Vidal Sassoon-ra emlékezünk
A modern hajvágás atyjától, a Wash and Go gondolkodás megteremtőjétől Vidal Sassoontól búcsúzunk. 84 évesen hagyta itt a világot, örökségül hagyva fantasztikus életművét.
1928-ban született Londonban, igen szegény családba, nehéz körülmények közé. Apja korán elhagyta őket, így kénytelenek voltak árvaházba adni. Tizennégy éves korában fodrászsegédnek állt, s ekkor döbbent rá, hogy ez az a hivatás ami igazán érdekli. Élete nem volt izgalmaktól mentes. Mindig is büszke volt zsidó származására, harcolt Izraleben, és London egyik antifasiszta különítményének is tagja volt.
Egy családi tragédia folytán hívta vissza édesanyja Londonba. Ekkor ismét munkát keresett, de a legtöbb elegáns szalonból eltanácsolták erős cockney akcentusa miatt. Kénytelen volt beszédtanárhoz járni a szebb kiejtés érdekében.
Munkát végül Raymond “Mr. Teasy-Weasy” Bessone-tól kapott. De nemcsak munkát, hanem gondolkodásmódot is tanult mesterétől. “Ő tanított meg igazán, hogyan kell hajat vágni …Soha nem jutottam volna el nélküle eddig. ” – emlékezett Bessone-ra.
De ekkor már érezte, hogy a hagyományos fodrászat felett eljárt az idő. 1954-ben megnyitotta saját szalonját, és elkezdődött a forradalom.
A hajvágás többé nem volt az, ami eddig. 57-ben vágta először Mary Quant haját. A legenda szerint nemcsak a haját, hanem véletlenül a fülét is megvágta, ám a tervezőnő enek ellenére is ragaszkodott hozzá, mondván:” Sassoon úgy vágja a hajat, mint ahogy én szabom a ruhákat.” Quant Sassoon geometrikus hajvágásának egyik emblematikus figurája, és remek reklámja lett. Hajvágási technikájához az inspirációt a bauhaus építészetből merítette. A bob frizura ma is az egyik legdivatosabb forma.
1963-ban Hollywood is felfigyel Sassoonra: John Krish kéri fel a The Wild Affair című filmjében szereplő Nancy Kwan frizurájának megkreálására. Az asszimetrikusan vágott frizura ismét sikert aratott, és nem volt többé megállása a legnagyobb divatlapokig.
Mia Farrow hajának rövidre vágása már komoly sajtóesemény volt. Annyi fotós és újságíró figyelme vette körül a híres frizura készítése közben, ami eddig fodrásznak még sosem járt ki. Nem mellesleg ötezer dollárt kapott ezért a vágásért, ami 1968 nem kis pénznek számított. Mondanom sem kell, hogy ez a frizura is a mai napig megállja a helyét, és bukkan elő. Elég megemlítenem a Harry Potter filmekből megismert Emma Watson, aki szinte ugyanezt a hajat vágatta.
Elkötelezett híve volt az egészséges életmódnak, és ez egyenes út volt ahhoz, hogy a hajápolást is forradalmasítsa. Termékeit olyan hírességek reklámozták, és használták, mint Andy Warhol. Sassoon ekkor már egy birodalmat irányított. Közben könyvet írt, tanított, és a fejlesztéseket felügyelte. 1985-ben a nevét viselő hajápoló termékeinek jogait a Procter and Gamble-nek adta el.
Származását, gyökereit sosem tagadta meg, vagy felejtette el. A nyolcvanas évek elején megalapította a Vidal Sassoon Antiszemitizmuskutató Központot Jeruzsálemben. E mellett a Vidal Sassoon Akadémiát is létrehozta, ahol számtalan fodrász tanulhat, és képezheti magát, világszerte pedig húsznál is több szalon működik a neve és filozófiája alatt. 2010-ben filmet rendeztek életéről. Ekkor már halálos beteg volt, ám ezt nem osztotta meg a nyilvánossággal.
2012. május 9-én örökre elhagyta ezt a világot.
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Vidal Sassoon, CBE (17 January 1928 – 9 May 2012) was a British hairdresser, credited with creating a simple geometric, “Bauhaus-inspired” hair style, also called the bob. Due to the popularity of his styles, he was described as “a rock star, an artist, [and] a craftsman who ‘changed the world with a pair of scissors.’”
His “wash and wear” philosophy liberated women from the “tyranny of the salon” and “revolutionized the art of hairstyling.” Sassoon’s styles became “emblematic of freedom and good health,” and their popularity allowed him to open the first chain of worldwide hair styling salons, complemented by his hair-treatment products. He is also remembered for his television commercials in the 1960s. Vidal Sassoon: The Movie, a documentary film about his life, was released in 2010.
Sassoon was born to Jewish parents in Hammersmith, London and lived in Shepherds Bush. His father, Jack Sassoon, was from Thessaloniki, Greece, and his mother, Betty, came from a family of immigrants from Ukraine. Sassoon had a younger brother, Ivor, who died from a heart attack at the age of 46. Jack Sassoon, a womanizer, left his family when Vidal was three.
Due to his mother’s extreme poverty and now being a single parent, she was forced to place Sassoon and his younger brother in a Jewish orphanage, where they stayed for seven years. His mother was only allowed to visit them once a month and was never allowed to take them out. He attended Essendine Road Primary School, a Christian school, before being evacuated to Holt, Wiltshire. After his return to London he left school at the age of 14 and worked as a messenger before starting a hairdressing apprenticeship.
At the age of 17, although having been too young to serve in the Second World War, he became the youngest member of the 43 Group, a Jewish veterans’ underground organisation. It fought against anti-semitism after the war ended by breaking up Fascist meetings in East London. One newspaper refers to him as an “anti-fascist warrior-hairdresser”, whose aim was to prevent Sir Oswald Mosley’s far-Right movement from spreading “messages of hatred” in the period following the Second World War.
In 1948, at the age of 20, he joined the Haganah (which shortly afterwards became the Israeli Defence Forces) and fought in the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, which began after Israel achieved statehood. During an interview, he described the year he spent training with the Israelis as “the best year of my life,”
Sassoon trained under Raymond Bessone, in his salon in Mayfair. He said, about Bessone, in 2010 that “He really taught me how to cut hair…. I’d never have achieved what I have without him.” Sassoon opened his first salon in 1954 in London.
Sassoon’s works include the geometric perm and the “Nancy Kwan” hairstyles. They were all modern and low-maintenance. The hairstyles created by Sassoon relied on dark, straight, and shiny hair cut into geometric yet organic shapes. In 1963, Sassoon created a short, angular hairstyle cut on a horizontal plane that was the recreation of the classic “bob cut.” His geometric haircuts seemed to be severely cut, but were entirely lacquer-free, relying on the natural shine of the hair for effect. Sassoon has been a key force in the commercial direction of hair styling.
By the early 1980s, after moving to the United States, Sassoon had sold his name to manufacturers of haircare products and the multinational Procter & Gamble was applying his name to shampoos and conditioners sold worldwide, with a commercial campaign featuring the iconic slogan “If you don’t look good, we don’t look good.” Former salon colleagues also bought Sassoon’s salons and acquired the right to use his name, extending the brand in salons into the United Kingdom and United States.
In 1982, Sassoon started the Vidal Sassoon International Center for the Study of Antisemitism, or SICSA, a research centre devoted to the non-political, interdisciplinary gathering of information about antisemitism.
In 2003, Sassoon sued Procter & Gamble in the Federal Court alleging that P&G was destroying his brand by skimping on marketing in favour of the company’s other hair product lines, Pantene especially. The suit was settled to their mutual satisfaction before trial.
In 2002, the chain of Vidal Sassoon salons had been sold to Regis Corporation. By 2004, it was reported that Sassoon was no longer associated with the brand that bears his name. Vidal Sassoon authored several books, including A Year of Beauty and Health co-written with his former wife, Beverly Sassoon. He also had a short-lived TV series called Your New Day with Vidal Sassoon, which aired in the fall of 1980.
In 2010, a feature-length documentary was released about Sassoon’s life, career, and influence on fashion and culture. It premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival in New York City in 2010 to much acclaim and was picked as an Official Selection that year.
On May 9, 2012, Sassoon died of leukemia at his home in Los Angeles. He told the Chicago Tribune in 2004 that he was proud to have entered the field.
“Hairdressers are a wonderful breed,” he said. “You work one-on-one with another human being and the object is to make them feel so much better and to look at themselves with a twinkle in their eye. Work on their bone structure, the colour, the cut, whatever, but when you’ve finished, you have an enormous sense of satisfaction.”
