In Bay Area cities, a new kind of barbershop is popping up to attend to men's beards, coif their hair, even perform manly manipedis. The shops have an old-timey look and relatively high prices. Men are drawn to these nostalgic barbershops, and the reason may go beyond the desire to sport a craft haircut and shave.
In a lot of ways Fellow Barber in San Francisco is like any other corner barbershop. Hair gets snipped, buzzed and blow-dried. The barbers and clients banter -- about dating, work and travel. But the place doesn’t look like any old corner barbershop, at least not one from this century.
Fellow Barber has a distinctly turn-of-the-20th-century feel. There is lots of wood, antiques, old maps and black-and-white photos of Yosemite National Park. The guys getting trimmed sit in front of mirrors built into a sculpted wooden fixture along the wall.
It’s from the Chicago World's Fair in 1893. The fixture embodies the aesthetic of the space. It’s solid mahogany, 9½-feet tall and has carved mermaids.
Jonah Buffa owns the place with his brother, Sam. Barbershops like theirs are popping up in San Francisco, Oakland and cities across the country. The aesthetics of the shops range from frontier Gold Rush to 1960s "Mad Men."