British celebrity hairstylist and beauty entrepreneur John Frieda has died aged 75, his salon announced in an Instagram post on Tuesday. The statement said he died peacefully, surrounded by his family, and described him as an icon of the hair industry who had mentored and supported its staff.
Frieda became a sought-after stylist in the 1960s and 1970s, cutting the hair of clients including model Twiggy, former US First Lady Jackie Kennedy and Rolling Stones singer Mick Jagger. His clients later included Diana, Princess of Wales, Madonna, Nicole Kidman and Scarlett Johansson.
He created the distinctive bowl cut worn by Joanna Lumley’s character Purdey in the 1976 television series The New Avengers. Frieda opened his own central London salon that year; it became so popular that appointments were booked months in advance. He later opened salons in Barbados, Ibiza and Los Angeles.
Born Alan Howard Frieda in London in 1951, he grew up in a family of hairdressers. After entering the family business, he worked as an assistant at Leonard Lewis’s House of Leonard salon before taking on work for British Vogue and Harper’s Bazaar.
Frieda later shifted his focus from cutting hair to developing products under his own name. He created the Frizz-Ease serum in 1988, and the business expanded in the 1990s and beyond. In 2002, Frieda and business partner Gail Federici sold the company to Japanese conglomerate Kao for $450 million (£334 million).
Frieda was married to singer Lulu from 1977 to 1990, and they had a son, actor and food entrepreneur Jordan Frieda. He later married Avery Agnelli, with whom he had two children and a stepdaughter.
Tributes came from across the beauty industry. Cetera Lamb, creative director at Frieda’s London salon, called him “a true legend” and “a real maverick in hairdressing”, saying his creativity and vision had left an enduring legacy.
Sources: BBC News UK.