Vidal Sassoon

Template:Short description Template:Use British English Template:Use dmy dates Template:Wikidata image Vidal Sassoon Template:Postnominals (17January 1928Template:Snd 9May 2012) was a British hairstylist and businessman. He was noted for repopularising a simple, close-cut geometric hairstyle called the five-pointcut, worn by fashion designers including Mary Quant and film stars such as Mia Farrow, Goldie Hawn, Cameron Diaz, Template:Langr and Helen Mirren.Template:Zwj

His early life was one of extreme poverty, with sevenyears of his childhood spent in an orphanage. He quit school at age14, soon holding various jobs in London during World WarII. Although he hoped to become a professional football player, he became an apprentice hairdresser at the suggestion of his mother.

After developing a reputation for his innovative cuts, he moved to LosAngeles in the early1970s, where he opened the first worldwide chain of hairstyling salons, complemented by a line of hair-treatmentproducts.Template:ZwjTemplate:Zwj

He sold his business interests in the early1980s and began funding Israeli think tanks. In2009, Sassoon was appointedCBE by Queen ElizabethII at Buckingham Palace. Vidal Sassoon: The Movie, a documentary film about his life, was released in2010. In2012, he was among the British cultural icons selected by artist SirPeter Blake to appear in a new version of his most famous artwork, the album cover for theBeatles' Sgt.Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, to celebrate the British cultural figures of the prior sixdecades.Template:Zwj

Early life

Sassoon was born to Jewish parents in Hammersmith, West London, and lived nearby in Shepherd's Bush.Template:Zwj His mother, Betty(Bellin) (1900–1997),Template:ZwjTemplate:Zwj an Ashkenazi Jew,Template:Zwj was born in Aldgate, in the East End of London, in1900. Although she was surrounded by grinding poverty, Sassoon writes that she nonetheless resolved to make the best of her life.Template:Zwj Her family had emigrated to England from the Russian Empire in the1880s to escape the antisemitism and pogroms then prevalent.Template:Zwj His father, Jack Sassoon, a Sephardi Jew,Template:Zwj was born in Template:Langr, in the northern part of Greece.Template:Zwj They met in 1925 and married in 1927. They then moved to Shepherd's Bush, which contained a community of Greek Jews.Template:Zwj Sassoon had a younger brother, Ivor.Template:Zwj

His father abandoned the family for another woman when Vidal was three yearsold.Template:Zwj With his mother now unable to support the family, they fell into poverty and were evicted, becoming suddenly homeless.Template:Zwj They were forced to move in with his mother's older sister. There, they shared a two-roomtenement with his aunt and her threechildren. The tiny flat where the seven of them lived had no bathroom or inside toilet, forcing them to share the one outside landing toilet with three other families. He remembered often standing in line to use it in freezing weather. Their roof was also falling apart, which let rain pour through. "All we could see from our windows was the greyness of the tenement across the street", writes Sassoon. "There was ugliness all around."Template:Zwj

Due to poverty as a single parent, his mother eventually placed Sassoon and his younger brother in a Jewish orphanage, where they stayed for sevenyears,Template:Zwj until he was 11, when his mother remarried.Template:Zwj His mother was only allowed to visit them once a month and was never allowed to take them out.

Education

He attended Essendine Road Primary School, a Christian school of about a thousandchildren. He was frequently taunted by classmates as a "Yid" or with chants of "All Jews have long noses".Template:Zwj One of his proudest days at the school was winning the 100-yarddash in an all-school contest. "The urge to win has never left me", he writes.Template:Zwj

File:A group of children arrive at Brent station near Kingsbridge, Devon, after being evacuated from Bristol in 1940. D2592.jpg

British children being evacuated to the countryside duringWWII

However, he says that he was "a very bad student" with abysmal grades in most classes, except for mental arithmetic. After one session of mental arithmetic, his master said teasingly, "Sassoon, it is a pleasure to see that you have gaps of intelligence between bouts of ignorance".Template:Zwj He took a volunteer job as a choir boy for the local synagogue, which gave him one of the few chances to see his mother, who would come on Saturdays.Template:Zwj

Sassoon and the other children at the school were evacuated after WWII began on 3September 1939. He was 11years old. "It's a date I'll never forget", he said. "Suddenly my brother and I and all our fellow orphans were on trains with hundreds of thousands of other kids, moving out of London."Template:Zwj He and his brother were taken to Holt, Wiltshire, a small village of a thousandpeople.Template:Zwj

First jobs

black-and-white photo of civilians sheltering in underground station

London Underground bomb shelter in London during World WarII

After his return to London, he left school at the age of 14 and worked as a messenger. The war was in full force with London still being bombed, which forced him to sleep in underground shelters. During work hours, he said "I got used to seeing bodies and blood, and hearing cries of agony" as he carried messages from central London to the docks.Template:Zwj

Upon the insistence of his mother, they tried to get him into a hairdressing apprenticeship; his mother told him that her ambition was for him to become a professional hairdresser.Template:Zwj However, he saw himself becoming a football player, a sport he excelled at. "I could not imagine myself backcombing hair and winding up rollers for a living."Template:ZwjTemplate:ZwjTemplate:Zwj

When she took him to the hairdressing school of a well-known stylist, Adolph Cohen, they were disappointed immediately when they were told it was a two-yearprogramme and would cost much more than they could afford. "My mother looked so terribly dejected", he said, that as they left the salon, "I thought she might faint".Template:Zwj A few minutes later, Cohen called them back to the salon, then told him, "You seem to have very good manners, young man. Start Monday and forget the cost." His mother began to cry out of joy.Template:Zwj

Political activities

At the age of 17, although he had been too young to serve in World WarII, he became the youngest member of the 43Group, a mostly Jewish veterans' underground organisation founded by Morris Beckman and several others which broke up fascist meetings in East LondonTemplate:ZwjTemplate:Zwj to prevent SirOswald Mosley's movement from spreading "messages of hatred" in the period following World WarII.Template:Zwj

In1948, at the age of20, he joined the Template:Langr (which shortly afterwards was integrated into the Israel Defense Forces) and fought in the 1948Arab–Israeli War, which began after Israel declared statehood.Template:ZwjTemplate:Zwj Sassoon arrived in Mandatory Palestine in April1948, a month before Israeli independence. He fought in the Negev against the EgyptianArmy.Template:Zwj During an interview, he described the year he spent training with the Israelis as "the best year of my life", and recalled how he felt:

When you think of 2,000years of being put down and suddenly you are a nation rising, it was a wonderful feeling. There were only 600,000 people defending the country against fivearmies, so everyone had something to do.Template:Zwj

Career

Sassoon resumed his hairdressing training under Raymond Bessone in his salon in Mayfair.Template:Zwj Sassoon opened his first salon in1954 inLondon;Template:Zwj singer-actress Georgia Brown, his friend and neighbour, claimed to be his first customer.Template:Zwj

black-and-white photo

Sassoon cutting Mia Farrow's hair for Rosemary's Baby in1968

Sassoon stated his intentions in designing new, more efficient, hair styles: "If I was going to be in hairdressing, I wanted to change things. I wanted to eliminate the superfluous and get down to the basic angles of cut and shape."Template:Zwj Sassoon's works include the geometric perm and the "[[Nancy Kwan|Nancy Template:Langr]]" 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. Peggy Moffitt’s hairstyle, an asymmetrical bowl cutTemplate:Zwj created by Sassoon, became known as the "five point".Template:Zwj

In 1964, 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. Advertising and cosmetics executive Natalie Donay is credited with discovering Sassoon in London and bringing him to the United States,Template:Zwj where in1965, he opened his first New York City salon on Madison Avenue.Template:Zwj

In 1966, inspired by 1920s film star Clara Bow's close-cropped hair, he created designs for Emanuel Ungaro. Director Roman Polanski brought him to Hollywood from London in1968, at a cost of $5,000,Template:ZwjTemplate:NoteTag to create a unique pixie cut for Mia Farrow, who was to star in Rosemary's Baby.Template:Zwj

In the early 1970s, Sassoon made Los Angeles his home.Template:Zwj In1971, he promoted his 30-year-old second-in-command, artistic director Roger Thompson, to director of the Sassoonsalon, explaining jocularly that, "Twenty-five years of schlepping behind a barber chair are enough!"Template:Zwj John Paul DeJoria, a friend of Sassoon, co-founded Paul Mitchell Systems with Paul Mitchell, one of Sassoon's former students. Mitchell said that Sassoon was "the most famous hairstylist in the history of the world".Template:Zwj

black-and-white headshot photo

Goldie Hawn's bob cut in Cactus Flower(1969)

Sassoon began his "Vidal Sassoon" line of hair-care products in1973.Template:Zwj The actor Michael Caine, who when young and struggling "was roommates with Terence Stamp and Vidal SassoonTemplate:Snd he used to cut my hair, and he always had a lot of models around",Template:Zwj claimed to have inspired this, saying, "I told him that he must have something that is working for him while he slept. I told him he had to make shampoos and other hair-care products."Template:Zwj Whatever the inspiration, Sassoon's brand was applied to shampoos and conditioners sold worldwide, with a commercial campaign featuring the slogan "If Template:Em don't look good, Template:Em don't look good."Template:Zwj 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 the United States.Template:Zwj

The El Paso, Texas-based Helen of Troy Corporation began manufacturing and marketing Sassoon hair-care products in1980.Template:Zwj In1983, Richardson-Vicks purchased the LosAngeles-based Vidal SassoonInc.Template:Zwj as well as Sassoon's Santa Monica hairdressing school; the company had already bought his European businesses.Template:Zwj Sassoon's 1982sales of hair products had topped $110million,Template:ZwjTemplate:NoteTag with 80percent of revenues coming from theUS.Template:Zwj

Two years later the company was bought by Procter& Gamble. Sassoon, who remained a consultant through at least the mid-1990s,Template:Zwj sued P&G in2003 for allegedly neglecting the marketing of his brand in favour of the company's other hair product lines, such as Pantene; the parties reached a settlement the following year.Template:Zwj

He sold his business interests in the early1980s to devote himself to philanthropy. By2004, it was reported that Sassoon was no longer associated with the brand that bears his name.Template:Zwj He also had a short-lived television series called Your New Day with Vidal Sassoon, which aired in1980.

Sassoon was twice a guest on BBC Radio 4's Desert Island Discs, on 27June 1970Template:Zwj and 9October 2011, when he was also Resident Thinker on the Nowhereisland art project.Template:Zwj He was a mystery guest on What's My Line? in March1967.Template:Zwj

Honours

Sassoon was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire(CBE) by Queen ElizabethII at Buckingham Palace in the 2009Birthday Honours.Template:Zwj

Personal life

photo of building exterior with "Sassoon Salon" over entrance

Sassoon Salon, Leeds

Sassoon was married four times, first to Elaine Wood, his salon receptionist, in1956; the marriage ended in1958. In1967, he married actress Beverly Adams, whom he met while filming Torture Garden(1967).Template:Zwj They had three biological children, including daughter Catya,Template:Zwj and adopted a son.Template:ZwjTemplate:ZwjTemplate:ZwjTemplate:ZwjTemplate:ZwjTemplate:Zwj Sassoon and Adams divorced after 13years of marriage.Template:Zwj His thirdwife was Jeanette Hartford-Davis, a dressagechampion and former fashionmodel; they married in1983 and divorced soon after.Template:Zwj In1992, he married designer Rhonda"Ronnie" Sassoon.Template:Zwj

Philanthropy

Sassoon had a lifelong commitment to eradicating antisemitism. He started the Vidal Sassoon International Center for the Study of Antisemitism, orSICSA, in1982.Template:Zwj Located at Hebrew University of Jerusalem, it is devoted to gathering information about antisemitismworldwide.

After selling his company, he worked towards philanthropic causes such as the Boys Clubs of America and the Performing Arts Council of the Music Center of Los Angeles via his Vidal Sassoon Foundation.Template:Zwj He was also active in supporting relief efforts after Hurricane Katrina. His eponymous foundation also funded educational pursuits on a need-basis in Israel and elsewhere. At the time of his death, he had academies in England, Canada and the United States, while planning to open locations in Germany and Taiwan.

Illness and death

In June2011, it was reported that Sassoon had been diagnosed with leukemia two years earlier. He died from the disease on 9May 2012 at his home in Bel Air, Los Angeles,Template:Zwj in the presence of his family. A memorial service was planned for a later date.Template:Zwj

Legacy

"He truly changed the world of hair and beauty. He was definitely the most innovative person ever to enter the industry. He led the way for the celebrity stylists of today."

Oscar Blandi, celebrity stylistTemplate:Zwj

"Vidal was like Christopher Columbus", said Angus Mitchell, who studied under Sassoon. "He discovered that the world was round with his cutting system. It was the first language that people could follow."Template:Zwj Neil Cornelius, the incumbent owner of Sassoon's first solo venture, called him a "hairdressing legend".Template:Zwj

Grace Coddington, Sassoon's former model and creative director of AmericanVogue, said that he changed the way the public looked at hair:

Before Sassoon, it was all back-combing and lacquer; the whole thing was to make it high and artificial. Suddenly you could put your fingers through your hair! He didn't create [the five-pointcut] for me; he created it on me. It was an extraordinary cut; no one has bettered it since. And it liberated everyone. You could just sort of drip-dry it and shakeit.

John Barrett of the John Barrett Salon at Bergdorf Goodman said that Sassoon "was the creator of sensual hair. This was somebody who changed our industry entirely, not just from the point of view of cutting hair but actually turning it into a business. He was one of the first who had a product line bought out by a major corporation."Template:Zwj

Books and films

• Sorry I Kept You Waiting, Madam (1968), his autobiography; New York: Putnam.
• Cutting Hair the Vidal Sassoon Way (1984)
• Vidal Sassoon: The MovieTemplate:Snd How one man changed the world with a pair of scissors. (2010), a documentary film directed by Craig Teper.

See also

• Vidal Sassoon International Center for the Study of Antisemitism

External links

• Template:Trim Template:Replace on YouTubeTemplate:Snd official trailer
• Voices on Antisemitism Interview with Vidal Sassoon from the US Holocaust Memorial Museum
• The secret life of Vidal Sassoon
• Template:Trim/ Template:Trim at IMDbTemplate:EditAtWikidataTemplate:WikidataCheck
• J-Grit.com – Vidal Sassoon – Anti-Fascist Street Fighter
• Template:Trim Portraits of Template:Trim at the National Portrait Gallery, LondonTemplate:EditAtWikidata