A few weeks ago, multi-award-winning actress Lupita Nyong’o went bald and shaved off her hair.
At the time, we thought she was probably auditioning for a new role. It turns out she wanted to enjoy a bald head and make art.
The “Black Panther” star shared pictures of her painted head, and it’s so beautiful. She said after being invited to an Indian wedding, she wanted to honour and celebrate Indian culture.
She wore a borrowed sari and jewellery from Misha Japanwala, and to complete her look, she contacted a Henna designer to paint her head.
Her Henna was painted using Jagua, a natural skin dye from South America by Sabeen Marghoob.
“Sabeen had never designed for a head before; I had never done such a thing before either. My only prompt to her was that I wanted a widow’s peak (homage to the Bindhi, Borla/Maang tikka), the rest was all her innovation. She suggested #jagua, a natural dye from the jagua fruit of South America that would be dark enough to give a good contrast to my dark skin,” Nyong’o says.
She says it took 24 hours for the dye to appear on her head, and when it did, she was super excited.
“I was simply moved. It was beautiful. It was bold and elegant; it had a point of view. We had not played it safe, and it had paid off. And I had found a new way to express myself without hair!”
Nyong’o encourages others to seek beauty in new ways.
Read the latest issue of IOL Fashion digital magazine here.