Vidal Sassoon

“I believe in the equality of man; and I believe that religious duties consist in doing justice, loving mercy, and endeavoring to make our fellow-creatures happy.”

“I'll never forget one morning I walked in and I had a hell of a bruise - it had been a difficult night the night before - and a client said to me, 'Good God, Vidal, what happened to your face?' And I said, 'Oh, nothing, madam, I just fell over a hairpin.'”

“My greatest regret is selling my company.”

“I don't sort of sit in a chair and pompously feel proud of myself about all the things we might have accomplished.”

“You never argued with my mother. You couldn't win.”

“Mary Quant is my favourite fashion designer.”

“For nine years I worked to change what was hairdressing then into a geometric art form with color, perm without setting which had never been done before.”

“There were so many pretty girls coming into the salon as clients, and others working in the salon. And I thought, 'Hmm. This is rather nice.'”

“If you don't look good, we don't look good.”

“I was a bit of a rebel.”

“I came home after a year and although my profession was only hairdressing, I knew I could change it.”

“Women were going back to work, they were assuming their own power. They didn't have time to sit under the dryer.”

“I was all about my thoughts, my work, my inspiration. I was always in hair.”

“'The Pianist' is a movie I could watch over and over again.”

“Hair excited me. As the old ways - backcombing, rollers and rigidity - went out of the window, I started to feel the possibilities in front of my eyes.”

“We learned to put discipline in the haircuts by using actual geometry, actual architectural shapes and bone structure. The cut had to be perfect and layered beautifully, so that when a woman shook it, it just fell back in.”

“I got a telegraph from my mother who said that my step-father had had a heart attack, come home and earn a living. So I went back to England and the only thing I knew to earn any cash was through hairdressing.”

“I just consider being one of the luckiest people in the sense that creativity came to me and it flowed.”

“I'm a great jazz fan.”

“It's okay saying sorry, but when you are drunk you say what you really feel.”