Anton Du Beke: Pain of hair transplant was better than pain of receding hairline

Anton Du Beke (Ian West/PA)

Anton du Beke has said he decided to have a hair transplant because “it doesn’t hurt as much as looking into the mirror and seeing your hairline disappearing”.

The Strictly Come Dancing professional had the procedure in 2017 after becoming increasingly uncomfortable about his receding hairline.

Speaking to Steph McGovern on Channel 4’s Steph’s Packed Lunch, he said: “I started to lose my hair a few years ago. Every time I looked in the mirror it’s all I could see.

Anton Du Beke with former fellow Strictly professional Brendan Cole in 2015 (Ian West/PA)

“I had a period of time when I tried to do all my photos in profile…It’s sort of always on your mind. It starts to consume you.”

Asked if losing his hair knocked his confidence, the dancer said: “It does in certain aspects, not as a performer… In normal life.

“You’re either OK with it or you’re not OK with it, so if you know you’re not OK with it then, for me, it was a case of do something about it.

“I was playing golf with Jimmy Nesbitt (actor James Nesbitt), who’s famously had hair transplants, and I went to his guy.

“It immediately transformed my life. All of that stuff that was going on went away.

“It is a painful procedure, so you accept it for what it is. It doesn’t hurt as much as looking into the mirror and seeing your hairline disappearing.”

Discussing his decision to speak openly about the procedure, he said: “I owned it, I would talk about it… I had no interest in pretending.

“I wanted to go ‘Look, I’ve had a bit of crop rotation, I’ve ripped a bit from the back and shoved it on the front’. ”

Du Beke is among a host of famous men who have had a hair transplant, where hair follicles are removed from one part of the body to a bald or balding part of the body, including Jimmy Carr, Wayne Rooney, Brian McFadden and Jack P Shepherd.