Tamara Hunter weaves lessons and appreciate into each individual braid she makes.
“When girls arrive right here, they know that they are receiving their hair completed or understanding to do hair in a position the place they are liked, they are listened to and they are understood,” says Hunter, who produces braids and teaches young girls to braid at her firms in Anderson and Spartanburg.
As a result of generations and throughout cultures, braiding procedures have normally been shared 1-on-a person, from just one technology to the future. Hunter is no exception. She was 8 years aged when she begged an aunt to instruct her.
“My aunt stated, ‘Go get your newborn doll.’ I did, and she confirmed me to start with how to box plait, which is the person plait. She explained to me to observe above and above and in excess of, just about every working day.” Hunter would finish and operate back to her aunt. Eventually, she acquired the remedy she craved. “She stated, ‘You bought it, newborn. You continue to keep braiding.’”
Hunter did. She also went to university and researched to be a nurse.
“Then I understood that I was obtaining via college by accomplishing hair,” she suggests.
Hunter claims her enthusiasm for braiding motivated her brand name, Eye Am Pretty.
“God gave it to me. I couldn’t assume of that my intellect does not work like that,” she says.
She shared the principle when an aunt urged her to communicate at a manner demonstrate.
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“I bought on phase, and I advised the men and women, ‘Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.’ I advised them to look at every single other. I questioned, ‘What do you see?’ Everyone was just seeking at me, not knowledge. And I stated, ‘Behold, you are stunning.’
“That was the true commencing of Eye Am Rather.”
And in 2006, her uncle — Roy Hunter, who owns Cuttin Up Barbershop in Anderson — drove her to Columbia to get the hair-braiding course and a examination administered by the South Carolina Board of Barber Examiners. She handed, paid out the $25 rate, and obtained her license in the mail.
“As braiders, we do the job in barbershops. We are unable to operate in salons,” Hunter explains.
Instead of attending cosmetology university, Hunter started out braiding hair inside a area she leased from her mentor, Reggie Rice, who owns Reggie One of a kind Cuts in Spartanburg.
She opened her individual store in Anderson last thirty day period but nevertheless works in both of those retailers and is learning the barber trade underneath Rice’s mentorship. “While I’m there doing work Eye Am Very, braiding hair, training braiding classes, I am also acquiring my barber’s license.”
Hunter says she respects that braiding has its roots in barbershops.
“As a braider, I focus in caring for your pure hair — no dyes, no perms, no substances at all,” she suggests. “In salons, they have substances. Barbers never function with chemical substances. And you never have the braider functioning as a cosmetologist or carrying out cosmetology function.”
In her shops, Hunter uses only normal items to clean hair and ailment the scalp.
Hunter’s individual hair is styled in extended braids that are a mixture of light and dim shades that dance in entrance of the vibrant yellow partitions at her braiding business and faculty in Anderson.
Braiders can attach extensions to natural hair so that the braids can be extended. The extensions can also be dyed.
“I see a lot of variety in the barbershops, and even in braids stores now. I respect it mainly because you discover so significantly from other cultures and other men and women. Which is why I appreciate it,” she suggests.
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Hunter doesn’t plan to include “salon” or “braid shop” or “barbershop” to her Eye Am Pretty brand name. Her objective is also ambitious for labels.
“My goal is to have Eye Am Quite in all 50 states, and then I would like to go intercontinental,” she says.
Her program also has a a lot more particular and critical element.
“My vision, with Eye Am Quite, is to quit and protect against teenage being pregnant, teenage suicide and teenage incarceration.”
That is why Hunter started presenting braiding courses for girls and youthful girls.
“I want to present a secure haven, a put of peace for children who truly feel that absence of adore, absence of help, absence of God, deficiency of advice,” she suggests.
“I hardly ever experienced my father. I felt a ton of discomfort, questioning why he chose not to be around. That is what pushed me to create this vision. That’s what pushed me to open up my shop.”
The mom of 3 boys — ages 4, 15 and 18 — strives to assist her students locate tranquility by the rhythm and repetition of braiding.
“Braiding is my put of peace. In crafting and making, you obtain inner peace. I wished to give that back again. When you are crafting, you might be innovating, you’re viewing lifetime elevate to an additional level. It pulls you to your higher self. It pulls me to my larger self,” she suggests.
“A lot of people today believe that daily life is about love. But to me, it really is about peace. No matter what is heading on, if I pick out to maintain peace, then that is what I give. And which is what I receive.”
Hunter expenses $350 for her braiding training course she’s running a $250 specific in honor of the new shop. Plus, she provides a voucher software for women who are encountering bullying at university or whose people just cannot afford to pay for the lessons.
“I would really like to give back to as many little ones — people — as I can,” she suggests. “When I instruct that baby, they will go dwelling and share it with their relatives. The ability, the craft, is continue to becoming unfold – even if it is to a person individual.”
Sharing a favourable sense of self, wellness and great mental health are Hunter’s best ambitions. She even has a notice on her desk asking girls and ladies to contact her if they have self-destructive views.
“Just achieve out to somebody. You are not by yourself,” Hunter says. “If we continually perform on ourselves, then we are generating this earth a much better spot.”
