Laura

Meet our salon owner Laura who qualified as a stylist aged 19.  She started as an apprentice with a large company called Steiner which had salons in Beaconsfield, London and, uniquely, on cruise ships where she worked on one of their ‘fun ships’.   

After that amazing contract I worked as a stylist in my town, it didn’t challenge me enough though so I trained as a florist and did part time hair at home and worked in a pub. Then, I went travelling as I was offered a job in New Zealand. After this, I went to Australia for a while as my brother was there and then onto Asia.

When I came home, I thought I’d be good at making sandwiches in a café, but I wasn’t! Jon offered me a job at his new salon ‘The Cutting Studio’. I started there at 24, after he’d been open for 6 months. There was just 3 of us as stylists and one trainee. That team grew and grew and I became manager, took my assessors award and started training too. I also went to night school to gain a teaching qualification, so I could teach in colleges, training hairdressing students. I thought I might go into teaching full time but I’ve not yet used that qualification!

I was ambitious and felt I couldn’t grow any further at the Cutting Studio so I bought a salon. I kept that for 3 years and it was a great little business but then I got married so I sold it. I had my son then decided to go back part time to The Cutting Studio family as a stylist.

My husband got a job offer in Barcelona so we then moved there for 2 and a half years. The only time I haven’t worked! That was a great experience but I missed hair. We came back and I once again returned to The Cutting Studio (Jon said I was a boomerang!) I stayed there till my move to Brooklyns. I’d been at The Cutting Studio for 30 years on and off so it was an emotional time.

Buying Brooklyns was a great opportunity I couldn’t pass up.. My children are grown now so time to take on a new challenge, which it is of course.

I love creating looks for long hair, balayage, blondes, curls and anything feminine.
As salon owner, no two days are the same. I find people so interesting, their life, loves, secrets and all the random information those clients share. I sometimes talk so much I don’t talk about their hair enough. On the hair side it’s the best feeling and so rewarding when that client loves what you’ve created for them.

I really appreciate my fellow stylists here and all the amazing stylists I’ve worked with over the years – they inspire me. Social media is also now so inspirational and quite a change from the old hair magazines as that’s all we had to go with.
My ultimate ambition is to buy the freehold of my business from my landlord, and maybe a little bolthole in Ibiza.
I would describe myself in three words as ambitious, chatty and helpful.
A fun fact about me is that I was born in South Africa and took GCSE Spanish as an adult. I did much better than I did at school and got an A* as an adult!