Hear Me, See Me: Haircuts4Homeless's book
Haircuts4Homeless (H4H) is a wonderful, heart-warming, honestly life-changing organisation. The charity, founded by hairdresser Stewart Roberts, is supported by some of the beauty world's big-hearted names, from Errol Douglas to Adam Reed, Sam McKnight and British Beauty Council's Millie Kendall, among other notable hair world/beauty names.
It's 'session styling with a difference': hairdressers get together and offer – yes, as the name suggests – haircuts to homeless people, very often living on the streets. As Stewart notes, 'Homelessness is at crisis point in 2021’. Almost 100,000 'households' were reported as homeless at the start of 2021.
The new Hear Me, See Me book sets out 'to humanise the face of homelessness by challenging stigmas and stereotypes via honest, thought-provoking imagery and words to acknowledge that the smallest of actions can have the greatest effect'.
Photographer Jack Eames has been photographing some of the transformations over time, creating poignant and powerful black and white imagery. But the book was the idea of volunteer hairdresser, session stylist Leigh Keates, whose A-List clients have included Renée Zellweger, Florence Welch and Sarah Jessica Parker. 'Several very close-to-home conversations with the guests had triggered an awakening moment for me,' he says, 'forcing me to realise that I, too, had stigmas and stereotypes attached to my understanding of homelessness.'
Haircuts, as H4H explain, are an unimaginable luxury for homeless people. The charity has 600 volunteer hairdressers working across 68 projects in the UK and Ireland, and has notched up over 40,000 haircuts. 'We've had guests that are so grateful they have been able to get a haircut for a job interview, to visit their children and feel more confident in many other situations that most of us are privileged enough to take for granted.' In fact, 67% of people agree that a haircut can improve their mental health. (As if any of us need convincing about the self-esteem-boosting power of a Good Hair Day.)
As Stewart Roberts says: 'This is not just a book, this is not just a haircut, this is a community. A community that creates a space for wellbeing and acceptance and – even if it is temporary – it allows our guests some respite and an opportunity to escape their difficult circumstances.'
100% of the proceeds of Hear Me, See Me will be used to continue H4h's work nationwide. Do buy a copy, if you can: this beautiful book is the sort of talking point we welcome having out in our own living rooms – anything to break down the taboo of homelessness, which has affected several people very, very close to us.
£49 + £6 p&p – buy here
