My First Bride of 2015!

Sometime late last year, this lovely young lady got in touch with me about styling her hair for her big day. She wasn't entirely sure what style she would be going for so we went through a number of trials before settling on the styles.

Now as is the case with most brides these days, she was going to be changing her dress at some point during the reception but she didn't just want to change her dress, she also wanted to change her hair styles - a formal do for church and the early part of the reception and then something more 'fun' for the latter part of the day.

Clip ins - washed and conditioned

After initial consultations, we decided we'd use the 'For Kinks' Heat Free Hair Clip ins to create both styles and she went about ordering them. Going by the ones I'd used on brides in the past, I knew the color would be slightly lighter than her hair so we agreed I'd color the hair to a darker shade.

Blow Dried

The night before, I colored, washed, conditioned, detangled and stretched out the curls with a blow dryer so I would have ready clip ins for the morning of. I got to her for 8 am as her service was for noon, blow dried her hair and proceeded to insert the clip ins and style the hair.

As with most brides who have their church service slated for noon, everyone was under this false impression that there was so much time until the 11o'clock hour started to loom and then the mad scramble began.

Nkem's Hair Blow Dried

I'd had to style the back of her hair and wait for her make up artiste to apply foundation etc because her hair style would require some hair in front on the side of her forehead. When it was past 11, it was obvious I'd have to continue while her makeup was being done - so I had to stand on tip toe (she was sitting on those ridiculously high chairs MUA's use) to finish her hair trying to ensure that as I inserted pins, I wasn't moving her too much so she wouldn't get any make up smudges.

Side View

Time is literally flying by at this time and Nkem starts to countdown (5mins! 3 mins!) and she's determined that she must make church on time regardless of how far (or not) she's gone with makeup and hair because according to her 'that's not why she's getting married' (It truly warmed my heart to hear her say that)

With only one set of eyelashes fixed and half her hair done, she tells the MUA and I to come and finish up while she wears her dress and we sprint up after her carrying our tools of trade lol. Somehow while her mum, aunt and sister dress her up, Stella (of Stella's Addiction) and I manage to finish makeup and hair, while even managing to take a few pictures of our finished work!

After everyone had left, I sat down and calmly used a curling wand to curl the rest of the clips ins creating some thick juicy curls for her updo later that evening.

Juicy Curls that never were!

 Alas! When the time came at the reception, she was told that she didn't have enough time to change her hair so she changed her dress and just managed to touch up her make up while I 'sorted out' her edges and smoothed the hair down.

Thankfully, the style still went really well with her dress so it was a win situation for all!