Introducing the New York Salon Where Models and Fashion Editors Head for an Under-the-Radar Cut

On a recent Friday morning at the White Rose Collective Hair Studio, a new by-appointment-only salon in Manhattan’s East Village, Teddi Cranford was already in the swing of things. The French model Ophélie Guillermand had paid the hairstylist an early visit, the Danish beauty Kirstin Liljegren was in the midst of getting bombshell waves before a Victoria’s Secret casting, and an editor was perched on the sunlit window seat awaiting a bang trim. Between the speakers thrumming with a Future Islands–inspired channel on Pandora and a candle flickering on the Lucite bar (an eBay find “like Michelle Pfeiffer’s bar in Scarface,” notes Cranford), the space felt more like a friend’s living room than a whirring salon. Which, of course, is precisely the point.

Cranford’s three-chair atelier quietly opened without signage during New York Fashion Week in September and acts as a home base for her boutique hair-and-makeup agency, also called White Rose Collective. The service, which launched a few years back and is now under Cranford’s sole direction, has earned a following among the cool-girl set (Pamela Love, Anna Ewers, Langley Fox, and Behati Prinsloo among them). Now, with the establishment of a brick-and-mortar studio—accented with a live-edge wood shelf and Pendleton hand towels, both nods to Cranford’s Oregon roots—clients can come in for bridal hair trials, red carpet styling for events like the Met Gala, and intimate, on-point cuts. (Diana Conte, a fellow industry veteran and White Rose stylist, also takes appointments; color is not currently available.) “There’s a different energy,” says Cranford of the one-on-one experience the salon offers, where direct dialogue and shared fashion references help guide the finished result. “Trust is huge.”
Her approach to hair—words like personalized, effortless, and natural are a key part of Cranford’s vocabulary—is one she honed during her years at top New York salons (Bumble and Bumble, Sally Hershberger) and backstage alongside powerhouse hairstylist Guido Palau, with whom she worked for five years on such directional fashion shows as Dior, Valentino, and Dolce & Gabbana. The experience with Palau was “the best training I could have ever gotten,” says Cranford, who developed her technical skill and nuanced eye under his guidance. After a two-month stretch fueled by word-of-mouth recommendations alone, Cranford’s runway-to-real-life aesthetic at the salon is soon to be the talk of the neighborhood—and beyond. After all, the hand-painted gold sign on the window just went up.