Steven Hammond, 44

Photograph: Beth Levendis

Who: Steven Hammond, 44
Where: Salon G (229 Sullivan St between Bleecker and W 3rd Sts, 212-228-3304)
Services: Cuts are $20 and up

You’re always chatting it up with someone outside or in a bar on the block. You’re like the mayor of Greenwich Village.
[Laughs] People actually call me that. I’ve been cutting hair in the Village for 21 years.

Only the Village?
Only in the Village. I’m never gonna leave it.

The neighborhood has changed over the years. Would you say it’s better or worse now?
Well, some of the people are a lot richer. But you have to be in touch with all the parts of the Village: the hippies, I hate to say it, but the drug addicts, the homeless, the store owners, the preppy business guys. I’m part of all that—I don’t discriminate against nobody in the Village because you never know who nobody is.

Were you born in the Village?
No, in Brownsville, Brooklyn. In the 1960s, a lot of blacks migrated from the South up to where we lived, but I wanted to have diversity and lots of cultures around me. One day I was in my father’s car and we drove through the Village and I knew I wanted to come back up here.

How’d you get into hair?
I have five brothers and, to save money, my dad used to cut all our hair. When he got tired of it, I took over but I’d always want to play and do designs in their hair. Then, when I was older, I had a job making Hallmark cards, but I wanted to do something different—something that allowed me to use my background and be an idol for people to look up to. I went to get my hair cut in Brooklyn, and I just realized I should cut hair. Then I went to Atlas Barber School and started working down here.

At what point did you become the mayor?
The owner at my first haircutting job—on 8th Street between University and Broadway—didn’t speak English well, so he used to send me to the Block Association of Owners. We’d have meetings about things we wanted to do with the neighborhood. I met a lot of the owners, and after work, I’d go sit at their restaurants or stores and meet more and more people. Eventually people started calling me the mayor because I knew everybody.

Speaking of knowing everybody, your business card says “Barber to Stars.” Who are your clients?
Dave Chappelle. You can watch me on Chappelle’s Show, by the way. I’m the crazy guy in the barbershop in the second season. I have Q-Tip, who is deejaying on Lafayette Street every Friday night. I have Mos Def. You know, just lots of eclectic people like filmmakers, actors, comedians, musicians and lots of NYU kids.

That’s quite a list. Get any good perks?
Oh my God. Trips to concerts, invites into their homes. And I don’t pay to get into no clubs.

—Interview by Lisa Freedman

If you like Steven, try… Dave at Thompson International Beauty Salon (210 Thompson St between Bleecker and W 3rd Sts, 212-475-9864). “Dave gave me an opportunity to work there when my previous store closed down. He does good ladies’ hair—from NYU kids to women in their eighties. He does things that I don’t like [doing, such as] coloring and curling and he’s just as great to talk to.”

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