Katherine Horn has just returned home from an afternoon with her latest client.

She has been visiting a woman going through the pain of hair loss as a result of her treatment for cancer.

Mrs Horn often finds herself as a shoulder to cry on and offering advice about getting through chemotherapy, having been through the traumatic process herself. Despite such an emotional day, she is a picture of enthusiasm.

“I love it to bits,” said the entrepreneur at her home in Ashford. “I drop everything to visit someone if I can. It’s my real passion.”

Three years ago, Mrs Horn was diagnosed with breast cancer. She underwent chemotherapy for a year until the start of 2014. She had been told she would not lose her hair, but she did.

“It restores your confidence because you have your identity back and you feel normal again..." - Katherine Horn, Panache Wigs

“I wanted someone to come to my home with a selection of wigs who had been through hair loss and understood,” she said. “I wanted them to be sympathetic but I couldn’t find anyone.”

After six months of research, she founded Panache Wigs in September 2014, a home-visiting wig service.

She said: “I found it so difficult to find a wig at the time of my hair loss. Having been through it, I know a wig has to be of the highest quality, realistic and easy to look after.

"It has to be comfortable and you have to know no one knows it’s a wig.

“I had been talking about it for a few months during my treatment and after a lot of research I set up the business.”

To launch the firm, Mrs Horn left her career of 24 years as a coordinator with social services around east Kent, where she gained many of her skills helping people emotionally. She travels across Kent, Sussex, Surrey and south east London visiting clients booked for whole mornings, afternoons or evenings.

“I’m not rushing in and out to people,” she said. “It is about giving people the time they need.”

Not long after getting up and running, Mrs Horn made it into an NHS magazine as the only person in Kent offering a home-visit wig service, which quickly gained her attention.

“The response was fantastic,” said the married mother of three. “I didn’t realise until I lost my hair how much it affects you. Ladies are very vain about their hair because it is part of their identity.

“When you lose that, you lose your confidence and it is something you want to keep very private. I thought I would be able to walk around with a bald head but when it came to it, I didn’t want to do that. I didn’t want to leave the house until I had a wig.

“It is a very private and discreet service. At home you feel most comfortable and can have family and friends present.

“It restores your confidence because you have your identity back and you feel normal again. It makes you feel more able to cope with the illness and treatments you are having.”