Alim Kheraj  0:00  
Episode Three: Open Barbers.

Greygory  0:02  
The message that we're giving is: stop imposing assumptions and gender binaries and other kinds of binaries on people. Just you know, just accept that people are varied and diverse and complex, you know, and maybe one day, the hair and beauty industry will have arrived at a realisation that that's a much better way to be in the world.

Alim Kheraj  0:25  
Hello, and welcome to Queer Spaces: Behind She scene, a podcast and photography series where we document contemporary LGBTQ+ spaces and analyse the ever shifting landscape of the UK is queer scene. I'm your host Alim Kheraj. I'm a freelance writer whose work is mainly about the intersection of queerness and popular culture. I'm also the author of Queer London: A guide to LGBTQ+ London past and present.

Tim Boddy  0:57  
And I'm Tim Boddy, a photographer, artist and picture editor whose work generally centres on the LGBTQ+ community.

Alim Kheraj  1:05  
Each episode of Queer Spaces: Behind the Scene will feature in-depth conversations with a diverse range of voices behind some pivotal LGBTQ+ groups and spaces. Each episode will be complemented by original photography and portraiture by Tim, which captures the spirit of the community.

In today's episode, we had the opportunity to head down to Open Barbers in Hackney where we spoke with founder Greygory Vass. Started over a decade ago, Open Barbers is a not for profit hairdressing service for all length, genders and sexualities, who offer a queer and trans friendly haircutting experience. We spoke to Greygory about his life, the genesis of Open Barbers and forced gender roles and community.

My hair had got to a point where it was unacceptable.

Tim Boddy  1:57  
It was very impressive. There was a lot of it I'd say

Alim Kheraj  1:59  
It was floof central.

Tim Boddy  2:01  
I was very jealous of it, quite frankly.

Alim Kheraj  2:03  
It just grows and grows. And I really, you know, actually part of why I hate going to the hairdressers is this very enforced masculine energy that barbers and hairdressers - even hairdressers! They should, should feel.

Tim Boddy  2:20  
Yeah, in kind of a traditional sense... and stereotypes. Quite gay.

Alim Kheraj  2:26  
But it makes me feel really uncomfortable. It always has I've always hated it.

Tim Boddy  2:31  
Yeah, absolutely same. Greygory had so many interesting things to say about, obviously Open Barbers, and hairdressing, and just the queer community in general. But the way that Open Barbers treat their clients with kind of respect and like great dignity and a huge sensitivity, is, yeah, to be absolutely applauded. Like, there was even some little throwaway comments that Greygory said that, like, have stayed with me since we did a recording a couple of weeks ago. 

I think he was talking about how some people were like, have such a sense of they can't even look themselves in the mirror, for example, because of like that huge, I guess, body dysmorphia, which can be related to your gender. It doesn't even have to be related to your gender, it can just be a part of who you are. And that's something that I kind of personally related to as I went through a period in my like, early 20s, or like late teens where, yeah, I literally could not look at myself in mirror, even in my own house, like had to turn the lights off. If I was doing my hair, just like yeah, just have an outline of that shadow. But if there was a space, like Open Barbers that existed, that would have helped coax me out, like a lot more in terms of like getting a haircut, and feeling like in a yeah, genuinely kind of safe space. 

As it happened. I didn't... I think I cut my own hair for like three years because I was so intimidated just to go to the barber and be judged or, or whatever, or just even like look at myself in the mirror at that point in time, which is like I've kind of worked on over the years. So yeah, it was yeah, this is one of my... I've loved all the conversations we had, but there was like a great sensitivity about how Greygory was talking about the experience of being queer and yeah, just getting a haircut.

Alim Kheraj  4:05  
He also had on some really nice glasses. 

Tim Boddy  4:09  
You bonded over those glasses. 

Alim Kheraj  4:10  
I then emailed him about afterwards toask where he got them from, because I was like, there's some nice glasses. 

Tim Boddy  4:16  
They sure were.

Alim Kheraj  4:17  
Yeah, well, they had a great little bit of green in them. They were just a really nice pair of glasses. 

Yeah, I think the next time I go, I'm gonna... because I hate going to the hairdresser's, I will just... I usually let my hair grow out. But the next time I get it cut, I'm going to go there. And I've wanted to do something like jazzy and fun, with my hair.

Tim Boddy  4:39  
A bit out there. 

Alim Kheraj  4:40  
And I feel like if I went to Open Barbers and said, I want to do something jazzy and fun with my hair, they would have really good ideas about what I could do and do it competently. And make me feel safe and secure in having that done.

Tim Boddy  4:57  
Yeah, there'll be that kind of I think... just implicit trust. Because, yeah, just both come from queer backgrounds and having an understanding. And they'll probably ask you the right questions. Even if you might not know, they'll, I'm sure they'll be able to, like steer you in that direction of like, well, what do you mean by like this?

Alim Kheraj  5:14  
Yeah. And it wasn't... it didn't feel too, like fashion and beauty-esque...

Tim Boddy  5:21  
Yeah, exactly. 

Alim Kheraj  5:22  
...as well. It had quite a community sense to it.

Tim Boddy  5:25  
Yes. A huge community sense. Like being in the actual space you really got a sense of "oh, this is for the community". 

Alim Kheraj  5:31  
Yeah. 

Tim Boddy  5:32  
You know... it's filled with like, little trinkets, and flyers, and posters. 

Alim Kheraj  5:35  
And I could have moved in

Tim Boddy  5:37  
Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Very homely feel. Yeah, it was it was like the opposite... Because we talked about the barbers being intimidating. This was like very much not intimidating from that kind of beauty kind of sense, or just from who they were as people. 

Alim Kheraj  5:50  
Yeah, it was great. 

Tim Boddy  5:51  
Yeah, loved it.

Alim Kheraj  5:57  
Today, we are at Open Barbers, who are a hairdressing services for all length, genders and sexualities, who offer a queer and trans friendly hair cutting experience. Hello, would you like to tell us your name, pronouns, and a bit about yourself?

Greygory  6:12  
Hi, nice to meet you. Thanks for inviting us onto this programme. It's exciting. My name is Gregory, I use he pronouns. And a little bit about myself. Well, I guess primarily, I'm a hairdresser. And I work cutting hair at Open Barbers. But I also run the business with my co director, Toddy. 

What more about myself? I actually have an arts background. So I studied Fine Art originally. And I did work in the arts for about 10 years before I retrained as a hairdresser and decided to set up Open Barbers, which was the purpose of my retraining, I saw a gap - a big gap - that wasn't being met for LGBTQI+ people around hair. And I thought... and I enjoyed cutting hair as a hobby. So I thought "You know what, I'm going to have a go and see if I can set something up." Anyway, you're probably gonna ask me more about that later [laughs]

Alim Kheraj  7:02  
What's the... what's the process like of becoming a hairdresser?

Greygory  7:07  
So I guess, for me, a big part of it was being self taught. I started out cutting my own hair, because I wasn't able to get a service that I was looking for, from barbers or salons or be turned away from barbers, because they'd be policing my gender.

Alim Kheraj  7:21  
Right.

Greygory  7:22  
Or I'd be... I'd go to salons, but they wouldn't give me the haircut that that I was really looking for. They either didn't have the skills to do that, or they didn't have the psychological capacity to go that direction with me. So I cut my own hair. And then because I had the equipment to do that, I was cutting other people's hair as well, mostly fellow students at the time, and family members. 

But then I decided that I wanted... when I decided I did want to go into hairdressing professionally, I then went and studied hairdressing at college. I did a short course in barbering, in a little private college. And then I did a one year course in hairdressing at a local educational authority college, City in Islington College, actually. And so I'd say that the experience was good. Like, I mean, we did have to keep pulling them up a lot of the time on saying things like "women's hair" instead of "long hair:, and using that as shorthand. 

And we did question quite a lot of things on the course that were sort of assumptions about what women would want. And we... because we were already doing a bit of Open Barbers at the time - cutting hair of friends - and it was growing already at that point, we were able to bring clients into the college as models. And we had to try to sort of get them to accept us bringing clients in who didn't necessarily fit their traditional idea of what that... who they would expect to be getting haircuts on the course. So when I say it was good, there was quite a lot of work, quite a lot of labour involved in like, supporting them to learn how to be more inclusive. 

But they were open to it and they were good teachers, they were, you know. The actual teachers on the course were great. I think the stumbling blocks that we came up against were more to do with the awarding body of the qualification 

Alim Kheraj  9:12  
right. 

Greygory  9:13  
And they (the college tutors) were supportive of us bringing in all genders of people, non binary people, and you know, any gender of person as long as it... as long as we were doing a service on that person that fitted what they needed to see that we could do. But the awarding body then, kind of, came came back and said we would disqualify any, any services that you've delivered on your course that were not on women. We wouldn't accept those those aspects of your course because you have to do two of each type of haircut. And you have to show that you can do it within the time, the allotted time, and to a certain standard. Snd they said they would disqualify anyone that wasn't a woman. 

So we... so the tutor supported us to change the names on the forms so that they just wouldn't know any difference. But yeah, those are the kinds of stumbling blocks that we came up against. But yeah, as I say, the tutors were great, we did learn a lot, we wanted to do the course, to be able to skill up around longer hair services, like layers, and long past the shoulder length, but also bobs and things like that. We wanted to skill-up around those things a bit more. And it definitely did that for us. 

But I don't know that we would have been confident to just go up and set up a salon immediately after qualifying. And I know that a lot of our fellow students didn't feel they had very much haircutting experience, because there was a lot of blow drying, and colouring hair, and doing wedding-style hair and stuff like that. So there wasn't actually... there was only a small portion of that time spent learning how to cut hair. And I think a lot of our fellow students didn't feel enormously equipped to be, like, out in the world. But because we've done so much self taught hairdressing, the hair cutting side of it felt very comfortable for us. So we could carry on and run Open Barbers with our qualifications and carry on growing the business.

Alim Kheraj  11:10  
So you said that you spotted a niche for space... and basically for LGBTQI+ inclusive hairdressing. How did that lead to "I'm going to start Open Barbers, I'm going to do it"? I know you were cutting hair, but to be... to then go "I'm going to start a business that does this". So how did you... how did you make that jump?

Greygory  11:34  
I'd say that the growth of Open Barbers as a business when completely in parallel with the growth of ourselves as queer and trans people. So the original founder with me was someone called Klara, who worked with Open Barbers for about a year. And then she moved on to set up a different business called Barberette. So shout out to them, because they're also doing great work out there in London as well. 

But after Klara left - which was quite early on in the business, so we were still sort of doing it a bit more like a hobby, really. I think as... when Felix joined, around the same kind of time, Felix was just coming out as trans and I was... I was out as trans, but I hadn't really found all the different... I hadn't really found the breadth of community that I now know is there from running this project. Because, you know, your community are people that you find through going out, and going out to the LGBTQ environments, or you know, whether that's the nightlife, or events, or protests or whatever. 

But I think from doing Open Barbers, I got to meet people who were showing me how I could be in the world, you know, and I've learned so much from our clients over the years. So I think we were very young, we were very... still evolving as people. And I think it was so much in parallel that we were finding that people we were meeting along the way were also having difficulty getting their haircut in a gender affirming way. Or also not even really about gender, but also about accessible, you know, making an environment that was warm, friendly, welcoming, not judgmental, accessible on a disability level, but also on kind of mental health levels also on, you know, not making assumptions about people. 

So we've had all kinds of people coming here who value what we do, whether that's people who feel fat-shamed when they're in salons, and they're told that they can't have certain haircuts because it will make them look a certain way that's not desirable or whatever. And also, you know, people who have a lot of anxiety about sitting and facing the mirror and things like that. So I think I'm definitely a different person than I might have been, had it not been for the community I've met here in the salon. 

But the growth of the businesses have primarily been about growing to meet the demand. And so I think when we first started, it was just my friends coming for haircuts as you do, and that was how it went. And then they told their friends, and then, you know, lo and behold, social media, as a form of digital word-of-mouth has meant that our business is just always oversubscribed. And I never would have imagined when we first started! I did used to think, well, we have enough clients for us to turn this into... from a sort of nighttime hobby, to a full time business, will there be enough people wanting it? 

And we've never lacked in clients. It's the one thing that's driven the business is the demand, and the need for the work that we do. And I think as I said before, people... they might come... they might hear about it in queer and trans community. But I think there's lots of other factors as well that kind of make it a valuable service for people. It might not be so much about the gender and sexuality aspect of things, but it might be more about having a bit more control over your appearance, and knowing that someone's going to actually listen to you and do what you've asked for, and not do what they think is best for you. So, yeah, I'd say, that's probably my answer [laughter]

Alim Kheraj  15:07  
Because... There's a sort of meme that goes round about gays being scared of the barbers. And there is an element of truth to that. You know, why do you think that traditionally those spaces haven't felt LGBTQ inclusive?

Greygory  15:27  
It's a good question. It's also a baffling question, isn't it really? Because I think, also, there's a stereotype that a lot of hairdressers are gay. It's like, it's a profession that people can go into when they, you know.... I don't know. I mean, I don't know if that stereotype is fair or true even. But; so it's a bit strange to me as to why, why that might be the case in that regard. But I think... I suppose that hairdressing environments are often very binary. So you might have men's barbers and women's salon. That's a tradition. And there's a lot of unspoken, and at times, spoken, gender policing that goes on in those environments. 

So it's, it's about who's welcome, once you've even just walked through the door, you know, let alone... on our booking system, we offer people the opportunity to tell us their pronouns in advance. And I think that goes a long way to indicating to people that they can, they can have whatever pronoun they want. And we're not going to make assumptions about that when they come through the door. Whereas you wouldn't get that in most salons or barbers. 

Even unisex places all still often have like a gendered pricing system. So even if they market themselves as unisex, they charge a different price to women as they do to men, which leaves non binary people completely out of the picture. But also people who don't fit those stereotypes in terms of short hair for men and long hair for women get charged inappropriate prices. And we hear about that all the time. Like literally every week, there's another example of someone who was... who didn't go to a salon because they were going to have to pay a different price, or that when they were there they got charged an inappropriate price for their hairstyle. 

But as to why? I suppose it's the same question as to why we have gendered clothing, and why we have gendered bathroom spaces or, you know, gendered spaces in general. There might be some explanations in some contexts why that might be. But on the other hand, you do think, why do we have to have that you know? Why can't we just have toilets? Why can't we just have changing rooms? And why can't people just buy the clothes that they want to buy? Why do they have to be women's jeans and men's jeans? You know, I've been to charity shops before and tried to buy a pair of trousers and the woman said "You do realise these are ladies trousers?" And I was like "Okay! Well they're not now! They're men's trousers now because I'm gonna be wearing them." 

So, you know, it's just things like that. It's so entrenched, and so engrained. I mean, I'm not... I imagine, without doing thorough research into this, that a large part is to play around capitalism, because you can sell more if you divide, you know, things into girls toys, and boys toys, you know, you can sell twice the number of toys, because if a parent has a boy and a girl, they're gonna have to buy the toy twice, you know. So businesses can make more money out of gender segregating things. 

But also, it's also about selling to people that they are not enough. You know, it's like, also, an aspect of capitalism is telling people, you're really ugly or really unattractive, you're really undesirable, unless you buy this makeup or unless you buy these clothes or unless you have your hair done in a particular way. And I suppose that, you know, that's a very gendered enterprise as well. So yeah, like I say, I'm not an expert on capitalism, but I suspect it's what's at the root of this... of this whole problem.

Alim Kheraj  19:04  
You opened up the physical space in 2016. Is that right? 

Greygory  19:08  
Yes. 

Alim Kheraj  19:10  
What was that process like?

Greygory  19:13  
So prior to 2016, we had five years of running Open Barbers out of other people's environments. So when we first started, we did pop ups actually, mostly at Bar Wotever in Vauxhall, at Royal Vauxhall Tavern. They basically gave us our first platform, literally, by giving us the platform on the stage to cut hair on. So we're ever so grateful for them always. And we went from being a popup space.... I think, I think the experience of doing the popups meant people were coming to us, getting probably slightly shonky haircuts really on the stage. But were still preferring them to what they could get elsewhere. And were saying "When can I come back? When can I see you again? I never want to get my hair cut by anyone else. So how can I do that?" 

And we'd be like actually "I don't know, because we don't have a venue, we only do these popups. And so I don't know when you can see us again." So it quickly led us to wanting to find a venue that we could work in. And we started renting a room at the back of another salon, mostly through me just popping in and chatting to the people. And I started to volunteer in their salon and helping them out. And then it sort of led to a bit of a relationship where they trusted us enough to let us have some keys and use the space. So we used the main salon first and we started renting their back room. 

And eventually we outgrew it, and they also wanted their space to expand their own business. So they gently nudged us out of the nest. And it was terrifying. But at the same time, it was like "Okay, this is what we need to do, we need to get our own shop." And I think the experience of getting our own shop has been wonderful, because it's meant that we have complete control over the environment we have, you know, in terms of things like what's on the walls, what music we play, you know, how out we are as a business in terms of having stuff on, you know, the signifiers, I guess, on the walls of like, who we like to welcome and who's welcoming, which is basically everyone. 

We don't police people when they come through the door. But I think it's very important that we are also openly expressive of the diversity of people that might come to the salon who work here. Also, yeah, things like... as the music has always been quite important, I think we always used to have to listen to the music of the other people, which is fine. But you know, sometimes that music can be a bit homophobic even. And so being able to play queer music and queer bands - not all the time, because sometimes we just want to play our late 90s throughback (well, that's my thing anyway, other people will have their own other types of music that they like to listen to). 

But people can make us playlists, and we can pay them in the shop, or clients can choose to music, if they want to, or have no music, you know. It's also sometimes good to have quiet. All of those things have been incredibly helpful in terms of us creating a space that is led by and for trans and queer people. But it's open to everyone. So everyone's welcome. And all of those like quite subtle things, but actually quite important. We have lots of zines and reading material in the space, which are often written by clients or published by clients. Or they've donated us things. And so that everywhere you look, there's been some kind of queer curating going on, intentionally or not, you know, it's just who we are. 

And we were also very lucky, because we searched high and low for a venue that was accessible, and affordable. And not too far away from public transport. Those were our three sort of primary checklist items. We just didn't want to compromise on having a wheelchair accessible space and a space that could be... could be made as accessible as possible. And it was very, very hard to find a venue that ticked all those boxes. So this was pretty much where we are today, it pretty much was the only venue that we even found that we could afford. And that was not too far away from a tube station. 

So we were very lucky, I think, to be in Hackney, and, you know, really well located. And we had to do some renovations to make the toilet accessible. But yeah, we're very glad. And Hackney Council are our landlord, and they've been

Alim Kheraj  23:29  
Oh great. 

Greygory  23:30  
Yeah. So we're not having... we're not lining the pockets of corporate landlords. We are paying rent to the council, and they've been very good landlords to us. So yeah, let's just hope - fingers crossed - that we carry on for the next... foreseeable future.

Alim Kheraj  23:48  
I mean, yeah, it's a great space. It's bigger than I thought it was going to be. I don't know why thought... just because, space in London is at such a premium. I just assumed that it would be a smaller space. But yeah, you've got masses of space.

Greygory  24:02  
Yeah. Well, it was more compartmentalised when we moved in, and we worked with some great builders who helped us to knock all the walls down, which was amazing, we got some great photos. People like, hacking at the walls. And also... all the other venues that we looked at, some of them were local authority venues, but some of them were private venues. And they honestly, they're completely the opposite. They were very small shops anyway. But often when we... when we even asked "Would it be possible if we convert this toilet into an accessible toilet, or we install a ramp in the shop?" Often the answer was no, because it would take up valuable shop floor space. You know, we asked if we could install a toilet on the ground floor rather than on the basement level. 

Or, you know, they'd say "You're reducing the value of this property by, sort of, removing possible shop floor space and instead installing a ramp." And we're just like "Well, that just says everything really doesn't it about where your priorities are in terms of access". It was really horrible, really horrible conversations. And yeah, so when we found this space, it was a bit like, you know, you can just imagine the angels [sings]. Kind of, this is it. Yeah, this venue.... I mean, it was it was pretty grotty when we found it! We had to do a lot of work to make it nicer. 

But now it's very DIY, and it is still a bit, sort of, rough and ready, but it's very community built. So it really, it attracts queers and children. Passers by; children look through the window with their face pressed to the glass, like, "I want to go in there! It looks so colourful, and there's rainbows and everyone looks really happy! Look at this brightly coloured hair." And yeah, so yeah, it's very much a community. So I think people really pick up on that.

Alim Kheraj  25:55  
We'd love to hear from you. Tweet us @queerspacesUK, message us on Instagram at queerspacesUK, or email us at Tim@queerspaces.uk. And let us know about your favourite queer spaces, how you feel about the evolution of the LGBTQ+ scene. And don't forget to rate, leave a review, and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts, it really helps us. 

Yeah, you mentioned community. Why was it... Why is it sort of important to foster that environment in the space?

Greygory  26:28  
I guess... In some ways, it's quite intuitive. I don't think... I don't think anything we've ever decided has been based on good business sense. Or like, what's the market for this? You know, we're just... I haven't got a clue! 

Alim Kheraj  26:43  
Right!

Greygory  26:43  
What's the market for this? Except that it works. But I think so much of it is quite intuitive. A lot of it is like no frills, we don't have a lot of money. We're a social enterprise. We don't have profit margins, you know, people pay what they can afford for services. So we're always operating on a shoestring. And obviously, there are some things you have to pay for. You can't expect people to come and do certain things for nothing, like plumbing and electrics and things like that. 

But, but a lot of heart and soul and generosity has gone into making this space, like loads of people donated their time to come and help us scrub the floors and paint the walls. Obviously professionals did the main build, but a lot of the, kind of, surface aesthetics of the space are... You know, as I say, people getting on their hands and knees and really just offering, and us feeding them, and saying thank you 100,000 times. 

But it's so... it's so valuable that we still talk about that with them. The same people still come here and who helped us to do that work. And we reminisce on, like, the time when they came and helped to scrape ceiling tiles, weird polystyrene ceiling tiles off the ceiling, and things like that. And I think it's yeah, it's very much as I say, very community built, and lots of things that are on the walls; Like there's some knitted bunting that someone's mum made for us? And there's posters on the walls of things that our clients have been involved with. We've got a notice board that's just covered, absolutely covered with flyers, some of which are probably a bit out of out of date by now. 

But people who are doing their own thing, you know, people that are running babysitter services, or knitting clubs, or that kind of thing, scattered all over the noticeboard. And so it's... nothing's really been designed. It's just sort of turned out that way. But somehow it works. And I think when when it's all rainbow colours, you can't really go wrong can you!

Alim Kheraj  28:43  
You mentioned that it's a not for profit, social enterprise. Why was it important to, kind of, have Open Barbers be that?

Greygory  28:52  
I guess we... we're a social enterprise. But when we started out Open Barbers back in 2011, and it was a hobby, it wasn't how we made our money. We used to do haircuts by donation, and the suggested donation was two pounds, or two pounds upwards. And that pricing model has always stayed with us, in terms of... you still now only (pay a ) minimum two pounds for a haircut. And now we have the sliding scale of 2 to 50 pounds. So it's pay what you can afford within that range. 

We give people a bit of guidance as well on like, what our minimum costs are and things like that. But we've always wanted, we've always believed that people should be able to access an affordable affirming haircut, regardless of their circumstances. And we know that some of our clients in the past have been in really difficult situations and have not really been able to afford much more than two pounds? And for some clients it's always going to be like that, like that's, you know, their lives mean that they don't have much, you know?

And then there are other clients who fluctuate what their income levels are, and other clients who earn enough to be able to pay at the higher end. And some people shoot over the top of the 50 and pay 60 even. And, you know, and that all helps with this kind of... I guess it's a system which has Pay It Forward kind of built into it, 

Alim Kheraj  30:14  
Right, Yeah. 

Greygory  30:15  
And it's pay it forward as-and-when, you know, from one haircut to the next, you might be able to pay more or less. I'm pretty certain - even though we don't monitor what people pay, because it's an honest detail - I feel very certain that clients are very... more often than not more generous with us than they would be elsewhere, probably. And so the social enterprise model works well for us, because we're sort of more driven by the mission of inclusion and being there for our community, than we are interested in making a profit out of this. So long as we can make enough money through our trading that we can exist and keep going, then, then that's fine. 

You know, we don't need to be making excessive amounts of surplus and profit. As we have enough money that we, we have some reserves, so that works fine. And we have enough money that we can pay staff above London Living Wage, so everyone gets paid the same, regardless of their levels of seniority or experience, whether they're newly qualified or whether they're a director, we all get paid the same hourly rate. And so yeah, there isn't really any motivation in here that's about profiting off other people's discrimination or experiences of prejudice. It's, it's about creating an environment where the priorities are looking after each other, providing a high quality service, listening to each other, creating enough space that if someone has a meltdown, in the middle of their haircut, we're not going to be like "Come on come on! Time is money!" 

You know, like we give that kind of space. It's just the priorities, the purpose, the focus, is about people having a gender affirming - or just human affirming - experience, not about growing the business and becoming, you know, multinational. We meet people, often, who are based in other parts of the country, parts of the UK, or even across the world who are interested in what we're doing. And we often get asked "Are you going to set up another branch somewhere else?" and so on. 

And I personally think that I'm more interested in supporting other people who live in other towns and cities, to set up their own version of Open Barbers or, you know, they probably already are setting something up. And like, sharing skills with them, or sharing learning with each other, because we've got a lot to learn too, from them. And I think they know their own environment. Like it makes no sense to me to set up a branch in Birmingham, because I don't know Birmingham, and I don't know who lives there. And I don't know what experiences people are up against. And it makes much more sense to me to support other entrepreneurial hairdressers, or even other types of businesses and support each other that way, so that we can have a network of solidarity across... across towns and cities rather than like, leaping in to other people's environments and...

Alim Kheraj  33:14  
Monopolising spaces and what have you.

Greygory  33:17  
Yeah, that doesn't really interest me so much.

Alim Kheraj  33:21  
The queer scene is sort of constantly evolving. And we're in an interesting period at the moment, sort of, with the pandemic, and London shifting in how you know, it always is shifting. How do you see Open Barbers fitting into the queer landscape sort of more broadly, in London?

Greygory  33:43  
There is a lot of overlap with who comes to Open Barbers and what else is going on outside of Open Barbers in queer scenes, plural. Because I think we are, to be honest, now that I'm a bit older, and, you know, a bit tireder. And I work a lot of evening shifts, so I'm not often available when things are happening in other places, I hear about what's going on from my clients. But I'm not always there to see it for myself. And so I have noticed that our client base has grown obviously, but also, I'm learning so much about what's going on, from the conversations that we have here n terms of things like performance and dragking contexts. 

Or... some of our staff who work part time, are also doing other things as well, such as performance. And I'm trying to think what else they get up to... like music, arts, things like that. So quite often, there's overlap there as well, like, some of our team might be performing at certain events and things like that. And I think... so there's obviously there's the nightlife side of things, which is probably the predominant thing we think of when we think of queer spaces, but I'm excited about the emergence of other kinds of spaces as well, that are more daytime sober spaces. 

Like, obviously, there's the LGBTQ+ Community Centre, which is in a temporary space at the moment. And hopefully will find a more permanent space, I'm yet to actually visit but we have clients who are involved in setting that up. And I've been very aware of what they've been doing for years. And it's been a very slow, long, slow burn. But like, I think it's important that these things aren't rushed. So I'm excited to visit there on Saturday, so we're doing a youth pop up there. 

And there's The Outside Project as well, who we do some partnership work with, and we've been doing pop ups there, in one of their social spaces, once a month recently. So there are these... I don't know if it would really fall into the category of scenes so much, because they're not necessarily about nightlife and, and parties. But I think they're very much integral to the scene. And also integral to creating space for people who are not normally... who don't normally get thought of, or included, in the scenes, because they can't necessarily go to alcohol centred spaces or be out late at night. 

You know, a lot of people do feel as much as they might want to attend events like that they actually can't, because there are barriers, you know. So I think places like The Outside Project, and some of the youth projects that are happening like Gendered iIntelligence for example, and the work they do. They're creating really important opportunities for queer people to meet each other. And to have solidarity and support. 

We also... I do home visits once a week. And the home visits are aimed at providing haircut opportunity for people who would find it impossible to come to the salon, whether that's for physical disability reasons or mental health issues that they might be going through. We only do it within London. But I often think when I go into people's homes, especially people who are chronically ill, and probably won't ever really be able to come to the salon. 

I sometimes think this is our way of... those people are also part of our community, they're part of our scene, even though they might never come to the space, they might never meet our other clients; the conversations that I have with them in their own home, I then might say "Oh, so and so is doing this interesting thing online." Or "Have you heard of this?" or they might say "Oh, I've been reading, you know, the zines, or these books", or whatever. And I'm like, "Oh, I didn't know about that", you know, there's the kind of way in which it reaches into those spaces. 

And in many ways, those clients are very easily overlooked and very easily go unnoticed or forgotten, because they're not actually going out and taking up space in a physical way. So, for me, that feels also really important to kind of think about, you know... there's queer scenes, but there's also queer people who are not able to access these spaces, but are still very much part of our community, you know, and thinking about how can we notice who's not here? And how can we make sure that community is still available to people? 

Alim Kheraj  38:10  
Yeah, and people are engaged and, and like you say included?

Greygory  38:14  
Yeah, 

Alim Kheraj  38:15  
Within that.

Greygory  38:16  
I think that interestingly, the pandemic, as terrible as it is; for some people, I was having those conversations of "Oh, now some people are starting to see what it feels like to not be able to leave home". And you're only access to, to social things is online, you know. And then suddenly, all these things became online that weren't online before. And then people could go to them who weren't actually able to go to them otherwise. 

And when lockdowns lifted, and those things started to drop away, I think it's actually quite hard because it was almost like "We could do this". We have the resources and facilities and the skills to do this now. But we're going to choose not to. 

Alim Kheraj  38:55  
Yeah, 

Greygory  38:56  
Because it's not our priority, or it's not what we think is important. So I think, yeah, holding on to that also is... the learning from that is really important as well.

Alim Kheraj  39:07  
Yeah, I completely agree. We had Queer House Party on the podcast. And I really appreciate how they've carried on engaging in that... in that digital space so that people can remain involved. Whether that's, you know, filming the nights, having them live streamed, having BSL interpreters and so on. Yeah, it's a shame when you see people kind of, it's now... kind of gone back, even though the pandemic is not over. 

Are there any... I mean, you mentioned that you don't, perhaps go out as much as you maybe once used to. But are there any queer spaces that you particularly love or loathe?

Greygory  39:58  
Well, I mean, I do have to say, I do miss dancing. I'm not a good dancer, but I like flinging my arms and legs around. Especially when someone else si enthusiastic. You know, there have been... I do have some really happy memories of dancing at the Royal Vauxhall Tavern. I mean, that was more back in my heyday. When I was younger. And Bar Wotever in particular was always like a regular for me at the time. 

And I used to go to Unskinny Bop, but I don't think they're running at the moment. Yeah, I think we're all crossing our fingers and toes that one day Ruth and Tamsin will make a comeback in that regard. But maybe, maybe not. And that's okay. You know, like things move on. I think... I often look forward to the Fringe Film Festival, as well, it usually happens in November. I do sometimes go to things at the Flare, but I find the fringe Film Festival more exciting for me in terms of what they programme, and also the community spaces they create, even if they're temporary. Because they sometimes... you go along, even if you don't get a ticket for anything, and you can just hang out and see people and still have a really good time. 

And yeah, I mentioned The Outside Project do really, really great things. And I can't say that I've been to any LGBTQ+ Community Centre events yet. But I've looked at their programme a few times, and I'm interested in what they're doing. So I'm interested to, to pop along there at some point. 

So I don't think there's anything... I wouldn't say there's anything I loathe. 

Alim Kheraj  41:32  
Oh I would [laughter].

Greygory  41:33  
I just, I'm probably just a bit.... I'm a bit more, like, naive. I've never been... I went to an online Queer House Party event. And I loved that. It was one of their... I mean, I think they're always doing findraisers, every one is a fundraiser isn't it. So like I think what they're doing is brilliant. And I really enjoyed, enjoyed that. And I went to I went to an online party - but it was actually a bit of a one off thing - It was a music night that some of our clients put on for us as a fundraiser. And I literally danced around... like dancing to a laptop is weird. But also really fun? 

Alim Kheraj  42:16  
Quite liberating? 

Greygory  42:18  
Yeah, it's like you can kind of, you can kind of control. It's weird. It's like dancing in front of a mirror. Because you're kind of like dancing to yourself, in part, but also copying what other people are doing. It's quite fun. So, so yeah, I did enjoy that. But that's not really a queer scene. That's just another thing I did once. But yeah, so I guess... I'm trying to think what else there is, but I'm not sure... I'm probably scraping around my memory banks. 

I spend so much time here at the salon or doing business things that I kind of find it hard to find the time to get out and about these days. But I do hear... I do hear that wonderful things are happening. My clients are always having a wonderful time. I think The Glory do some great things. I know Man Up was very, really successful, in drag king competitions, and a lot of our clients entered Man Up  - various eras of Man Up. And that's really launched a few drg king's careers, you know, like, seeing some people now what they're doing. Like Georgous Michael, and Prinx Silva, and Gio. You know, I'm not sure if that's how Gio started. But you know, seeing how successful some people are becoming in that world is really exciting.

Alim Kheraj  43:36  
And Open Barbers has been running since 2011 you said. It's basically, you know, it's just over 10 years. Where do you see the next 10 years going? Can you even think like that?

Greygory  43:53  
I probably should think like that! If we're going to have any sense. I think it's quite hard to think, in those terms, because everything does feel so uncertain with the pandemic. I mean, one thing is for sure that when we... when the pandemic hit, initially, our clients just literally threw money at Open Barbers so generously and so, you know, just without thinking twice. One of our clients set-up a Crowdfunder for us. And then, over the course of a year or so... because we just didn't, we thought, oh, maybe a couple of months, we might get help? And then just went on and on and on. 

So our clients have really, really supported us through this. And I think that... I think that was pretty much the thing that got me through the pandemic, not just the money. Money was great, and obviously very vital. But it was what that symbolised as well, it was like people just didn't want to see us go under. And they were... it was the messages that came with those donations as well. That was like, we absolutely must keep this business going. And people circulating it, and the messages that came with that as well. 

And I think that for me.... because we could have just given up, you know, we could have just said this pandemic is going to swallow our tiny little social enterprise. And that will be the end of it. But that kept me wanting - I was like, I must, I must keep this business afloat as well, because everybody wants it, and I want it. And you know. So I think we're still probably in that survival mentality at the moment of, we don't know what's going to happen next. We can't probably plan too much. But I think, first thing is we would like to get things closer to how they were before the pandemic, in terms of capacity. We're still, we're still operating on a lower capacity, because we still feel that we need some restrictions to protect our clients and our staff. 

So we're not yet back to how things were in terms of capacity and numbers in the space. And we still have a bit of like, cleaning time between clients and things like that. So obviously, there may hopefully come a point where we can relax on these things. 

I think I'm excited about the number of creative people out there who were doing something like Open Barbers, but that makes sense to them. Like there are other hairdressers who are incredibly talented, who we know about, and who don't work with us, but we know that they're there. And we often signpost people to them. And there's a lot of really nice camaraderie and solidarity that goes on there. I'd love to maybe find a way of collaborating with some of those people, whether that's hosting them for popups here and there, or, you know, finding an even more robust way to build that network. 

And then there are other kinds of creative people who are not doing hair but are doing something else. Like whether that's clothing based, or nails, or makeup, or even outside of the hair and beauty sector. Something else that's more to do with, like... there are like sports groups like Queer Kickabout, and other kinds of projects that we know our clients are setting up and involved with. And I'm not really sure what that means or looks like, but there's, there's already a lot of signposting and a lot of like, when people come to get their haircut, they're looking for more community, they're looking for places to go to meet other people. So there's always already that signposting there. 

But it would be nice to sort of think of ways of, like building on that, I guess, so that queer history will not be forgotten, you know. So often queer and trans people's lives just don't get documented and don't get kind of, I guess, written into history. In pen. You know, I just went to the Bishopsgate Institute exhibition at the Barbican, for example. And it was great to see all that material. But also, I mean, that there's only a tiny fraction of their archive, I'm sure. But I just kind of... going into things like that make me think, "Oh my God, I'm so glad someone kept these leaflets. I'm so glad someone kept these posters. So glad someone filmed that, you know, that event happening, these protests, and things like that." 

So I guess like, I guess we want to make sure that, that that history is, is part of the of the future as well, you know. And I guess that's it really, supporting... whether that also means supporting up and coming hairdressers, who we don't know yet, haven't met yet, haven't even trained yet, you know, who are interested in becoming part of the future of Open Barbers. I'd like our business to keep going, you know, I'm not really very, as I'm not very business minded as such, like, we've managed to keep this project going. I don't know how, on a wing and a prayer, and community, and goodwill. 

So I'm not someone who's kind of necessarily already decided, who's going to run Open Barbers when I move on, in my current and next life. But I guess we will just have to see, we'll just have to see where... I think it's good to keep open to where queer community's are going? Because I think to be honest, I'm in my 40s now, and I'm already very out of date, when it comes to like, what, what's going on. My colleagues laugh at me, because I'm 42 going on, like, 82, in terms of like, my awareness of what's coming up, you know, Tik Tok and things?! 

And this is what we've got now. But you know, it's important that... things are evolving very quickly. How queer people talk about themselves, how they see themselves, what their demands are, is getting bolder and bolder, and more adventurous, and more creative, and more brilliant all the time. And that's... we need to keep open to that because those - that's the direction - in some ways, I'm of the generation of like, kind of, being quiet and mousy in the corner and being like "Is it okay, if I'm here and queer I'm sorry, I'm sorry!" You know, like, that's my background,  apologising for existing. And I know that that's common amongst many of us. 

But I'm very excited about a generation of queers that are not apologising for existing, you know, like saying, I deserve to be here, I deserve respect, I deserve to be counted and included, and I'm not going away. And I see those voices strong... strongly coming through. And they're of all generations, of course, you know, people older than me who have been like that. I'm not trying to suggest that it's only young people that are like, have that courage. But I feel like it's, it's coming through in bigger waves, you know. And so I think we need to sort of keep open to that and not, you know, not just be grateful, and to be more demanding. I just don't know that I can do it. 

But I'm, like, excited about the energy, the energy that we get from our, from our community, I want to be... go along with that and sort of allow more of that energy and be sort of caught up in it as well, I guess. So who knows? We'll see. 

I actually think maybe one day we won't need Open Barbers anymore, because... we weren't.... because we'd have had such a big influence. The message that we're giving is stop imposing assumptions and gender binaries and other kinds of binaries on people, just, you know, just accept that people are varied and diverse and complex, you know. And maybe one day, the hair and beauty industry will have arrived at a realisation, that that's a much better way to be in the world. And then we might no longer require Open Barbers, you know, as a space for people to come to. And I think that would be a great day. You know, if, if it comes to that. I suspect it won't happen in my lifetime, but we'll see, you know, but that's the kind of the goal, in a way is to like...

Alim Kheraj  51:51  
Make yourself redundant.

Greygory  51:52  
Yeah. Yeah! Like, just say, our work here is done. 

Alim Kheraj  51:57  
Yeah. 

Greygory  51:58  
And there are some there are lots of people pushing for that in lots of different kinds of ways. So you know, I'm excited and I'm hopeful.

Alim Kheraj  52:06  
Well, Greygory, thank you so much for your time, and thanks for joining us.

For more information about Open Barbers and to find their prices and book an appointment, visit their website at openbarbers.com. You can also find them on social media @openbarbers you can also support them on Patreon. 

Queer Spaces: Behind the Scene was born out of a desire to document the importance that queer spaces have to LGBTQ+ people. Each episode is complemented by original photography and portraiture by Tim Boddy. You can find these pictures on queerspaces.uk or on Twitter and Instagram @queerspacesUK. Find out more by subscribing to our newsletter. 

Queer Spaces is produced, written and edited by Tim Boddy, and hosted and written by me Alan Kheraj. The podcast is supported through a MEAD Fellowship awarded by the University of Arts London.