Texture Diaries is a space for Black people across industries to reflect on their journeys to self-love, and how accepting their hair, in all its glory, played a pivotal role in this process. Each week, they share their favorite hair rituals, products, and the biggest lessons they’ve learned when it comes to affirming their beauty and owning their unique hair texture.
It’s been three years since the British producer, singer, and DJ Aluna dropped her first solo project, Renaissance, an experimental project that aimed to push the boundaries of what dance music is considered to be. Now, Aluna is blessing us with another movement-inducing gift: her second album, MYCELiUM. “This album really feels like the peak moment on the dance floor,” Aluna—who is known for songs like “Kaleidoscope Love” during her days as one half of the dance music duo, AlunaGeorge, as well as her hit “Together” with Kaytranada—says. “It’s less about experimentation and more about that full body high. It’s the part of the night where you lose your inhibitions. There’s no messing around.” The 14-track project includes dynamic electronic tracks like “Oh the Glamour” and “Running Blind”—but her lively music isn’t the only thing that will get you going. Her green locs will leave you wanting to have more fun with your hair, too.
Much like her music, Aluna has been experimenting with her hair for decades. But it’s taken her some time to find the style that feels right for her. “I feel like I’ve definitely gone down some nightmarish roads,” she says. Aluna was pressured to shave off her hair growing up due to the lack of decent product options at the time. “And by the time it grew back out fully, I was entering the music industry and there was a lot of pressure to straighten it all the time and do keratin treatments,” she says. Over time, she began investigating going natural again. “But I remember having to figure a lot out on my own on sets,” including the “To U” and “I’m In Control” music videos, “as I couldn’t find a stylist who knew what to do with my hair and wigs are so expensive.”
Looking to figures like Kelis and Erykah Badu gave her inspiration during this period. “They are just mouthwateringly and holistically beautiful,” she says. “I love that they both tap into nature and high glamor at the same time.” Additionally, “my confidence, in general, started to shift when I began to analyze the deep-rooted effects of racism on a Black person’s mind,” she says. “I began to speak up more for myself and for the industry as a whole.”
This period of experimentation and self-exploration has led her to doing her own colorful locs– first baby blue, and now a lime green. As a form of self-care, Aluna locked them herself with a crochet hook and, so that she doesn’t have to dye her own hair, Aluna dyes hair from Fashion Dreads using the color Slime Light from Bleach London and wraps them around her own locs. For upkeep, she washes with Alikay Naturals or Le Labo shampoos. Overall? “This is the most liberating hairstyle I’ve ever had,” she says. “Being able to go to the most humid places all over the world and not have to think about my hair has been a game changer.”
On the heels of her album release, you can catch Aluna and her new ’do on tour in a city near you now through November. Before then? She’s ensuring to continue her self-care practices, wash days included. “There are so many beauty standards that we, especially as artists, feel pressure to live up to,” she says. “But I’ve been focusing on finding time to evaluate what self-care just for me looks and feels like.”
