BLACKBURN'S longest-established hairdresser is putting away his comb and scissors for good.

John Slater is retiring next week from Slater's Hair and Body Shop, Whalley New Road, at the age of 58.

He started work as an apprentice in his father's salon 43 years ago but today runs a team of 10 hairdressers and beauticians at the busy Blackburn unisex salon.

And while only going through four pairs of scissors he has seen more than one hairstyle come and go.

Everything from Elvis cuts, DAs, Beatle cuts, Keegan perms, Chrissey Waddle mullets to the more recent Beckham mohican.

He is handing over the reins to his current manager Alison Chambers who has bought the business after working there for 24 years.

The former president of Blackburn and District Chamber of Trade said he started working for his dad at his Penny Street hairdressers after leaving school at the age of 15 with no qualifications.

And in that time he swears he has never done a dodgy haircut. "I'm quite lucky really, in all my time I don't think I've ever done a bad cut, but I've been asked to do some pretty strange things. Like the guy a while back who asked me to dye his greyhound dog!"

After taking over the business from his dad he opened branches selling wigs in the old Thwaites Arcade and with another shop on Blackburn Road, Accrington, before consolidating with the Whalley New Road shop.

John, of Mellor Brook, made hairdressing history in 1997 when he qualified as Lancashire's only trichologist. This enabled him to treat diseases and disorders of the hair and scalp like alopecia and psoriasis.

Despite standing for around nine hours a day, six days a week, John said he will miss the cut and thrust of hairdressing life.

"It's going to be a great wrench. I'm really going to miss the regular clients -- and particularly the Rovers banter. There's one regular who said if he added up all the hours he's sat in my chair having his hair cut it would be in the range of 24 full working days."

But instead of pining for the past, John said he remained upbeat and has future of leisure planned out. "I've got eight grandchildren so I'm going to have my time cut out there, but me and my wife Josie, who has run the beauty side of the business for 30 years, plan to do a bit of travelling.

"That way I can tell my hairdresser where I plan to go on on my holidays instead of me doing the asking!"