Textured Tresses

A celebrity hairstylist offers a practical, inspirational guide on how to achieve a variety of fashionable looks, describing the five basic types of hair and how to care for them, presenting step-by-step instructions on how to achieve diverse popular styles, and furnishing helpful advice on selecting a salon, hair care, conditioning, and more. Orig

Auteur

Two-time Golden Globe nominee and Emmy, Grammy, and seven-time NAACP Image Award recipient Blair Underwood has distinguished himself as an award-winning actor, director, and producer. He has starred in Sex in the City, Self Made: Inspired by the Life of Madam C.J. Walker, and Disney Channel’s The Lion Guard. He lives in Los Angeles, California. Follow him on Twitter at @BlairUnderwood.

Texte du rabat

Celebrity hairstylist and master designer Diane Da Costa offers the solution to unraveling the tresses of textured hair. Counting five-time Grammy winner Lauryn Hill and critically acclaimed actor Blair Underwood among her clients, Da Costa provides both information on the proper care of textured hair as well as a step-by-step guide on achieving exciting styles.

Résumé
Twist it! Braid it! Loc it! Enjoy the freedom and beauty of naturally textured hair.

Textured hair styles like Locs, Braids, Twists, Cornrows, and Knots are all the rage, adorning the heads of celebrities, athletes, and everyday folk now more than ever before. Yet, the actual caring, styling, and maintenance of textured hair still remains a mystery to many.

Now, Diane Da Costa, celebrity stylist and master designer of natural hair, unravels the tresses of textured hair, providing readers with information on the proper care of natural hair as well as a step-by-step guide on achieving various exciting styles.

Textured Tresses will help you:

-Identify and celebrate the texture you were born with (whether it's wavy, curly, very curly, or tightly coiled)
-Keep your hair healthy and strong by using hair products and tools correctly and managing stress effectively
-Select the right stylist and salon to suit your hair care needs
-Transition from chemically relaxed hair to natural hair safely
-Experiment with color, weaves, and chemicals
-Achieve the styles you admire on your favorite movie stars and recording artists

Packed throughout with photos, illustrations, and special celebrity sections, Textured Tresses is a must-have whether you already twist, coil, loc, or want to learn how to begin.

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Introduction

It's an era of rebirth and what do you see? Take a close look. Textured hairstyles are everywhere. Sexy cornrows and bushy afros work the runways of Paris and Milan, the sidewalks of both Tokyo and Philadelphia, as well as the sweaty courts of the NBA and WNBA. Locs and twists adorn the heads of your favorite celebrities. It's no wonder. Textured Hair is Beautiful Hair!

Most women desire something other than what they already have, especially when it comes to our own hair. We want longer, fuller, thicker hair with more manageability, control, flexibility, and options. Well, I have one word for you -- texture. Texture will give you everything you're seeking and then some. Textured hair allows you to have it all.

Sometimes reinvention is the mother of invention. With that said, I'd like to offer a new spin on something we've known all along. Texture is what you can see with your eyes and feel to the touch. Texture, as it relates to hair, refers to the straightness or curliness of the hair's surface, yet it is also the softness, roughness, or coarseness, if you will. Texture is straight, wavy, curly, very curly, and tightly coiled hair, too. Cornrows, afros, locs, twists, braids, and knots are styles with texture. Texture is what we all desire and want.

No longer must we apologize for our textured hair. Instead we should celebrate, love, and appreciate our God-given texture. This begins with taking pride in acknowledging that certain styles originated from specific regions in Africa. The Samburu people of the Massai Tribe in Kenya and Tanzania wore locs first.

The Samburus were herders who lived above the equator. Before becoming warriors, the young boys prepared their hair with ochre, a red clay mask. The boys would fling their ochre-colored hair in the face of girls they wanted to meet and the girls would flirt back with the young warriors.

The soft, wavy, textured hair like that of the cover model Waris Dirie is common in her homeland of Ethiopia. West Africa is the birthplace of Senegalese twists and many braided styles.

Our flair with textured hair in America is nothing new. It's merely a rediscovery. In the roaring 20s, the Marcel curls and waves were worn by practically every woman, both black and white. In fact, when Cicely Tyson needed to portray a character who wore Marcel waves during that era for the movie Hoodlum, she turned to Helen Graine Faulk, the oldest living cosmetologist at the time in Ohio. Apparently no one on the set knew how to create the waves without relaxing Ms. Tyson's natural hair (which was completely unacceptable to her). Ms. Faulk consulted with Cicely Tyson and created the beautiful waves by pressing her hair and using Marcel irons.

Think back to the shiny, slicked-back ponytail of the lovely Billie Holiday in the 40s, the luscious waves of Dorothy Dandridge in the 40s and 50s, and the fierce yet sexy afro of Pam Grier in the 70s.

Michaela Angela Davis, former editor-in-chief of Honey magazine, remembers getting her hair cornrowed and rocking afros in the 70s. "When the other kids in high school wore relaxers, I wore braids," says Michaela. "In D.C., there were braiders at the museum on Saturdays and Sundays braiding hair."

Remember the long loc extensions of Lisa Bonet in the 80s? Let's not forget Janet Jackson's Casamas braids in Poetic Justice. Many braiders can attest to clients, both regular and new, requesting the "Janet Jackson braids." And no one can deny the impact of Brandy's individual braids worn in various lengths, widths, and styles during the 90s.

Today we see the vibrant wavy hair of Tracee Ellis Ross on UPN's Girlfriends, the exotic cornrow extensions of Alicia Keys and Christina Aguilera, the sensuous, full, naturally coily 'fros of Lenny Kravitz and Maxwell, and the texturized Caesar worn by Blair Underwood in Sex and the City. The possibilities are infinite with Textured Hair.

As a natural hair care specialist, colorist, and precision cutter over the past 15 years, I've seen many of my own textured creations become hair trends, including the Cosmicloc (a loc extension) that appeared in Moods magazine in 1990. In the early 90s, while working with model/owner Peggy Dillard of Turning Heads, one of the top-rated natural hair salons in New York City, I got my first big break. Essence magazine called the salon to request a style that I called the "Twist Out." Since then my work has appeared on their covers and in their fashion and beauty pages. I've also had the privilege of being the Hair and Beauty Advisor of Heart & Soul magazine as well as the first Hair Editor for Honey magazine. However, one of my greatest accomplishments was creating and owning Dyaspora Salon and Spa in New York City. This inspiring, trend-setting salon was created to bring artists together in different forums, such as book signings by authors and original artwork showings by painters, where clients would be pampered in a relaxed, cozy environment. It had been my dream since the day I first entered Robert Fiance Hair Design Institute in New York City, just two years after graduating from Pace University with a bachelor's degree in Business Administration and Marketing. I birthed many young, talented stylists, many of whom went on to open their very own salons.

I firmly believe that it is m…