{"id":225336,"date":"2026-01-09T17:40:09","date_gmt":"2026-01-09T17:40:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/225336\/"},"modified":"2026-01-09T17:40:09","modified_gmt":"2026-01-09T17:40:09","slug":"meet-the-man-behind-new-zealands-largest-hairdressing-collection","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/225336\/","title":{"rendered":"Meet the man behind New Zealand\u2019s largest hairdressing collection"},"content":{"rendered":"

Alex Casey spends an entertaining and enlightening morning with Michael Turner, owner of the largest collection of hairdressing memorabilia in the Southern Hemisphere.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Summer read \u2013 originally published August 25 2025. <\/p>\n

Michael Turner presents a delicate ivory cylinder to me like a magician pulling a rabbit out of a hat. It\u2019s the same colour as his tremendous handlebar moustache, curled with the kind of confidence and panache that can only come with four decades dealing in hair. \u201cThis is what we call a hair safe,\u201d he says. \u201cWhen you brush your hair and take it all out of the hairbrush, you can store it in here.\u201d I stare gingerly into the empty hair tomb. Why would you ever want to do that? \u201cBraid it, curl it, turn it into a keepsake, a locket, a bracelet, a necklace \u2013 anything.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

A few metres away, from behind an original 1965 Helene Curtis conetop dyer, Eden from Ferrymead Heritage Park<\/a> chips in with some additional historical context. \u201cWomen would often reuse the old hair to puff up and bulk out their own hairdo.\u201d Turner snaps his fingers and points straight up at the air. \u201cOf course Eden \u2013 the higher the hair, the closer to god.\u201d<\/p>\n

We are standing on the second storey of a Ferrymead warehouse and, despite my own pitifully flat mop, have ascended to hairdressing heaven. As hail pelts down on the roof and Westlife croons \u2018Flying Without Wings\u2019 from a nearby workshop, Turner takes me on a tour of his hairdressing memorabilia exhibit, the largest in the southern hemisphere. \u201cThe biggest collection in the north is in Barcelona, and [the owner] says he has over 5,000 pieces,\u201d he says, smirking. \u201cWell, I know I\u2019ve got well over 2,500 pieces up there, and about as many at home.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"Michael Turner and his Ferrymead exhibit. (Image: Alex Casey)<\/p>\n

And what a collection it is. There\u2019s a brood of pastel 1960s Ralta hairdryers, nested like eggs in a carton, backdropped by a technicolour array of hair dye swatches. Glass cabinets contain an array of ornate antique hand mirrors and brushes, along with 1800s hair curlers that look like medieval torture devices. Turner holds up what appears to be a pair of large wrought iron Grain Waves on the end of metal tongs, soon revealed to be 1820s flame-heated hair crimpers. \u201cWe actually haven\u2019t changed much,\u201d he says. \u201cWe\u2019ve just moved from solid fuel to electrickery.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the shaving section, Turner pulls out a large silver shaving bowl, compete with chin rest, that contains a particularly shocking surprise rattling around within. \u201cOh there\u2019s a tooth, sorry. We\u2019ll get to that later.\u201d I need answers now, and Eden pipes up again with some much-needed context: \u201cThe original barber shops were also bloodletters and dentists,\u201d he explains. \u201cThat\u2019s where the red, blue and white comes from on the striped poles \u2013 the red represents the blood, the white is dentistry, and the blue is hair.\u201d Turner doesn\u2019t miss a beat: \u201cor those of us with blue blood.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Reptilian or not, Turner has been collecting hairdressing memorabilia since he started his career as a 15-year-old in north London, following in the footsteps of his grandfather. From there he worked onboard the Queen Elizabeth II<\/a>, before heading to Harper\u2019s magazine and then to the south of France. There, he placed third in L\u2019Oreal\u2019s World Champion colourist competition in 1989, worked on a few French films, and had a memorable stint as a hair stylist with Cirque du Soleil. \u201cFreaky styles and freaky colours, sex and drugs and rock and roll, honey,\u201d he says.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"Sex and drugs and rock and roll, honey. (Image: Alex Casey)<\/p>\n

He then moved to Western Australia, which is where he met his wife Angela \u2013 \u201cmy goddess, my queen, my love\u201d \u2013 and levelled up his collection by salvaging old pieces of equipment from the salon bin. \u201cMy boss would be saying, \u2018well, that\u2019s broken, let\u2019s throw it away\u2019 and I\u2019d be saying \u2018but it\u2019s pretty, let\u2019s cut the electric cord off, stick it in a box, and the kids can play with it as a toy\u2019.\u201d His boss didn\u2019t agree. \u201cAnd so I thought I better start saving everything myself.\u201d<\/p>\n

During this time Turner was also the director of the International Hairdressing Society, and did a lot of stage work which involved using formaldehyde for hair straightening. \u201cIt works bloody brilliantly, but I was sniffing it in for over two years which unfortunately led to my nose becoming very difficult to manage.\u201d Turner soon had chronic sinusitis, polyps, and needed multiple surgeries. \u201cThat\u2019s why you\u2019ve got health and safety standards today when it comes to ironing hair and using different products,\u201d he says.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Turner ended up in Christchurch following the 2011 earthquake to help out Angela\u2019s daughter and children. His memorabilia collection came with him, but he had to leave parts of his hairdressing career behind in Australia. \u201cBy the time I arrived here, I couldn\u2019t do full service anymore \u2013 no bleaches, no colours, because it all just hurt my nose too much.\u201d He found a new job at Just Cuts, and relished the quick client turnover. \u201cI like the change. I like the rapid movement, I like to be entertained and I like to entertain. I basically get 20 minutes to show off.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"A small selection of pieces on display. (Image: Alex Casey)<\/p>\n

And when he wasn\u2019t working on his tight five at Just Cuts, Turner was still adding to his collection. \u201cOver the last 10 years, I\u2019ve really focussed on finding stuff that\u2019s physically from families here in Canterbury,\u201d he says. \u201cThings that may have been made overseas, but owned by somebody here.\u201d Scouring Woolston antique shops, Riccarton markets and accepting local donations, Turner\u2019s collection soon began to outgrow their garage. \u201cOne day Angela said to me: \u2018what are you going to do with it all?\u2019 and that\u2019s when I started to think about donating it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Just six months later, that collection is now available to view every Sunday at Ferrymead Heritage Society. \u201cThis is local history which has to be shared,\u201d Turner says. \u201cPeople always come through all excited saying \u2018I had one of these in the house. I had one of those in the house,\u2019 and it\u2019s just great.\u201d And even though hair might seem a frivolous subject for a museum, Turner says the collection is of \u201cexceedingly important\u201d social significance. \u201cWe have to learn about where we have come from to work out where we\u2019re going,\u201d he says.\u00a0<\/p>\n

And where I\u2019m going is off home, to crack open my hair safe and start saving up my strands.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Alex Casey spends an entertaining and enlightening morning with Michael Turner, owner of the largest collection of hairdressing…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":225337,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[4487,6144,21642,492,134714,134715,8993,1861,111,43,139,69,113060,2935,123306],"class_list":["post-225336","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-christchurch","tag-collecting","tag-collection","tag-comments-enabled","tag-hairdresser","tag-hairdressing","tag-heritage","tag-history","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-otautahi","tag-society","tag-tourism-fiji-summer"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225336","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=225336"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225336\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/225337"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=225336"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=225336"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=225336"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}