Vidal Sassoon - Vidal Sassoon Forced Into Hair Career

Vidal Sassoon Forced Into Hair Career

Vidal Sassoon's mother forced him into become a hairdresser.

The 83-year-old crimper - who is known for creating some of the most iconic styles of the 60s - explained while when he was a teenager he wanted to become a professional soccer player, his mother told him he wasn't good enough at sport and enlisted his services to a hair salon in London's East End.

He said: "I said I wanted to be a footballer but she said I wasn't good enough so I should forget it. She told me that she'd had a premonition that cutting hair was the job for me.

"She was a great lady. Strong. She dragged me, not by the hand but by the Elbow - no escape - to a salon in the East End run by Adolph 'The Professor' Cohen. He was a crazy disciplinarian. I had to come in with pressed trousers, clean shoes, my nails spotless."

Vidal also admitted as soon as he cut three foot off screen legend Nancy Kwan's hair - transforming her locks into a chic bob - he had a gut feeling the style would take the world by storm.

He added to The Scotsman newspaper: "I remember after cutting Nancy Kwan's hair I called photographer Terence Donovan and I asked him what he was doing. It went everywhere, that bob. It just went everywhere. I just knew. I just knew that was the bob."