After more than half a century in the industry, hairdresser Irene Cater is finally hanging up her scissors.

The owner of Hair Care, in Higham, between Gravesend and Strood, has decided to retire after 58 years and has sold the salon.

Irene said: "I was quite emotional last week. It was a sad day but it had to come. I was starting to feel the pressure of running a business and was at retirement age.

"It is an end of an era. I am going out while it was going good. I have no regrets. It is going to be quite weird not coming in.

"I have been lucky. We have had some really fabulous clients."

The grandmother-of-two was 15 years old when she started her training as an apprentice hairdresser. She then worked as a stylist in a John Lewis salon in London.

After getting fed-up with travelling to and from work every day, Irene decided to open up her own business and moved to the village.

"I was only 25," she added. "It was a big leap really but at the time it was something that just came up and I took it.

"When I moved in, I was very much an outsider. I think they thought I had landed from London and was not sure on what I would do. I had to work on them. It is a nice village."

She was the third owner of the salon in School Lane and has run the business for 48 successful years.

During her career, she has cut thousands of heads of hair, done hundreds of perms and has seen numerous styles come in and out of fashion.

Back in the 70s and 80s, Hair Care had a whole wall of hood dryers used for setting older hair styles but now the shop only has two.

"The industry has changed a lot," the 73-year-old said. "It has been hard, we have tried to keep up with the times. We have grown a lot and grown with our clients.

"When you are in hairdressing you have to evolve with it. When I was taught there was no blow-dry, it was sets and perms which our older clients still want.

"There are not many salons that do perms any more. All our clients are asking us where they will go now."

Irene said popular styles are continually changing and coming in and out of fashion but many are now making a comeback such as barrel curls and big '60 dos.

Fellow hairdresser Karen Taylor, who worked at Hair Care for 43 years, added: "Styles are changing all the time. I think as a village salon we have done quite a lot and kept up.

"When I joined nobody knew how to do a blow-dry, that is how quickly things were changing. I had to teach everyone."

Throughout the years, there have been 15 staff members working at Hair Care.

Irene, of Fairview Drive, Higham, added: "All the girls that worked here over the years are all still friends. We have always worked as a team. We would all muck in and help."

Looking back at their time in the salon, friends Irene and Karen said all sorts "has gone down in here".

They said an Army platoon once stopped by to use their toilet, a Father Christmas stripper caused chaos as clients packed out the shop to get a glimpse, and they had a client who read a book on how to kill your husband every week.

Karen, 65, said they even had a lady who passed away while under one of the dryers. She said they thought she had fallen asleep but after a while noticed something was not right.

They all rushed to get a doctor and call an ambulance but then had to carry on working.

Hair Care closed on Saturday, January 28, and is now to become a dog parlour and groomers, although an opening date is not yet known.

Karen joked: "It will be giving another type of cut!"

Irene said she will be spending more time with her grandchildren and going to the gym but most importantly is looking forward to her first Saturday off.