Linnéa Nordberg is a London-based session stylist. Here, she talks her biggest inspirations, Suki Waterhouse, and the key to assisting on fashion shows…
“There are so many photos of me doing my cousin’s hair when I was a kid. It’s actually really cute and shows that it’s something that I always enjoyed doing,” Linnéa Nordberg tells us, as she chats to us about how she got into hairdressing. So, it doesn’t come as a surprise that she headed straight to college to study hairdressing. “I’m from Sweden, so once I completed college, I worked there for a couple of years before I moved to London in 2011,” she tells us. “When I moved to London, it was very much the fashion scene. London had the heritage of Vidal Sassoon – there was a buzz and it just seemed like the coolest place in the world at the time.”
Working as an assistant at Windle & Moodie in Covent Garden, Linnéa underwent further training and specialised in cutting and styling. “I did that for a few years, but I always wanted to do fashion, so I gradually moved into that, and became freelance in the salon, doing session work and a lot of assisting.” It was from here that Linnéa tells us she began assisting Ali Pirzadeh. “He was the first person I really assisted – he’s amazing. I learned a lot from him about ‘the babysitting of the hair’ and keeping an eye on the hair, and just the joy for it,” she shares.
From there, Linnéa started doing shows with Duffy, and soon became the first assistant to Alex Brownsell, Creative Director and Co-Founder of Bleach London, for three to four years. “I was also working in product development at Bleach, which was a really good experience. I was learning, kind of doing office work but still doing hair – it was really interesting to get to see that side of things.” However interesting it may have been, it led Linnéa to realise that being on set and doing client’s hair was what she really wanted to do, so she gradually moved into doing her own work across fashion and beauty brands, gaining a celebrity clientele.
When it comes to her A-List clients, Linnéa explains that is very much a collaborative effort. “I think I’m very lucky, all of my celebrity clients are absolutely lovely. You have a bit of a chat, like what are you wearing? What kind of vibe do you want? And then you go somewhere with that.” Suki Waterhouse, for example, is a regular client. “I think why we work so well is because we have similar taste,” Linnéa tells us. “We like the same type of hair, so it just makes sense. With Suki’s hair, the signature is the cut, and we change up the style. We do different textures – we’ve done more of a blow-dry for red carpets, more volume and movement, and more of a rock vibe for her headline shows. We recently did a haircut that was inspired by Marianne Faithfull in the 60s, playing with these nice flicks.”
When it comes to inspiration, Linnéa likes to look a lot into vintage. “I love going into shops with old books. I went into one recently and found a book about Pucci, the fashion brand, and there were some amazing hairstyles with really big ponytails from the 60s” she says. “It’s really inspiring and fun seeing cool stuff basically! I love Pinterest but I do find it can also be quite repetitive, and everyone can see the same photos, so going out and finding photo books, and even online archives of Vogue, I find really good.”
Meanwhile, her advice for any young hairdressers looking to step out from behind the chair into the fashion world, goes beyond assisting. “Seek out the people that are like you and assist – it’s very helpful to work with people whose style you like. But it’s one thing to want to do something, and it’s another thing to be ready for it,” she explains. “You never want to be booked for a job and not be able to actually do it or have the skills. Doing test shoots allows you to put stuff onto your Instagram or your portfolio where you can show the person you want to assist that you can do hair. When you’re assisting, it’s not about your style or taste, it’s about, can you do a good blow-dry? Can you do a sleek ponytail? If you can show that, do some test shoots, then you’re more likely to get booked on assisting jobs.”
Looking back at the young girl doing her cousin’s hair in photographs, Linnéa reflects: “I think if little me could see me now, I definitely would be proud of myself, that’s for sure! I think when you get frustrated with yourself, you have to remind yourself where you started.” So, what’s next? “I would probably say I still haven’t reached my goal, but then I also don’t really know what my goal is anymore.” Whatever it is, we can't wait to watch from the sidelines!
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