A haircut and styling appointments at James Horta’s YGDV Barbershop are booked for a full hour.

The Mercedes barber with his business located on Texas Avenue in the city’s downtown compares his shop to “a speakeasy back in the day,” minus the alcohol, of course. What Horta refers to is the feeling of being a customer at ease and leaving the worries of the world behind when stepping into the space of his shop.

“I want you to come here and relax,” he said. “You’re here for one hour to yourself. And then when you leave, feeling like a million bucks.”

A good haircut or hair styling will do that for you. It’s Horta’s goal to make every customer feel that way. His shop is bright and enthusiastic as its owner. Horta is a Mercedes guy through-and-through, having grown up on Mile 2 E Road near the Heidelberg area. He’s community minded in supporting food bank drives and donations of coats to help keep local residents keep warm during the winter months.

Horta is perhaps best known from a community-giving-back perspective for his annual free haircut day for students heading back to school for a new academic year. He donated 33 free haircuts this past August and calls it passing “some goodness back to the community.”

“It’s one of those things,” Horta said, “that I can do to help the community.”

Feeling ‘Like A King’

Horta had a varied working background before deciding to become a barber.

Saying he was always “good with his hands,” Horta worked in welding and with heavy machinery in addition to spending time in the food industry. In 2019, he went through an intensive nine-months course offered by Advanced Barber School in Weslaco, which is one of the Rio Grande Valley’s longest-serving and more respected schools in that field.

He successfully completed 1500 hours of the barber school’s curriculum. Horta then earned the needed state-level certifications and is today licensed by the Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation. He saw opening a barber shop in Mercedes as something that fit him well in terms of his personality, skills, and connection to the community. Horta enjoys the freedom of having his own business along with the creative side of barbering.

“It’s something you can do and no one can judge you on it,” he said.

Horta prides himself on “using the best tools in the industry,” and using high-end barber chairs that run over $1000 in price. He believes in having a good discussion before a haircut to understand the look and appearance a customer seeks and then being meticulous with the cut so hair grows back evenly. The latter is an important measure of a good haircut in Horta’s view.

“I like traditional haircuts,” he said.

But he’s familiar with all the styles, saying, “everybody comes through here,” meaning men and women, kids and seniors, a wide range of customers.

“It’s an experience I want my customers to have in feeling like a king when they come here,” Horta said.

Upbeat & Positive

Horta has been in business since August 2023 on 242 S. Texas Ave, Suite 6.

His glow-in-the dark shop is adorned with splashes of color featuring art deco-style posters of famed figures ranging from Albert Einstein to Alfred Hitchcock to race car driver Jeff Gordon. There’s plenty of memorabilia featuring Horta’s favorite team – the Dallas Cowboys. It’s an upbeat space full of color and nostalgic pieces from Horta’s growing up years of the 1990s going into the aughts. The name of his shop derives in part from a popular sitcom of that era, “King of the Hill.”

He’s looking forward to Halloween and treating kids who come by his business with full-length candy bars as one more little thing that adds up to his other community contributions.

“I like giving back to the community that puts trust in us,” he said.

• Ric Cavazos

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