Bonomini: the UK’s second B Corp salon.
When I was little, me and my Granny went everywhere together. My Gran took great pride in her presentation and was always fabulously dressed - some of my earliest memories are playing hide and seek amongst the fur coats in her vintage shop. She took particular care of her hair and ever since I can remember, every Thursday at 10 am she would get her hair done at a salon in Clifton on Alma Vale road; a salon called Bonomini.
have you heard about Bonomini?
Bonomini is one of Bristol’s most esteemed hair salons. From the intricately thought-out decor, with large driftwood mirrors framing customers' faces on the small Victoria shop floor, to the beautifully branded - and equally beautifully feeling - products they use. Bonomini is an elegant salon where hair care and condition take precedence. A salon that knows that tuning into the finer details makes all the difference.
It was a crisp and foggy early-December morning when I was warmly welcomed into Bonomini, bustling with people and bursting with vibrant conversations amongst cuts and colours. I was greeted first by Bear, Egidia’s lovely little Parsons Terrier before I was given some tea to warm up in the most adorable little teapot and strainer (Egidia really does think of everything).
As a born and bred Bristolian, I’ve known about Bonomini for as long as I can remember. It’s one of the only salons I’d visit in between University budget self-cuts. During my recent visit (to fix another fringe gone wrong), I was amazed to learn about their incredible sustainability standards. If you didn’t know, Bonomini is almost one of the only 2 B Corp Certified salons in the UK.
what is B Corp Certification?
As stated on their website, B Corp Certified companies are “verified by B Lab to meet high standards of social and environmental performance, transparency, and accountability”. “[They’re] leaders in the global movement for an inclusive, equitable, and regenerative economy.” (1). It’s not an easy certification to achieve and there are only 1,000 companies that hold it in the UK. As Egidia says “I’ve been working as sustainably as possible for a long time, which is why I’m able to apply for B Corp. But, we’ve been working to get it for about 3 ½ years”.
In order to be a certified B Corp business you have to go through a long series of tests and assessments to ensure that your business meets its exceptionally high standards. “We’re conscious of everything here at Bonomini. We use disposable, compostable towels to avoid using washing machines and excess energy, we have special hoses that use less water, and I only use UK gas and clean energy.
Even down to our coffee - we get our beans from [an] independent, female-run start-up from Stroud, we don’t use plastic bottles and use Naked Sprout loo roll - which is bleach-free and recycled”
Egidia talks passionately about the work they do to maintain Bonomini’s environmental standards, a passion that had been ignited in her for over 25 years. She’s always been conscious of the waste in hairdressing, and one way she avoids this is by partnering up with the Green Salon Collective. “They’re a collective that takes away all our used foil, hair, chemicals, towels, PPE, colour tubes and paper to recycle, compost, or recover.”
And what do they do with all this waste? Most of it is reused and recycled back into the hair industry. But, the coolest bit is what they do with our hair:
our chopped-off locks are being used to help absorb oil spills, are added to compost mixes, or are made into wigs for charities!
And, on top of everything, all the profits made at Green Salon Collective go to charity! “It’s expensive but worth the cost” Egidia says: “everything we do is more expensive, right down to the Davines products” which is where she initially heard about B Corp.
I’ve tried many different hair products and most leave my hair feeling claggy and brittle by the end of the day from all the chemicals used in them. Davines, however, are as natural as possible. As Egidia says: “we put the condition of the hair over and above everything, and Davines really are the best products. They’re a family-run business from Italy who run on a zero-carbon footprint. They source their ingredients from local farmers whose details you can find on their packaging, using local ingredients that may go extinct. Like this bitter olive they use in their shampoos.”
We’re told not to judge a book by its cover, but the simplicity of Davines packaging merely lures you into its natural beauty. As well as being exceptionally high quality, Davines are also the only B Corp-certified hair care products and are now sold in over 70 countries worldwide!
Davines make everything from shampoo to hair colour, but B Corp Certification still doesn’t account for colour wastage.
“The worst thing in hairdressing is the chemical waste”, Egidia tells me. “Most salons just throw their waste down the drain. That shouldn’t happen, ever. So, we use software that measures the colour and saves what's used onto the customer's file. That way, the next time they come in we know exactly how much to use, which saves money for both of us. But most importantly - no waste gets washed down the drain”.
Egidia’s meticulously mindful management and devotion to both people and our planet is admirable. I asked her what her future goals were for Bonomini:
“For now, we're going to continue doing what we’re doing.
I’ve started working with the City of Bristol College, talking to them about sustainable hairdressing as it hasn’t been bought into any academies or colleges yet. I’m hoping we’ll be able to use our knowledge and experience to help other salons across the UK, I’m sure they’re just waking up to it now. But, colleges and academies or where it starts.”
Before I left the salon, I thanked Egidia for all the work she’s done to make Bonomini as environmentally sustainable as possible, she concluded with:
“You need to put your environment and your employees before profit. It’s not the government that can change the world, it’s companies that are going to change the world. I’m only a little tiny company, but we do what we can do.”
Such a beautifully inspiring phrase of words, I couldn’t have put it better myself.
