Stop by Highland Avenue, when you need a trim
(Somerville Wire) – Razors Barbershop is more than a place to get a haircut. A place of community, the shop is family owned and can give you an updated look or something more classic. Recently, Razors partnered with Capito Coffee to open a café in their Somerville space. I talked with owner Anthony Berriola about what makes this place so unique and what visitors can expect when they take a seat in the chair.
How would you describe Razors’ approach to cutting hair, which has been described as both modern and traditional? What do you think makes a good haircut?
We consider ourself a traditional barbershop, not just in our shop’s aesthetic, but also in the services we offer and our approach to them. Our Traditional Shave is as classic as can be. It is performed using Proraso products that have been tried and true since the 1940s. We take our time to not only give a great shave, but to prepare the face for the blade and refresh the skin after … It’s a prideful process. While our services may be very traditional, our barbers always stay up to date. They are very knowledgeable on modern haircut trends, the products that are used for those styles, and we are always open to learning from fellow barbers to help expand our knowledge of the craft. For these reasons, we consider ourselves both modern and traditional.
You recently opened a coffee shop at your Somerville location. Can you tell us a bit about what inspired this and what kind of drinks are available at the café?
I have had the opportunity to visit many shops around the world and I always take back a little something from those places to incorporate in our shops back home. One barbershop in Amsterdam, and another in Brooklyn, incorporated a cafe that attracted not just clients, but coffee drinkers alike from around the neighborhood. When our Somerville shop had the opportunity to expand, we decided to bring that same idea to our neighborhood. We partnered with Capito Coffee, a local coffee roaster from Peabody, Mass. and they now have a full-service coffee bar inside our location. Like our shop, the coffee offered is very traditional to the Italian standards and we proudly offer a large menu of espresso drinks, cold brew, teas, and more. We just launched the coffee bar about a month ago, but we hope it becomes the place of choice not just for clients, but for anyone interested in exceptional coffee. No barber services are required to enjoy a great espresso, latte, cappuccino etc.
What do you like about working in the Davis Square area? What would you say the environment or vibe of the barbershop is like?
We are truly proud and honored to have been able to serve the Davis Square community for almost 18 years, and we have enjoyed watching the growth that has happened to the area over that time. It has brought to us all walks of life and has become a city that is inclusive, creative, and lively, just as our shop strives to be. Our community has been extremely supportive of us over the years, especially during the COVID shutdown, and we are truly humbled by the friendships we have developed with our clients over the years.
You also used to hold music concerts at the shop! What were these like, and will they be coming back again?
We wanted our shop to not just be known as a place that people come to for barber services, but also a place that tries to bring the community together in fun, creative events. One of those events is our Fresh Cuts Concert Series. We bring in unbelievably talented musicians from all over to perform an exclusive, intimate storytellers-style concert inside our barbershop. If you have visited our space before, you will see our multi-level layout offers a natural “stage” for the artist and a great viewing experience for the listeners. Though COVID had put a halt to these concerts, they will definitely return as soon as it is safe to do so. Our expanded location and addition of the coffee bar will make for an even better experience, and we are excited to bring the event back to the community.
Can you tell me a bit about the Anthony Shaves the World web series?
I have an unbelievable passion for barbering. I love to meet like-minded barbers and visit their barbershops around the world. It’s a great way to build a community of industry friends and learn new things that can be incorporated in my shops back home to help keep things fresh. My clients seemed to take an interest in my visits to these shops, so I decided to document them. What started as a personal passion project turned into a small web series called Anthony Shaves The World. Each episode showcases barbers and their shops while also featuring a musician or band that performs an exclusive recording of one of their songs that is set as the background music for the episode. It was a fun way for me to incorporate two passions of mine, barbering and music. I love that someday when I am an old man, I will have these videos to remind me that I not only had the opportunity to work from behind my own barber chair, but also all over the world. To me, that feels pretty amazing.
This article is syndicated by the Somerville Wire municipal news service of the Somerville News Garden project of the Boston Institute for Nonprofit Journalism.
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Shira Laucharoen is assistant director of the Boston Institute for Nonprofit Journalism and assistant editor and staff reporter of the Somerville Wire.
