Spiral of Success

There was a little girl,
Who had a little curl,
Right in the middle of her forehead.
When she was good,
She was very, very good,
But when she was bad, she was horrid.

The little girl who inspired that nursery rhyme may have been upset with the very thing that made her memorable – not her naughty behavior, but a tight spiral of hair.

In which case, contemporary hair product entrepreneurs Wendi Levy and Kim Etheredge would have been happy to help her out. The two women created a custom line of hair formulas for biracial consumers after years of experimenting with over-the-counter products aimed at mainstream scalps.

Both are biracial, which is immediately seen in their company name, Mixed Chicks. Kim’s father is an African-American married to an Anglo woman, while Wendi’s African-American mother is wedded to her father, who is Jewish.

For New Jersey girl Wendi, managing her hair was not so hard, as her African-American mother was very experienced in using products to “straighten” Wendi’s curly locks. Blow-drying, hot combing, processing are all methods that are still used today. “She knew how to deal with coarse hair,” Wendi recalls. “I had a lot of brothers and sisters and she took care of our hair.”

Kim grew up in Los Angeles where the sunshine and outdoor activities are revered. She also struggled to manage her curls, especially since her mother didn’t have a clue about what worked and what didn’t. “The West Coast is a beautiful place, but it is hard on hair,” Kim writes at the duo’s Web site, MixedChicks.net. “Participating in all of these everyday activities was a privilege, but try blow-drying your hair to style — now that was a nuisance, not to mention bad for my hair. In a place obsessed with looks, my life was hell.”

As often is the case, hairstyles of the times were not suitable for the coils of hair Wendi had, but being fashionable can be very tempting. “I insisted in getting a haircut in the sixth or seventh grade—with feathered wings,” Wendi says, adding that her mom “kept telling me my hair wouldn’t do that.” Undeterred, Wendi’s hair was cut into lots of layers. When Wendi tried to duplicate her salon look at home, she found it impossible: “I realized that I had a big curly Afro.”

Time for a reality check.

Wendi began blending products such as hair gel and curl activator to use on her curls. Even with her mother’s help, she began to realize that the daily effort to tame her curls was a never-ending battle, just like it was for her mom. “To me she was a slave to her hair and I just never wanted to spend that much time on my hair,” Wendi says. “Even though people say my hair looks better straight, I spend more time on things that make me feel better.”

While Wendi was beginning to mix it up, Kim also was looking for hair products that would address the rough texture and dryness of curly hair. The two would later meet and discover they were both in search of the same results: soft curls. They collaborated on hair products aimed specifically at “combination hair,” beginning with a moisturizing conditioner. Friends and family urged them to start a business, and Mixed Chicks was born. The online company now sells internationally, but Wendi says they still hand-pack every order to send out to customers.

As many who are of African-American descent can tell you, curly hair is often seen as a racial marker. Even the words used to describe curly hair often carry a negative connotation: kinky, snarled, knotted, frizzy, wild or coarse.

With the “blending” of races, biracial people are blurring the stereotypical forms of attractiveness, knocking big holes in the mainstream perception of what is beautiful (straight hair) and what isn’t (curly hair).

Today’s fashion designers have begun to showcase the different look of biracial models with naturally curly hair – a signal that a shift in the American public’s perception about curliness has started to occur.

For example, there are many African and African-American models with natural, short hair, Wendi says, who “look absolutely beautiful.”

This shake-up in perception can lead to some identity confusion for both curly-hair wearers and observers, but not for Wendi and Kim, who accept their curls for the naturally beautiful hair it is. “I think that would be a great thing to come up with a new vocabulary and describe curly hair in more positive terms,” Wendi says. She advises people to look at their hair as beautiful in its own right and to ignore the negative words used to describe curly hair: “Don’t allow those terms that exist to affect you. Change your perception.”