Hair is—to borrow from PRO stylist Claudia—a fabric. It’s a canvas for self exploration. In celebration of Latinx Heritage Month, we’re introducing a new series on the K18 blog: hair stories. In this series, we’ll learn firsthand the personal meaning of hair across cultures and experiences. First up, Rosi Mercedes and Claudia Franco. 

Rosi Mercedes is a curl expert and owner of RosiCurls Salon. She was born in the Dominican Republic and lives in Florida. When we chatted during a K18 fireside for Latinx Heritage Month, we learned just how connected hair and culture are for her. 

“My hair and my culture at the beginning was hard,” Rosi, who has curly hair, remembers, “You had to look a certain way, and have straight hair to look done up. My Dominican grandmother would say I have pelo malo, or ‘bad hair.’ I was 12 when I got my first relaxer because I wanted straight hair.” 

But as an adult, Rosi took self-perception and expression into her own hands. 

“I’ve been natural for the past seven years, and I embrace that,” she says. “It’s my way of telling my grandmother that I do look good. It’s influenced my career, to help tell people their hair looks good.” 

Claudia Franco, K18’s PR + Partnerships Manager, identifies as someone who is “200%,” meaning she is 100% Mexican and 100% American. She experienced hair bias based on her roots as well.

Claudia interacted with multitudes of people who all expected her to have thick, strong ‘Hispanic or Latina hair,’—a stereotype perpetuated from the actresses in telenovelas to clients in the salon. 

“I like to stay away from saying ‘Hispanic or Latina hair,’ because my clients say they don’t have the hair they’re supposed to have,” Claudia says, and there is no one way to have hair, even within cultures. “Speaking to hair like it's a fabric helps people not be put in a bubble,” she says.  

It’s not just clients in the salon who feel like they have to fit a certain mold; Latinx stylists and students are put in a bubble, too. 

Claudia saw this bias result in a loss of career opportunities for those coming out of school.  

“The Spanish-speaking students would go to the Spanish-speaking salons. They weren’t involved in being at high-end salons in their community; there was always this separation,” she says. To her, it created a feeling of inferiority. “We’re always told we don’t belong here, and that’s ingrained in us when we grow up. You start to question your purpose of being here,” she says. 

For Rosi, she saw her multitude of talents diminished by other beauty students to a single stereotype. 

“In beauty school, everyone was like, ‘oh you’re Dominican, you know how to do a blowout,” Rosi says. She emphasizes that Dominican stylists, including herself, are a community full of creatives who can do more than just blowouts. Thankfully, she’s noticed a shift in this mindset thanks to increased representation of Dominican stylists, herself included. 

“There are really talented hairstylists out there [changing] that mentality of what a Dominican salon is,” says Rosi. “I love seeing the change and seeing clients that say ‘I’m not going to a Dominican stylist; I’m going to a hair stylist.’”