Every once in great a while, the Gods of Fashion send word down to the mortals that curly hair is in. And the peasants rejoice.

But, when said peasants actually look at the Fashion Gods’ pictures, they are whole-heartedly disappointed. All too often, to these arbiters of taste, “curly” means “straight with a very slight artificial wave about half-way down.” Take, for instance, these “natural-looking curls:”

And the peasants cry.

That hair is beautiful, but realistic? Hell no.

But this year, this year, goddammit, it supposedly the year of the curl. Celebrities are donning curls, stylists are throwing away the irons and magazines are telling us to “embrace our natural texture.” Too bad, for many of us, that is far easier said than done.

For a lot of us curlies, our hair has always been the bane of our existence (unless we were around in the 80’s). The 90′ s and most of the 00’s have told us that if our hair is “big,” it’s dated, or out of fashion. Curls are okay…as long as they’re flat. Which, quite frankly, natural curls are not. So, we attempt to flatten and - bottles of gel later - we don’t look fashionable; we look like drowned rats. Read More »