Continuing our lightening-quick interviews, we aim to get to know better our hairdressing friends with just 10 questions that reveal something of their personality, their work ethic and their hairdressing style. This is what we learned from one of the UK’s most interesting, influential and accomplished educators, Gianni Scumaci
A third-generation hairdresser with Italian heritage but an upbringing in the UK (Lincoln to be exact) where he started in the industry as a pre-teen kid already makes Gianni Scumaci interesting in our eyes. We learn that he was immersed in the craft of cutting hair from a young age – even to the extent of touring the UK at only 14-years-old to present his skills in seminars. A move to join the house of Vidal Sassoon was pivotal in moving on his career, as Gianni became Sassoon’s youngest-ever creative director. Gianni went on to meet Vidal himself in 2001 and the two became good friends. The past 20 years our man has worked on many innovative shoots, shows and projects. Since 2013 he heads up GS Education, and is currently Vision Director at John Frieda Salons in London. Now, let’s find out more from his snappy answers:
1) How many years have you spent in hairdressing now?
30 years
2) What’s your signature hairdressing vibe?
I think my Instagram page describes it best
3) What keeps you in hairdressing?
My heart
4) Tell us a precious memory?
I was optioned for a shoot with Madonna and Grace Coddington for the cover of US Vogue along with one of my greatest influences Julien Dy’s (above). It was Julien who got the job but while on the shoot, he asked Madonna for her copy of the book he published on her [limited edition, published 2005 during her Re-Invention tour]
He wrote a message to me in it and passed it to the photographer Tim Walker who gave it to me as a gift from Julien shortly after. Especially significant as then I was working on my first British Vogue cover.
5) What’s your favourite piece of music?
Bad by U2
6) What’s your Karaoke song?
Anything by Guns ‘n’ Roses
7) What do you love most about hairdressing?
Working with people, expressing creativity, and most of all enhancing self esteem
8) Where’s your ideal place for relaxing?
A hidden beach in the south of Italy
9) Best advice you were ever given?
Be yourself because everyone else is already taken
10) Hope for hairdressing after this pandemic is tamed?
I have spoken as a guest speaker at Apple & Nike about ‘The Social Function Of A Hairdresser’. It’s the key purpose of my brand, particularly the education side and how valued we have been historically in times of change. More than hope, I believe our value as an industry has just risen and the perception of our service will be elevated, my real hope is that we will recognise it as much as the wider public
Thanks so much for your time Gianni – lovely to get to know you more!
See more from Gianni on IG – his page really shares his aesthetic
@gianniscumaci
For more of our ’10 QUICKFIRE QUESTIONS and our ‘ME IN 6 PIX stories, click these names:
Jason & India Miller
Sally Brooks
Antoinette Beenders
Giammarco Amoroso
Akin Konizi
Siobhan Jones
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