Getting your hair done can be very relaxing, but sometimes what would make it even better is a fine feline friend.
Actor and writer Daniella Sinder had a great haircut in Brooklyn courtesy of stylist Kate Carretta, but one of the best parts was Emperor Clawdius, “Lord of Bushwick”–Carretta’s cat, who she was able pet while getting styled. In a post that’s since gone viral, Sinder shared a video of Clawdius, a brown tabby, gently resting in her lap as Carretta cuts her hair. “Support local business am I RIGHT,” Sinder wrote.
At the studio, Carretta is known for great cuts–Sinder wrote herself that it was amazing–but Clawdius has also become a star in his own right. As Carretta wrote to GOOD, “lately because of a few reels of him on laps I have been getting people seeking the cat salon experience.” Indeed, the commenters on Sinder’s video, which now has over 40K likes on Instagram, were instantly enamored. “How much does this extra luxury treat cost???” one person wrote. “Whoa, THIS is service,” said another. “I would totally shlep all the way to Brooklyn for this,” one more shared. And no, you don’t have to pay extra for Clawdius’s affections–they come free with Carretta’s styling fee.
Carretta has been cutting hair for 20 years on and off, she reports, always working with private independent clients in addition to her work at salons. She’s had her current studio for two years, and is also an artist, creating both home decor and furniture. Clawdius entered her life almost nine years ago.
“I got him from a really great organization called Bushwick Street Cats. They estimated he was around 3 years old at the time he was taken in. He had been having a rough time–dirty, hungry and struggling,” Carretta wrote. “They thought he was feral so they trapped him to neuter and release (his ear is tipped), but when he was brought inside to recover from the vet visit he started jumping on laps, so they put him on their adoption roster. When I went to meet him, it was love at first sight.”
Clawdius remained a consistent cuddler, too. “He likes a lot of attention,” Carretta wrote, adding that he’d been jumping on clients’ laps occasionally for years. As he gets older, he wants even more attention, though.
“These days he [jumps up] right away when clients sit in the chair,” Carretta says. “I think he thinks the salon chair is a ‘petting chair’ because to him it just looks like every day people sit in it and I start petting them. He doesn’t want to be left out so he gets in on it. Also I think it’s the equivalent of walking over your laptop when you’re trying to work–but I’m working on a person, not a computer.”
Carretta always asks if clients are “pro or anti- cat lap before I let him jump up,” she says. “In the uncommon event that someone doesn’t want him on their lap, I have to actively shoo him away and he gets very confused.”
If you are seeking the “cat salon experience,” Carretta is the stylist for you, and of course Emperor Clawdius will be delighted to meet you as well.
