African American hair care is notoriously expensive. In Los Angeles, a set of professionally braided extensions can cost $250 to $600.
Hair is considered a major tenet of Black identity and self-expression, and the rising prices make this cultural necessity inaccessible for many. This is especially true for Black students at some of the predominantly white and Asian universities dotting Los Angeles, where a shoestring student budget doesn’t support steep salon costs.
So where do students go?
Dorm rooms.
Black populations at some of the flagship LA area universities like UCLA, USC, and LMU are 6-8%. Among these slim percentages is a network of unlicensed hair stylists converting their dorms into salon spaces.
Alyssa Burton, a UCLA junior majoring in Gender Studies and African American Studies, is one of several local unlicensed hair braiders working out of their dorm rooms and student apartments. Burton and other dorm braiders promote their work on Instagram under school tags like #uscbraider and #uclabraider. Burton describes herself as a self-taught stylist who started doing her own hair to avoid steep salon prices.
“It's very expensive to get your hair done. So I decided to learn how to do my own hair. And then my friends started to really like it, so I decided to start doing my friends' hair. And now I'm like, I can make this little side hustle,” says Burton.
Her Westwood single bedroom doubles as her studio. As she braids, clients sit at the same pencil-and-notebook-covered desk she uses for school. Styling tools and hair products cover the edge of her bed.
Burton leans in to section a client’s scalp as she braids. Photo by Kelsey Ngante.
The neighborhood of Westwood hovers at approximately 4% Black, which Burton says makes the area a “hair care desert” requiring students to trek across town.
“I feel like we all definitely value our hair. … We don't have a lot of beauty supply stores here. We don't have a lot of resources … nor do we have the time, being on quarter systems,” says Burton.
Even in more ethnically diverse neighborhoods like South Central, near USC, professional braiding services can cost well over $300. Burton only charges around $180. She says she understands why students spend so much on their hair.
“When I get my hair done, the world is great again,” says Burton.
Caitlin Jones, a third-year sociology major and one of Burton’s clients, says the same.
“It feels good. I love walking into a classroom [with my hair done] ... even though it's not a lot of Black people that are in my classrooms. … It just makes me feel like oh, yeah, that's me. That's Caitlin right there,” says Jones.
Dr. Marne Campbell chairs the African American Studies department at LMU, and she says the consistent demand for Black hair maintenance allows prices to soar.
“I think now, the market is probably getting saturated. However, everybody understands, and I'm saying the makers of these products understand that Black people will pay,” says Campbell.
Fourth-year neuroscience major and dorm room braider Funmi Baruwa says students also offer lower costs to promote connection within the Black student body. She requested that her school remain unnamed to avoid potential conflict with her housing contract.
Baruwa works from her living room in a shared four-bedroom university-owned apartment. The school-gifted wooden dining table doubles as her salon station. Baruwa says she doesn’t see a professional hairdressing future beyond campus grounds, but enjoys the flexibility of being able to make money while hanging out with other students.
“I feel like our Black community is pretty tight-knit … so if there's a braider on campus, chances are they're probably servicing a lot [of] the Black community in our school,” says Baruwa.
Funmi Baruwa (standing) braids from her living room. Photo by Kelsey Ngante
One of Baruwa’s clients – second-year UCLA urban planning major Sabine Goldberg – says being one of few Black students initially felt isolating: “I'm [from] out of state, and I came into the school not knowing anybody, and I was in a classic dorm [sharing a] bathroom with like 40 people. … So I started asking around, ‘Is there any way I can come back to your room and get something [done]?’”
Shared cultural necessities like getting her hair done helped connect her with other students.
“There's so few of us … [so] everybody really looks out for each other,” says Goldberg.