A BUSINESS owner and her husband converted a damp, old 1930s garage covered in ivy into a luxury beauty salon in under six months.
Lisa Payne has been working as a beauty therapist for over 20 years but has now opened up a new salon in her back garden.
Mrs Payne converted her old garage at her Bilford Road home for her salon Retreat Health and Beauty.
Mrs Payne said: "If someone told me I would have opened a beauty in an old garage, I would've said 'no way'.
"I wouldn't have believed them.
"Twenty years ago having a beauty salon in your back garden wasn't kudos, it meant you weren't very good, but now it's becoming more and more popular.
"I think it's because it stops you from paying rent for someone else and it is all your own profit."
And now, she is giving customers a 20% discount on her grand opening on Monday, May 8 as the nation gets ready to enjoy the bank holiday after the King's coronation.
Mrs Payne said the garage used to be filled with clutter and described it as her husband's 'man cave'.
She said: "I have OCD, so I don't like clutter, so before lockdown, we cleaned the garage.
"Then we changed it into a salon this year, we started in January and it took three months for us to add everything in.
"It cost just over £20,000 to get everything fitted.
"The customers love it and they are like 'it's so luxurious' and they say 'We can sit in the waiting room all day.'"
"The building is wood and it doesn't have your typical garage doors anymore, it has glass doors and we've put some bamboo trees up and it looks like a salon now."
Mrs Payne decided to start up her own salon from home after she couldn't afford to pay herself a wage due to high rent prices while working in a different venue.
She said: "I paid the rent and obviously, I paid the girls who worked there but I couldn't pay myself."
Although she said is very happy and excited about her new salon she said: "It was never the dream, I was forced into doing it, I thought I'd miss the social side of working in a bigger place, but I don't because I end up seeing 15 clients a day.
"But I never had the intention of opening up something like this."
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