Changing The Narrative

Fashion is an extension of how we feel about ourselves. I like to refer to it as dress up.

When we were kids we had a vision of how we would present ourselves to society, it was creative and bold, with no shame attached. Fast forward to the adults we are now, baggage, experience, perceived visions of ourselves, comparisons to what we have been fed in terms of beauty…all aspects of beauty.

Now take that and add the fact that you were somehow an outsider where you live.

You don’t look like anyone in your village.
When you look at magazine covers you never see a reflection of yourself.
When you watch a movie you were used to the fact that only certain people that look a certain way play leading roles… and none of them look like you… And that’s just the surface shit.

That’s before anyone has a chance to create further doubt within you about

your hair
your skin
your accent
your food

When I was an immigrant child, my father would take me to get my haircut. There was a Caribbean salon that our very small community went to, the only problem was that you were stuck there all day( it ran on Caribbean time) and you got what you got. The culture was soothing and I felt normal because they looked like me, spoke like my loved ones and understood my general plight in my efforts to be myself but somehow I fit in. Unfortunately, they weren’t really up on current cutting techniques so you got what I called an old lady haircut. My few experiences with top salons in the city was, looking back, soul crushing and shameful, further cementing the narrative of my 12 year old heart and mind that I would never be good enough, beautiful enough, or talented enough.

My hair was unruly, unrefined, frizzy, difficult black hair.

I witnessed stylists arguing openly about who had to do the little black girl's hair… Destroying what little confidence in my burgeoning unique beauty I ever had. Looking back I realize now that my work with curly textured hair started then and has been a lifelong pursuit, acceptance and the perfect haircut. I want every client that sits in my chair to know how beautiful their hair is… How beautiful they are.

I have realized that my curly hair clients, no matter their cultural background, have had some of the same issues and experiences. The false narrative of black and white hair has been spoken to both sides to convince us of a construct that supports lies that have been fed to us by our ancestors. Through my work, I’ve felt more kinship, not less, with humans that have had different experiences than me. Yet we share the experience of having a physical attribute that society (up until now) has frowned upon.

Curly/ textured hair( of all kinds) is: