Michelle Johnson, who got her first chemical relaxer at six years old, committed to stop straightening her hair after university. During that journey, she's learned to embrace her natural curls and explore the endless possibilities of protective styles. "It's been four years since I've big chopped," Johnson tells Refinery29 in our latest episode of Hair Me Out. Since then, Johnson has experimented with tons of looks, except one: faux locs.
"Faux locks is not something that I've been able to do myself," she tells us. So, she enlisted the help of professional stylist Koni Bennett to make her thigh-length loc dreams a reality. To start the process, Bennett intricately braided Johnson's hair into small box braids to lay a neat foundation. Then, she crocheted pre-twisted locs to Johnson's hair and completed the look by wrapping pieces of curly hair around each loc.
The entire process took roughly 6-8 hours, but Johnson's transformation was well worth the wait. Click play to see her new "goddess" look come to life.