — bringing future-facing styles that did the exact same thing: made people feel like themselves. ( For those who don’t know, “Buffalo” wasn’t just a name—it was a Caribbean term for rude boys, rebels with style. It wasn’t about being rough, it was about effortless cool, taking street style and making it iconic. That’s why we wear sports shoes today instead of standard shoes. That’s the Buffalo legacy.)
And that’s the lesson Paul's carried all the way through. It’s never just about the haircut. It’s what it unlocks inside.
Movements like Buffalo. Catherine Hamnett’s “Stay Alive at 85.” Clubs like The Wag, The Mud Club, and Enter the Dragon. They all shaped how he saw hair — as something with meaning, shape, attitude and soul.
He's had the privilege of crossing paths with some remarkable people and each one added something to the story.
So here’s to 40 years of cutting, caring, laughing, enjoying the moment and never losing the love for the craft.
If Paul can pass even a fraction of that on colleagues, clients or anyone willing to listen... he'll count that as job done.
Here’s to the next chapter.
Still standing. Still cutting. Still loving it.🥂
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