this is janelle monae, an artist who, i think, is woefully underrated. a lot of naturals know about her, her hair is dope and i’ve *heard* that she styles it herself. but, to me, i think that j. monae is the embodiment of natural hair 5.0.
see, it’s like i’m in ‘survival’ mode right now. you know, doing the twist/twist out/braid/braid out circuit. but one of the beauties of natural hair (as expressed by j. monae) is how VERSATILE it is. and one of the reasons i decided to go natural is cuz i was tired of everybody saying that you just can’t do anything with natural hair, except flat iron it. i still feel that there’s a WORLD of styling options out there (which is why i take up so much space on this blog just showing styles), and i am hopeful that one day naturals will evolve to a higher level of styling innovation (i know some of you are already there.) i mean braids and twists are great, don’t get me wrong. but i wanna do some rolls and bumps and ‘poufs’ and god knows what else.
when i read about j. monae on wikipedia, the article said judy garland is one of her inspirations. so i looked up photos of judy garland, and saw some similarities in aesthetic, which is cool. (much like kanye’s interpretation of the mullet.) yay for black celebrities doing amazing styles with natural hair! (although they probably can all be counted on one hand… i swear, walking into a roomful of black female celebrities is like ‘adventures in weaveland’ or ‘adventures in good-hair-land’)
judy garland:
janelle monae:
here’s j. monae’s myspace page. thoughts? do you like her style? do you not like it? what do you think of natural styles diversifying beyond braids and twists?
