Secrets of a Session Stylist 

Show notes for podcast episode 76

LET’S MEET OUR GUEST – Richard Kavanagh

Richard Kavanagh has been awarded Five times Australian Session Stylist of the Year, co-founder, and CEO of piiq, internationally published author and creative director for Redken, Rodney Wayne, and ghd, Sydney based Richard Kavanagh is the southern hemisphere’s pre-eminent hair professional.

A hair director at Fashion Week in New York, Sydney and New Zealand, Richard has worked on hundreds of shows over the years for brands such as Armani, Prada, Versace, Marc Jacobs, McQueen to name just a few, he is the go-to commentator for emerging trends and has a knack for making hair easy to understand for everyone.

With more than 30 years in the business, his client list reads like a who’s who of A list celebrities, and he is known for creating effortlessly undone looks for covers, editorial, red carpet and campaigns

what is the difference between session styling and salon styling?

Do you need a different tool kit and a swag of techniques for editorial, bridal, salon, show, photography, fashion week, advertising and collaborative event hair? 

The short answer is YES it’s all totally different. And the long answer is still YES, but it’s not what you're probably thinking! There are many avenues of session styling, including advertising, celebrity red carpet, session work, fashion week. Even though the output is hair, the end results in the fashion industry are not just about the hair. The industry is completely different to creating hair in the salon and charging the client for their hair and products. When you work in fashion week your outcome is to create hair to help sell the clothes, for example. 

Richard shares session styling secrets in this podcast interview that dives deep into the mindset, skillset, personality types for teamwork, flexing to suit client briefs and many more tips to help you get into this secret society of hairdressers that are renowned for not sharing the inside knowledge of session styling.  His online course was created from the point of view of what he wished he knew before starting his career. He shares what is in his kit and where to source things. He also shares products and why you need certain products. There are concepts and methods to help you become a hairdresser that knows how to do session hair. 

Richard’s pro tips for hairdressers wishing to be a session stylist:

• Find a mentor and ask to assist them
• Find a mentor or stylist you love their work and ask them who their agency is
• Contact your fave stylist or mentors agency and register as an assistant on their books
• Learn how to do hair for all the different types of jobs by starting off with test shoots
• In the beginning, say yes to everything to build experience
  

  Listen to learn more in Episode 76 of the Colour Kristina Talks podcast. All the important links can be found below.