Entering Dan’s Barber and Styling Salon is like stepping back into a time when people cruised the strip, drank diner milkshakes and dropped words like “nifty” in casual conversation.
“In an unlimited number of salons in an unlimited number of strip malls, the ambiance is all the same. It’s either walking into a pristine white ‘80s science lab or a makeshift rainforest. Long gone are the days of the three-chair barber arguing with a regular about the local sports team,” one Yelp reviewer wrote. “Except at Dan’s.”
This month the barber shop, which is housed in a small, modest building on Monroe Street, celebrated its 60th anniversary. Though the space has expanded over the years, much of it remains the same as it was when the late Dan Flambouras emigrated to the United States from Greece and started the business. Read more.
Ask most barbers who have been in the game for more than three decades and they will tell you that the modern barbershop is nowhere near the place where they were in the 50s and 60s. You can blame the demise of the traditional barbershop on the “grunge look” of the 90s or the disheveled video-game player look of the early part of the 21st century or even the recently popular organic movement – which places more value in wide weeds than manicured lawns. One thing is clear, though, barbershops are back!
