Disturbing reason behind Britain's barber shop boom: 665 opened last year and they're appearing on every street. Now in a special investigation SUE REID reveals why...
Disturbing reason behind Britain's barber shop boom: 665 opened last year and they're appearing on every street. Now in a special investigation SUE REID reveals why...
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Foleshill was once a tiny rural hamlet. Mentioned in the Domesday Book, it was home to Lady Godiva, the nobleman's wife said to have ridden naked on a grey horse through the nearby city of Coventry to highlight the plight of the local poor. Today, Foleshill is a shabby, multicultural suburb of sprawling modern Coventry in the West Midlands. It is split in two by the Foleshill Road, lined with drab houses, cheap clothing stores, kebab takeaways, fried-chicken shops and 'Turkish-style' barber shops.
![[Hewa Rahimpur, 30, and his gang of fellow Iranian Kurds were detained on suspicion of bringing 10,000 migrants into Dover from the French coast in small boats]](https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2024/12/06/02/92842553-14157989-Hewa_Rahimpur_30_and_his_gang_of_fellow_Iranian_Kurds_were_detai-a-104_1733450599712.jpg)
Police statistics reveal the area is notorious for violence, sex offences and shoplifting. Stabbings happen. Shootings too. It has the second highest crime rate in the city. Only the parked black Mercedes and Range Rovers, many with darkened windows, show there is money here – and clearly lots of it.
![[Ilford resident Hewa Rahimpur being detained in east London. He was later extradited to Belgium, where he went on trial]](https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2024/12/06/02/92847771-14157989-Ilford_resident_Hewa_Rahimpur_being_detained_in_east_London_He_w-a-106_1733450599713.jpg)
Outside the biggest shop on Foleshill's main street – a furniture emporium with a multitude of identical cream sofas on display – a Palestinian flag flutters from a tall pole. Next door to the furniture store was one of those Turkish-style barber shops, an array of which have sprung up on Foleshill Road over the past few years. A minute's walk away, on the same side, is an almost identical establishment.
![[Albanian Gul Wali Jabarkhel, 33, was accused of using his barber shop in Colindale, North London, as a base for a smuggling racket]](https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2024/12/06/02/92842545-14157989-Albanian_Gul_Wali_Jabarkhel_33_was_accused_of_using_his_barber_s-a-105_1733450599712.jpg)
It's the same story further up the street: clustered in one section, there are five similar barber shops in a row. Not far from Foleshill, in the same northern fringe of Coventry, is another place that has known better times. Far Gosford Street, dating to the 12th century, is one of the most historic in the West Midlands. It still has 14 historic listed properties, but scattered among them are ten barber shops offering a litany of grooming services.
![[Tarek Namouz, proprietor of Boss Crew Barbers, was sentenced to 12 years last year for sending £11,000 to Syria to 'purchase weapons and explosives' to use against President Assad's government forces]](https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2024/12/06/02/92847751-14157989-Tarek_Namouz_proprietor_of_Boss_Crew_Barbers_was_sentenced_to_12-a-103_1733450599711.jpg)
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