Since the Natural Hair Studio’s grand opening in April of 2012 owner, Angela Walker has been making strides in the natural hair community. Now that we are on the cusp of her 3rd Annual Naturalista Hair Show, Angela is breaking new grounds. Last month, we sat down with Angela in her element to get a better understanding of the master mind behind the Natural Hair Studio.
Who is Angela Walker?
“I am an avid creator who just happens to be creating in the space of natural hair and in the natural hair industry. I’ve always loved hair! Hair, has been a part of my life since I was a little girl. I remember choosing my dolls based off of what type of hair they had.”
Based on the questions we curated just for her, Angela’s began to open up to us.
“As my own personal views expanded on culture, history, and black history specifically in America, I decided that the only reason why a black woman would want to straighten their hair, is to look like something she is NOT.”
From that moment of realization, Angela Walker made her love for hair more specific to natural hair. She goes on to tell us, “I quickly realized how powerful the images of black women wearing their hair natural and the effects that it can have, not just on our children but the effects it can have on the culture in the black community. It has now become my own personal goal to influence as many women to wear their hair as “natural” as possible.”
For Angela, her natural aesthetic has always been sisters to her God given talent; meaning her craft is truly a reflection of her. When asked to describe her own natural hair she referred to it as,
Wild & Attractive
Angela admits that she hasn’t always worn her hair in its natural state. She vividly remembers the very first time her hair was altered form its natural state as a little girl.
“I was in the fourth grade, my father took me to my sister’s hair dresser and I was supposed to get a press. The moment my father left, I saw them pull out the cream and I got really excited because I realized one of two things.
1) They didn’t hear what he said. OR 2) They didn’t care what he said.
Either way I was happy because I’ve always had very thick hair and my mom doesn’t know how to do hair, which is probably why I became a hair stylist.” She laughs. “My braids would always be sticking up everywhere and I would get teased and made fun. So when they pulled out the cream I was really excited because I had been told for many years by my little classmates, “why don’t you get a perm, why don’t you get a perm?” And I remember my dad picking me up from the salon thinking it looked like a press to him. I got home and I remember my mom being furious saying “this is not a press!” My dad became furious as well and that was the first time I got my hair permed.”
The now 27 year old Naturalista did not make the conscious decision to go natural until her freshman year in college at University of Maryland College Park.
How did your Natural hair find you?
“My natural hair style found me after the first two years of wearing it natural. It was kind of neat in the sense that I would twist it and take it out. My twist outs would be very perfect with every strand in place. My bush was always very wild. Then one day I decide to not wash my hair as often as I use to. It became very wild and I liked it so from that point on I would just wash my hair once a month, do large twists and let it out. I wouldn’t touch the twist for another month.
Angela began this particular hairstyle she’s rocking after cutting her hair for a second time upon the birth of her son.
“ I was telling one of the ladies who was working with me at the time that I am thinking about starting locks. I knew I didn’t want neat locks like most of my clients. I didn’t have time for that. So one day she was detangling my hair and she said well why don’t you start your locks from your bush. I was like what do you mean? She was like just start it from your bush, don’t worry about parting it, and don’t worry about twisting it that just seems more like you.
On New Year’s Eve 2012, Angela detangled her hair for the last time and never looked back. She let nature take its natural course. “From then on whenever they would shampoo my hair they just wouldn’t detangle it. I continued that process for about 5 months. Whatever locks had formed together, I just separated them. Other than that, I don’t really put a lot of products on my hair.”
The N Natural Hair Studio owner, truly identifies the wholistic lifestyle of being natural.
“I think natural hair is part of one’s true state of being but I am a bite of an extremist. If we are really going to talk about someone being “natural” for REAL… to me that’s someone in the desert who’s walking around with a stick, probably naked , just feeding off the land.
Angela believes that being natural is a personal choice.
“Black women shouldn’t straighten their hair but I also understand logically how some women feel. Those that feel, I’m still natural even if I straighten my hair because I don’t have a perm in. We do not straighten hair at the N Natural Hair Studio because I am the owner and I don’t like black women wearing their hair straight. By heat, I just mean straightening the hair not blow drying. It doesn’t make you any less of a Naturalista. However you feel natural is then that’s natural to you. My own personal definition does not include straightening hair but that does not mean I’m completely against it.
As a DMV Naturlaista, Angela does not believe in the natural hair grading scale. She tell us, “I think the grading hair scale has caused a divide in our community. I think that sometimes the natural hair community is just a watered down version of “the house nigga and the field nigga” in the sense that, yes now we are natural and now that we are all curly and returning to our natural state, its cool to be curly as long as your curls look like someone who is mixed, right? So now it’s as if, we are not trying to be white anymore, we just want to show that we got some white in us. I think the scale puts a label on it so you can say “oh she has 3B hair I have 4C hair my hair sucks, I wish I had 3B.” Overall, it just makes it easier in the sense of translating what kind of hair that you desire.
Recently, Chimamnda Ngozi Adichie said that hair is political. We asked Angela if she agreed with this powerful statement. If so, Can hair can be a vehicle for change for the black community in America?
Like Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Angela Walker believes that hair is political. Angela goes on to tell us, “Natural hair is a vehicle for change for the black community in America. The whole point of the Naturalista Hair Show is because I’m tired of black women saying things like “you can do that but I can’t because my hair isn’t a certain kind of way.” The point of the Naturalista Hair show is for people to not have that excuse. You can’t come to a show that’s showing you how to do two strand twists, showing you the different products on the market and showing you all the different natural hair salons in the area and leave saying that you don’t have a choice. The goal and purpose of this show is to make people feel more comfortable in that natural hair space.
With her 3rd Annual Naturalista Hair show coming up on September 27th 2015, Angela is on a mission to change the way black women look at natural hair.
If you would like to meet NkemLife and Angela at this years
3rd Annual Naturalista Hair Show, look below!
