Celebrity hair stylist James Brown reveals HE'S had a hair transplant (after 20 years of hiding his bald spot under those trademark hats)

He is famous for styling the tresses of Kate Moss, Sienna Miller and Emma Watson.
But while his glamorous clients had luxurious locks, celebrity hair stylist James Brown was hiding a terrible secret. In a rather bitter irony, he was losing his own hair.

And, rather than just being fashion statement, his trademark hats were also to cover up his embarrassing bald spot.
Now, MailOnline can exclusively reveal he has joined fellow celebrities such as James Nesbitt and Wayne Rooney in having a hair transplant – and is sporting full make of locks once again.

Transformation: In a painstaking two-day procedure, James had thousands of hairs surgically transferred from the back of his head to the crown

James, 43, first noticed his hair loss nearly 20 years ago.  He said: ‘I was 24, I was in Miami and my hair got wet. When I looked in the mirror I noticed my hair was going on the top.

‘What saved me is that I have curly hair so you couldn’t really notice it.'
But over the years, the problem predictably got worse.
‘I live [my life] going through airports, from LA to London, and I used to panic about having to go through airport security,’ he said. ‘ It got to the point when it was so bad, I didn’t want to take my hat off.  

‘Those minutes before going through security and taking my hat off, they were torture for me. 

Rather than just being fashion statement, James's trademark hats were also to cover up his embarrassing bald spot. Right: with celebrity pal Kate Moss

‘I am known for wearing hats, which I still wear all the time - that’s kind of my look when I work - but once when I was at a film premiere they asked me to take my hat off – which I really didn’t want to do with 40 rows of people behind me.’

THE ROAD TO A FULL HEAD OF HAIR

 In Ultra Refined Follicular Unit Transplantation (URFUT), a thin strip of skin containing the permanent hair is surgically removed from the donor area and the resulting incision is stitched back together.
This hair-bearing skin is then dissected and the resulting grafts, known as follicular units, are then inserted into the thinning or balding areas of the scalp.

As the only long-term solution to hair loss, the technique transplants hair from the back of the head, an area immune to hair loss, to those parts of the head that need it most.
Individual hair follicles are implanted one by one into the scalp. These follicles will then grow in their new location permanently. 

Most hair transplantations take between eight and ten hours, split into twos sessions, where up to 4,500 grafts can be transplanted in a single day. A team of six specialists worked on James’s hair.

He added: ‘It got to the point where hair loss was something that was constantly on my mind. But I just was too nervous…I didn’t have the confidence to talk about it, so I let it go and it got worse and worse to the point I had to do something about it.’

By March 2011 he had decided to take the plunge and investigate a hair transplant, citing ‘nervousness, insecurity and paranoia – I had to do something about it’.
He approached Dublin-based hair transplant clinic Hair Restoration Blackrock (HRBR), where experts recommended he have an Ultra Refined Follicular Unit Transplantation, said to be the ‘gold standard’ in modern hair transplants.
Dr. Maurice Collins, medical director of Hair Restoration Blackrock and a Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons London, Dublin and Edinburgh, said: ‘The results of James’s transplant are fantastic, even at this early stage.
'By going public about his hair loss, James has, like James Nesbitt, Louis Walsh and Wayne Rooney before him, helped remove the stigma about hair loss and hair transplant surgery. Fifty per cent of men by the age of 50 suffer from hair loss and it is vital that all men feel comfortable talking about it.’

Confidence boosted, James says he now wishes he’d had the surgery sooner.

‘I have the confidence now, it’s mine, it’s not going to fall out – it’s my hair, it’s incredible and I really wish I'd had it done it ten years ago to save me those years of hell. It’s incredible.
'My friends have said, "your bald bit has gone". And when I tell them about my surgery, they think it's amazing.’