Last year I was approached by Анна Линеен the photo editor of leading Russian hair magazine Hair's How & Beauty. She was interested in featuring one of my photographs in the magazine and promised that when it was published she would post me a copy. So when a thick envelope covered in Russian stamps landed on my doormat last weekend I was very happy to find one of my pictures in print for the first time, they even did a little write up, in Russian of course.
“As a photographer, I am interested in photos with a retro theme, especially the 70s and 80s – the time of my childhood” – says London photographer, Tom Sebastiano. “I remember how my mother and her friends sat in the hairdressing salon under the driers while I played with my toy cars by their feet. These buzzing lampshades were at the same time funny and strange.
London is full of salons which are trendy, modern and really uninteresting. But one day Tom was lucky - whilst wandering around the suburbs, he looked through the window of one salon and stopped in his tracks. “The same sounds, the same equipment - it seemed to me that I had stepped back into 1982!” exclaimed Tom. “I went back with my camera and asked the owner if I could take some photos. She didn’t refuse. I was photographing this wonderful lady who under the drier was happily ignored all the confusion. At that moment, she took the paper and unwrapped a sandwich which she had brought with her from home.” Having taken the shot, he called it Creature Comforts and included it in a series of touching retro-photos called Salon Stories.
Translation - Nicky Webber