I discovered this place by serendipity... I was scrolling through my Explore feed on Instagram when I found this dope looking hoodie. I'm a sucker for hoodies so I clicked through and it seemed like it was a collab between a local Chicago clothing brand Hidden Characters and.... a.... barber shop? What?
Needless to say, I thought the design of the hoodie was dope so I clicked through the barber shop. It sent me down a slippery slope of pure curiosity and interest. The aesthetics of the shop itself intrigued me and I realized I had a fair amount of mutuals that have gone there, know the barbers there, or, in the case of my old friend Daniel from my undergrad days, worked there! I had several degrees of connection to this barbershop despite having never heard of it before, so I made a promise to myself to get my next haircut there.
I'm usually not very fussy about my haircut. As a military man, as long as it's within regs, I'm cool with it. I've been going to Sport Clips lately, and before that Super Cuts, and before that.... Betty and Nick's. So you can see that my standards for haircuts aren't... super high. For years I always prioritized speed and price over quality. Sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn't. Overall, my experience with hair has just been meh. Every few months or so I'd try out a new random barbershop that had a coupon or was recommended to me, but other than that, I never really had a "spot."
I think that might have changed after today. I think Fernwood might be my "spot."
I originally intended to walk in on Saturday, but I was feeling lazy and didn't have a lot of time, and I just had a feeling that I'd be waiting for a long time even if I went at opening. I wanted to walk in because the walk in price for cuts is $30 as opposed to $40 for an appointment (and we've already established that I'm a cheapskate) but I ended up just making an appointment for today, Wednesday, because I was just that curious about the place.
I got to Fernwood a few minutes after my appointment time at 5:30PM, so I was a little late, but my assigned barber wasn't done with his previous cut yet so it worked out. I was greeted by the aforementioned Daniel, whom I knew from my undergraduate days and we caught up and chatted. Of course I had to bring up how I found out about Fernwood and I brought up the hoodie, and just my luck, the owner said he could sell me a hoodie today. Great! So I was already out $60 because of this darn hoodie I fell in love with on Instagram. So much for being cheap. Daniel informed me about the fridge with free beer and water that I heard so much about from Yelp reviews. I did not indulge today, but I really appreciated that feature. 5 minutes in this shop and the vibes were already on point.
After about 10 minutes I got into Mikey's barber chair and began my cut. I will say that for probably 99% of all the haircuts I've gotten, I've always wanted to just get in and get out with no motivation to talk to the barber. Getting cut by Mikey was different, and I get the feeling that any of the barbers at Fernwood would have provided the same vibes and atmosphere. He was super chill and easy to talk to, yet didn't force conversation which was great for my introverted self. I chatted to him about how I found the shop, about my background and where I was from. I asked him the same and about how the shop was founded and the meaning behind it. From his words and also from just being in the shop itself, there's a very strong emphasis on community which I love. I'm all about community.
As I've mentioned, I'm in the army so I need my haircuts high and tight. I had absolutely no view of the mirror during the entirety of my cut so I had no idea what the progress looked like, but I can say that Mikey did wonders. I was taken aback when I finally looked in the mirror... is this what having a haircut from a non-franchised shop looked like? That's crazy. He did a perfect 0-1 fade on my sides and styled/cut the top of my head just right to the way I like it. I haven't been able to style it yet but I have a feeling it'll look great, because it looks great unstyled. My hair ALWAYS looks like crap unstyled, but most of the time I'm too lazy to style it or I just wear a hat. The fact that I would wear my unstyled Fernwood cut out without a hat and love how it would look... it just goes to show how clean the cut was.
I'm running out of characters here but long story short, I can't say enough good things about my experience at Fernwood. It is a little pricey but it's a price I'll willingly pay every so often to get a quality cut and great vibes from the entire team. Definitely check it out if you're ever in the LID area, but be warned that these barbers TAKE THEIR TIME; you will likely be there for a while. My cut from Mikey took about an hour or a little more. It's more than I'm used to but again, I'm willing to invest that time every so often for the quality.
Definitely a fan of Fernwood. I will be back! read more
