Horsehairdressing’s Lucie Holt on making fake tails for top horses, and why she prefers equine clients to human ones...
I’ve been around horses all my life. I used to showjump and I’ve worked on yards. My family were horsey; my grandmother was a stunt rider and doubled for Elizabeth Taylor in National Velvet. My dad bought a livery yard and was planning to give it to me to run when I left school, but I wanted to train as a hairdresser – for humans.
Horses make better clients than humans, but when I decided I wanted to move into horse hairdressing people laughed. My dad thought I’d lost my marbles: “Who’s going to pay to have their horse’s hair done?” But now when he phones me I might be driving halfway across the country to fix a tail, and I’m going to Australia for a month later this year to show my work (or early next year if travel is still limited) which is exciting.
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IEhvcnNlICZhbXA7IEhvdW5kOyAyMSBNYXkgMjAyMDwvZW0+PC9wPgo8ZGl2IGNsYXNzPSJhZC1jb250YWluZXIgYWQtY29udGFpbmVyLS1tb2JpbGUiPjxkaXYgaWQ9InBvc3QtaW5saW5lLTUiIGNsYXNzPSJpcGMtYWR2ZXJ0Ij48L2Rpdj48L2Rpdj4KPHA+Cg=="}
