How viral hair artist Kayra Theodore turned childhood bows into a manifesto on freedom

TheGrio...

Kayra Theodore’s hair show, “Untied,” reimagines the hairstyles that once made her a target into symbols of freedom, healing & creativity.

The act of sitting down for an elder to detangle your hair is a ritual that Black children, especially Black girls, learn at a very young age. But while the comb and brush work loosen the knots hidden in their curls and coils, another kind of knot can quietly begin to form beneath the surface. A tension that takes root in the child’s subconscious, and tightens slowly as they grow and come to navigate a world that isn’t always kind to natural hair.

For hair artist Kayra Theodore, the tensions began in middle school when she became the only Black girl in her class. And now at 27, she’s using her artistry to unpack her journey, loving her hair and self-expression, a story that inspired her first hair show “Untied” hosted in partnership with the Instagram Draft Fund, which helps creatives turn amtious ideas into a reality.

“Untied has a lot of layers. Some you could visually see, and others, maybe I would have to go in-depth and tell the backstory for you to really grasp everything,” Theodore told theGrio. ““My family is from Haiti. My parents immigrated from Haiti, and then I was born here in New York. And within Haitian culture, there are a lot of values. So one thing that they wanted my sister and me to [carry] into American culture was very much about appearance and really just trying to be the best we can be, so that we can be accepted into society and have a leg up, in a sense. So, going to school, my mom would just make sure that my sister and I were pristine.”

In addition to freshly ironed clothes, shined shoes, etc., Theodore remembers hair bows, barrettes, and clips as a key part of their morning routine. And in elementary school, the hair accessories didn’t phase her or her classmates. However, when she transitioned to middle school, the accessories her mother understood as symbols of care became the source of kids picking on her.

“At the time, being so young and impressionable, I wanted to fit in. That’s all I ever wanted,” she said, recalling the ritual she adopted to appease the bullying. “I would go to school, get off the bus, go to the bathroom, take out the bows and the clips and everything, and try to put [it] into a ponytail that I felt would resemble them, so that I could fit in.”

And at the end of the school day, she’d go home and hope that her mom had already left for work by the time she arrived because she couldn’t bring herself to explain why the thing her family valued was the thing making her a target.

And years later, she put that very hairstyle on a runway.

“With Untied, I wanted to reclaim what students made me feel embarrassed about,” Theodore shared. “I can almost give it a new meaning through my artistry and showcase that as my growth and evolution as an individual with my identity.”

Kayra Theodore presents “Untied” (Photo: Quacey Bull)

So, she opened her first hair show with a little girl whose hair was modeled exactly the way her mother did it in middle school, and who was made fun of. From there, the show went on to showcase various styles featuring bows, with each one becoming progressively complex, reflecting her journey as an artist.

Through the years, Theodore has gone viral for her unique, avant-garde braid styles. However, she revealed that braiding was a talent she stumbled upon. Recalling a hairstylist denying her request for jumbo box braids one summer, Theordore decided to figure it out herself with the help of Youtube and some patience.

“I wasn’t thinking this is the end-all be-all,” she explained, reflecting on how that one decision led to a braiding business in college and now a hair show. “Naturally, because I always gravitated towards unique styles, I would do unique styles on myself. But it was just something fun. It was my way of expressing myself and just having full autonomy on how I show up in the world.”

And after, 30 models walked down the runway with hair sculptures crafted by Theodore, makeup by her sister Laura Theodore and looks styled by Kyrie Thompson, the “Untied” creator concluded the show with a full circle moment. She revealed to theGrio that the little girl who appeared at the beginning of the show was a twin.

“I wanted her identical twin to come out at the end of the show, and her hair is pretty much exactly the same, but I added just some creative swirls around the bows to almost show this is who I would have been if I were free to be myself and free to embrace my uniqueness,” she shared. “So it’s subtle, but that was the biggest thing. I needed that moment so that people could kind of see the comparison. It’s very slight, but to me that was the most impactful part of the runway show.”

And now that she has untied the knots of her complex relationship with hair and self-expression, Theodore hopes to thread those lessons of self-expression into future ventures. From hair shows that she dreams will one day appear on the Council of Fashion Designers of America fashion week calendars to creating a comic book where the hero’s superpower is linked to her hair, the young creative sees no bounds to her future.

“I have a lot of goals. I have a lot of visions,” she concluded. “I feel like Untied is a little snippet.”