Taraji P. Henson is determined to take back laundry day.
While isolating at home at the beginning of the 2020 coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic, she noticed that more and more people were struggling with their mental health and sense of well-being. I did. She didn’t want washing her hair to be a multi-step chore, but rather an opportunity to slow down and love herself.
“We had to love ourselves or we were doomed. There was no other choice,” Henson said of the process. “We were disgusted with ourselves all day every day, and that’s when we realized, ‘Wow, we’re really taking this as a chore.'” And now, self-care is more important than ever. …Maybe now is a good time to try changing that narrative. ”
The Oscar-nominated actor never expected to launch a hair care line. The actress, best known for her roles in the movies Baby Boy, Hustle and Flow, Hidden Figures and the hit TV show Empire, launched a campaign in 2018 to focus on destigmatizing mental illness. He founded the Boris Lawrence Henson Foundation. Increased care and access to care in Black communities.
In 2020, Henson channeled her decades-long passion for hair into TPH by Taraji, a vegan hair care line focused on scalp health and all hair textures. TPH is now a staple in black women’s bathrooms, including shampoo, conditioner, edge control gel, curl cream, hair oil, and mist bottles.
Henson is one of several black women in Hollywood to launch hair care products in recent years. Her other works include Pattern by Tracee Ellis Ross, Sienna Naturals by Issa Rae and Hannah Diop, Flawless by Gabrielle Union, and Her 4U by Tia Mowry. This is part of a boom in the beauty industry, which has often benefited from black purchasing power, but only a minority of black business owners have been successful.
According to a 2022 McKinsey report on industry representation, Black consumers spent $6.6 billion on beauty products in 2021 (11.1% of the total U.S. beauty market), but still face frustrating shopping with limited product choice. I was facing an experience.
According to the report, only 4% to 7% of beauty brands carried in stores are black-owned. According to the report, Black-owned or founded brands contributed just 2.5% of industry revenue and the median amount of venture capital funding raised was $13 million, compared to $20 million for non-Black brands. That’s what it means.
Henson said she had big ideas about hairstyles and couldn’t “sit down” growing up and rely on her mother to style her hair. Her Henson was sensitive, and her sensitivity often irritated her mother, making her “dramatic” in the process. By the time she was in ninth grade, Ms. Henson had cut her hair drastically and her mother told her not to continue styling her hair. But Henson said that was her intention all along.
She described her mother as a fly-on-the-wall woman who would put on makeup, eyeshadow and eyeliner and watch her go to work or go out with her girlfriends.
“I started doing it because I wanted to do that and be girly and wear makeup and perfume and all that,” Henson said. “She was my inspiration.”
Henson started getting perms when she was 6 years old, but as she grew older, she became more conscious of keeping her hair healthy. She tries not to overprocess her hair when using relaxers, and sometimes she would wait six weeks or she would wait two months before receiving her relaxers. When she moved to Los Angeles, one of the first things she did was look for someone to give her a perm.
During the filming of Baby Boy, Henson said she was embarrassed to have her hair stylist see her roots because she didn’t touch up her makeup. However, the stylist assured her that her hair was beautiful and convinced her to start growing out her natural hair without a relaxer. She said Ms. Henson still held her hair back and it wasn’t until she was 30 that she wore it her natural hair, including curls. At the time, she hated her natural hair and thought it was “unmanageable”.
“I’ll never forget the first time I had to do my own hair,” Henson said. “I was crying in front of the mirror. The brush and comb got stuck in my hair.”
Another Hollywood stylist told Henson to go to her salon. Henson said her experience “set her free.” She received a kit of natural hair products for her use. That’s how she fell in love with styling her natural hair. Currently, she refuses to put chemicals in her hair or dye her hair. She loves the curl pattern and curls.
“I love my hair. The tighter and stronger the curls, the better the twist-outs,” Henson said with a laugh. “I mean, I have a girlfriend who has loose curls and she can’t do twist-outs and she’s like, ‘You can’t do that with my hair,’ and I’m like, ‘I get it.'”
Kim Kimble, a hairstylist who has worked with Hollywood stars such as Henson, Union, Vanessa Williams, Kerry Washington, Garcelle Beauvais and Zendaya, says relaxers were popular at the beginning of her career. Lately, she has been looking at a combination of natural hairstyles and wigs. She said she’s not surprised that Henson developed her own hair products because she “definitely believes in taking care of herself and taking care of her hair.” Working with his customers, Kimble began creating hair care products not found on the market and eventually launched his own line.
While the use of natural hair products was on the rise before the pandemic, many salons were unable to offer remote services or went out of business completely during the pandemic. Because of this, clients had to figure out how to care for their natural hair and find protective styles such as wigs.
“I think we’ve always been creative with hair, depending on the hair type,” Kimble said. “I feel like we had to find options and things to do. I think the natural hair movement has taken a big step forward in some ways. I really love that movement.”
She said there are several reasons why Black Hollywood has changed the way it looks at hair, including the rise of natural hair influencers on YouTube and social media, the increase in products available, and the impact of relaxants on long-term health. He said there were concerns about this.
Kimble said a new generation of Hollywood stars are entering the industry hoping to embrace their natural hair and are similarly bothered by having to straighten their hair or wear it a certain way. No, he said. She said more TV stations are allowing stars to wear their natural hair and are aware of the potential backlash when Black people try to decide how their hair should be styled. .
“I think we’re all looking at ourselves in a different way now, seeing ourselves as beautiful, having beautiful skin and beautiful hair,” said Kimble, head of hair on HBO’s “Euphoria.” “Now you can see people who know how to handle it and are actually doing it, and I think it’s becoming popular.”
Henson marvels at how far hair’s natural movement has come. Gone are the days when you could only choose from a few types of shampoo. Black girls and women now have entire aisles of products owned or created by Black people.
“We have proven our power in the economy because we were forgotten and because we started inventing things like slaves. That’s why someone said, ‘The black people invented it.’ I’m never surprised,” Henson said. “Nobody cared about our hair but us, and now all of a sudden they’ve got all these big brands and now they’re showing natural[hair]commercials. became.”
Henson said she’s happy to see Black women entering the hair care industry and demonstrating “the deep economic power that we have as Black women.” Don’t move without us. ”
