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Features

Whose hair are you buying?

Britain buys £43 million worth of human hair a year. But it’s dismayingly hard to find out who it comes from

25 April 2015

9:00 AM

25 April 2015

9:00 AM

Perhaps you recall the moment in Les Misérables when Fantine chops off all her hair? The destitute young mother sells her long locks, then her teeth (a detail often excluded from child-friendly adaptations) before she is eventually forced into prostitution. It would be nice to think that her experience was no longer a reality, that the business of human hair had gone the way of the guillotine — but the truth is, it’s booming.

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Lara Prendergast is The Spectator’s online editor.


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