Kat Graham’s natural hair story was all about saying 'I'm here for myself'

Watching beauty routines during this pandemic can introduce new tips and tricks into your own life, but for actress Kat Graham it's about much more than that. Graham gifted us with an early Christmas present in August when she gave us her natural hair routine for Vogue, which showed the Vampire Diaries actress embracing her beautiful, natural afro.

In the video, she said she'd learned a lot during quarantine (as have the rest of us) because she hasn't had a team of hairstylists working with her. Kat revealed that before quarantine, she would leave her hair in cornrows and throw on a wig because "most of the jobs that I had done as an actress wanted a certain kind of look." The 31-year-old actress said it has been "really therapeutic" to wear her hair "really, really big" and shared some tips on achieving that big hair status.

Kat spoke with etalk's Traci Melchor recently about that move of embracing her natural hair as part of an ongoing journey of self-acceptance and the significance of sharing her natural hair beauty routine for Vogue. While speaking with Kat, Traci thanked her for the Vogue video and Kat thanked Traci for rocking her own "fabulous curls," adding: "what a blessing on this world that you have bestowed upon us!"

"There is so much that comes with self-acceptance, and a huge part of that is our hair," Kat said. "To feel like you are still oppressed stylistically in some way affects your subconscious of your worth, and that is something that we really have to tackle."

In her Vogue beauty routine, Kat admitted that quarantine has completely changed her and she doesn't even know if she would have shown her afro to her fans before learning to love her hair. She told Traci that now she's willing to try any style as long as it's curly.

"I love my curls. I love my curls now. I'm like, 'How do I make 'em bigger?'" she said. "I'm like, 'Here's my hair! And what can I do? Okay, I'm going to do loose curls; I'm going to do tight curls; I'm going to do, like, the biggest afro; I'm going to look like Angela Davis!'"

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Black women are so often told explicitly or implicitly through popular culture that they have to change their natural hair to meet the social norms and expectations dictated by whiteness. California made history in July 2019 when it became the first state in the United States to ban employers and school officials from discriminating against people based on their natural hair. The Crown act made it illegal to enforce grooming policies against hairstyles such as braids, twists, afros and locks, but there's still a long way to go in North America.

Kat explained that the biggest part of embracing your natural hair is how it teaches self-love in ways you never could have imagined. "That's something that we have to be brave enough to say, 'This is who I am,' and once you say 'This is who I am,' take it or leave it," Kat added. "I'm here for my hair but the deepest thing about that is I'm here for myself. That's what hair for me is. It's saying I'm here for myself, and you got to be here for yourself first in this life for real, for real."

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