Texture Diaries is a space for Black people today across industries to reflect on their journeys to self-enjoy, and how accepting their hair, in all its glory, performed a pivotal role in this procedure. Every week, they share their most loved hair rituals, products and solutions, and the largest lessons they’ve figured out when it arrives to affirming their magnificence and proudly owning their exclusive hair texture.
“I assume my most loved element about what I do is the escape of it all,” says Avatar: The Way of H2o star Bailey Bass. In James Cameron’s extensive-awaited sequel, the 19-year-outdated Brooklyn-based mostly actor plays Tsireya, a youthful no cost-diver and the daughter of Metkayina clan leaders Ronal and Tonowari. While Bass relishes slipping into diverse people like “Reya” (“I relate to this character a great deal,” she claims. “I’ve been informed I have a warm spirit.”) on screen, she prioritizes self-care off of it. “Confidence ebbs and flows, in particular in this marketplace, but I’ve acquired to shield my psychological well being,” she claims. “I limit a ton of points on my social media, and I’m all about spending extra time with my loved ones and acquiring a work-lifetime equilibrium.”
Another pillar for keeping grounded? Caring for her signature cloud of spirals, which were on show during her Avatar: The Way of Water press tour. “Growing up, I did not constantly see a ton of curly hair illustration, so I had a large amount of pleasurable pulling visuals of straight hair [looks] from Pinterest and recreating them as curly hairstyles,” suggests Bass, who wore everything from intricate serpentine braid appears to be to a stunning, slicked-back cascade of moist-appear curls with the enable of trustworthy hairstylist Cassandra Normil. You would not know it now, but getting pleasure in her hair and discovering relieve in her plan was a journey for Bass. “I consider my earliest recollections of my hair are of me breaking brushes,” Bass suggests with a chuckle. “I believe almost just about every actor I have spoken to has some form of hair horror story on established, which is genuinely unfortunate. I consider it’s critical that far more stylists understand to do the job distinct textures.” She credits liked types, her mom specifically, for often reminding her that her hair is wonderful.
“When I look back again, I certainly imagine about how specified microaggressions bought to me, and I wouldn’t often want to don my hair out,” she suggests. “But my mom and household normally encouraged me to, so that was useful.” Just one of her fondest memories is when her mom took her to get her hair braided at age 10. “It was a 50 percent-cornrowed, half-curly appear,” she recalls “I don’t forget another person at faculty experimented with to explain to me it did not look fantastic. But that was just one of the first periods I didn’t care what other persons imagined of my hair. I felt so attractive.”
