((PKG)) A NEW YORK CITY ICON
((TRT: 08:22))
((Reporter/Camera: Aaron Fedor))
((Producer: Kathleen McLaughlin))
((Editor: Kyle Dubiel))
((Map: New York City, New York))
((Main characters: 0 female; 1 male))
((Sub characters: 2 female; 8 male))
((Blurb: We visit Astor Place Hairstylists, an iconic New York City business that’s been on the cutting edge of urban hair styles from punk to hip hop, for over forty years.))
((NATS))
((Jonathan Trichter
Co-Owner, Astor Place Hairstylists))
Welcome to Astor Place. I am the owner of Astor Place Hairstylists. And as a small businessman, this is the closest I will ever get to owning Rockefeller Center. It's another New York iconic institution. Lots of New Yorkers famous came through here, but really, we cater to working-class New Yorkers, and we have working class prices, and we've been around since 1945 or 1947. There's some discrepancy here. So there’s some discrepancy whether it was 1945 or 1947, but it was after the war and it was started by the Vezza family.
It was a small shop of Italian immigrants. They opened up. They had six chairs, maybe four chairs. They were very successful, but this location was industrial. And so, when we lost manufacturing, it hit on hard times, and then nobody got their hair cut in the [19]60s. So that was also tough.
((Courtesy: Astor Place Hairstylists))
But then the [19]70s and punk was revival for them. Since the [19]70s, Astor Place has played a major role in the evolution of urban style through hair. Pretty much all of the cultural and fashion movements that started in an urban area or New York specifically got washed through here, and got styled via the haircut, and then emanated uptown through our doors, and then through the rest of the world.
((Courtesy: Nicolas Heller))
((Jonathan Trichter
Co-Owner, Astor Place Hairstylists))
Speedy's been here 35, 40 years. They call him Speedy, not because he's actually fast. He's one of our slowest barbers actually, but he works clean and he's meticulous. Scott actually was here when the place opened. I think he was 57 [years old] in 1945, which would make him like 127 [years old]. He will never stop working. Some of the Astor Place women. We're also a woman's salon. Say hello, Narcy, Irma. Say hello, Wave.
((Hairstylists))
Hi.
(((Suzy
Hairstylist))
Wow, who's this? My princess.
((Anne Marie Cruz
Artist, Creator of non-profit fundraising tool))
There's so much history here, you can kind of connect. If you get your haircut here, then you know that you’ve gotten your haircut where Blondie got her haircut. But also, as a woman, it's hard to get a haircut for less than 100 bucks, and you can get one here for 35 bucks. And I just got my haircut here a few weeks ago, so I'm really happy about it. Suzy is the one to go to if you're a woman. Just feels like you're hanging out with your grandma, but she's giving you a cool haircut. If you don't get Astor Place Hairstylists, then you don't get New York.
((NATS/MUSIC))
((Courtesy: Astor Place Hairstylists))
((Jonathan Trichter
Co-Owner, Astor Place Hairstylists))
We’ve been around for a long time. It's a small business that has endured through the years. There are more languages spoken here than at the UN. The joke also is that we speak every language and a little bit of English, and that's true. There are a lot of immigrants, a lot of immigrant stories, and we are a place that's multicultural and proud of it.
((Yacob
Barber))
How short you want it?
(((Suzy
Hairstylist))
What kind of haircut do you like today?
((Peter
Barber))
Welcome to Astor Place. So, you need a haircut.
((Sergio
Barber))
Good morning, sir. How are you?
((Customer))
I’m good. How are you?
((Jonathan Trichter
Co-Owner, Astor Place Hairstylists))
So I've been coming here to get my haircut since I was 13 [years old], and I've always been coming back. When I heard it was going to close due to the pandemic, I curled up in a fetal position and cried. And then I walked down, and I asked the owners if I could buy it. And word got out. And all of a sudden, friends that I knew, who had done well and been successful, offered to chip in and purchase the place and finance it through the pandemic and through the recovery.
((NATS))
((Jonathan Trichter
Co-Owner, Astor Place Hairstylists))
This is our longtime manager. Mike is now an owner. When we bought the place, we made him an owner. He's been here for 40 some odd years, sitting at the door, he does the list. We get more walk-ins than any barbershop in the world, I would think.
((Mike Saviello
Manager, Co-Owner, Astor Place Hairstylists))
Hey, how are you doing?
Well, everybody called me Big Mike Saviello here. Everybody knows me as Big Mike. I've been here 38 years. It's the only place you could come in the world that you come in the shop and there's 30, 40 people cutting hair. And you'll see an old lady getting a beehive right next to a hip-hop guy getting a fade next to another guy, Wall Street business guy, right next to each other. And it's like no big thing. You only can see this in New York. That's the only place. Everybody loves coming here because of the energy. And just come in, you get your haircut, get a great job, great price. And I just fell in love with it. You know, I said, “I love this place. I got to stay here.”
((Nev Schulman
TV Host and Producer))
When you walk into a place like this and you look around, you see that whatever they do here, they commit to it a hundred percent. So, whether it's
((Courtesy: Nicolas Heller))
the walls that are covered from floor to ceiling in paintings by one of the barbers here, or the photos of people who have come here, whose pictures are now on the wall, like they just…it is just full. The place just brims with commitment to itself.
((NATS/MUSIC))
((Courtesy: Astor Place Hairstylists))
((Jonathan Trichter
Co-Owner, Astor Place Hairstylists))
And again, it started with punk, right? CBGBs [New York City music club of the 1970s that fostered new genres of American music] was right next door. And our stylists and our barbers were experts with shears and razors and coloring. They were the ones who fashioned the punk scene with their spiked hair and their shaved heads.
And one day, Andy Warhol, who had his office around here, had his factory, walked in to see what was going on. And when he came with his entourage, after that the place blew up. One day, nobody's quite sure why, but there was a camera here for some reason. And Benny,
((Courtesy: Nicolas Heller))
who is really retired now, but he comes in maybe a couple of times a week just to kind of hang out, somebody walked up to Benny with the Batman logo and asked him to put it in the back of his head. And he did,
((Courtesy: Astor Place Hairstylists))
and the camera caught it. And then the next day, there were three cameras here and print newspapers, and it was on the cover of the tabloids.
So, the Batman logo in the back of the head became huge. Benny started it, and then all of the intricate designs really started with Benny.
((Courtesy: Nicolas Heller))
Hip-hop style, Downtown style also got its haircut here. We were the first to put lines in heads, and all of the New York rappers got their hair cut here back in the day. From Method Man to Q-tip and Spike Lee, not a rapper but a major cultural force in the [19]80s, all regular customers, all walked through here.
((NATS))
((Mike Saviello
Manager, Co-Owner, Astor Place Hairstylists))
When I first started back in the day, this young lady comes down. She had like a short haircut and everything, and she had like a little accent, and she goes, “I want my head shaved.” So, I was thinking maybe she wants a short haircut, right? But I go home that night. I'm watching David Letterman, right? And after David Letterman, at the end, he always brings on new acts and everything, you know. And all of a sudden, he goes, “Now making her USA debut, Sinéad O'Connor.” It was that crazy. She ripped up the whole thing. I'm like, I tell my wife, I'm like, “That was the girl who got a shave.”
((NATS))
((Frank Ribecca
Manager, Astor Place Hairstylists))
It's a never a dull moment, and you're not bored because you can have an interaction with one customer about his day, and another customer will come in, and while he's getting his haircut, be talking to the barber,
((Courtesy: Astor Place Hairstylists))
and they'll call me over just for, you know, getting into the conversation. You learn a lot, a lot about people.
((NATS/MUSIC))
((Jonathan Trichter
Co-Owner, Astor Place Hairstylists))
So one of the benefits of owning Astor Place is that it's connected me to a bunch of New Yorkers who love this business and the fact that I saved it. And as a result, I am a semi-regular poker player, and we started a small game that picked up, and word got out, and so we've got a lot of New York notables who come play with us now once a month, including Ira Glass, John Hodgman, Danny Strong, Doug Liman sat in once, Meals by Cug, New York Nico.
((Nicolas Heller
aka New York Nico, Director))
I've been coming to Astro Place since I was about 10 years old. Very old school. Like it’s…it really is like a microcosm of New York City. It's, it’s changed over the years, but it's still kind of held on to what made Astor Place so special in the first place, which is this super old school
((Courtesy: Nicolas Heller))
New York vibe, which you don't really get anywhere else in the city anymore.
((Mike Saviello
Manager, Co-Owner, Astor Place Hairstylists))
It's iconic. That's what it is. Yeah.
((NATS/MUSIC))