SALON THAT NEVER WENT OUT OF STYLE
INSIDE it looked as though the staff had simply stepped out for a bite to eat one lunchtime and never returned.
Cans of hairspray and sets of curlers, along with tubs of Brylcreem, straight razors and scissors were all laid out neatly, as though in preparation for the next client to arrive for their shampoo and set or short back and sides.
Gowns hung on door hooks ready to be worn, while the wireless radio sat in the corner waiting to be switched back on. Yet it never was. Indeed, no-one would ever again grace those leather-backed barber chairs, have their locks rinsed in the porcelain wash basins or sip a cuppa beneath the hairdryers in its baby-blue and pastel-peach cubicles.
Frozen in time since the death of its owner, the interior of Lewis’s Hairdressers in Aberdare was a perfect snapshot of how it had looked in its 1950s heyday – when beehives were the bee’s knees and the Elvis quiff was king. And this retro treasure trove in the town’s formerly bustling Gadlys Road was only rediscovered when, under the possible threat of demolition, the front doors to the by-now derelict building were opened once again many years later.
A time capsule of a bygone age, the shop’s contents were saved and moved to St Fagans National Museum of History, in Cardiff, for preservation.
However, photographs of how the salon looked just before that salvage operation began were recently posted on social media, prompting a flood of nostalgia from those who recalled going there in their younger days.
A family affair, the shop was started by a teenage entrepreneur called John Lewis in neighbouring Cwmdare in the 1930s.
On his 17th birthday the business then moved close to the entrance of Aberdare park, expanding as John’s children, Thomas, Olive and Mari, all joined the payroll. Father and son ran the barbers’ section, while Mari and Olive ran the hairdressing salon, along with two apprentices.
Lewis’s would finally close with the sudden death of Thomas in 1990, while Mari and Olive would pass away a decade or so later.
For 15 years the building stood empty and untouched, by which time it seemed beyond saving.
Nevertheless, it was spared the wrecking ball after being bought at auction in 2005 and renovated.
But, sadly, claims that it was to reopen once again as a salon proved unfounded and it remains disused to this day.
As for those fixtures and fittings though, they’ve been meticulously catalogued and numbered and will stay in the vaults at St Fagans until a suitable home can be found for them.
It’s likely a replica building from the same era will be built to house them on site.