Look, we all agree—actors are beautiful people, who have access to every possible resource to look even hotter. 

But it has to be said that Anya Taylor-Joy’s hair at the Golden Globes is a religious experience. It’s a shimmering curtain of pure platinum. It looks like the moon, softly weeping. It looks like the spray from a bottle of Veuve Clicquot. Raw silk spewing from the butt of a silkworm! It’s hair that would make Barbie self-conscious. 

I mean, she looks like a mermaids who drags sailors to their deaths. 

Taylor-Joy accepted the award for Best Performance by an Actress in a Limited Series for The Queen’s Gambit, and her exceptional talent should not be overlooked just because her hair made me gasp out loud and clutch my Olaplex bottle to my heart. 

The 24-year-old was a double nominee at her first-ever Globes, for her role in Emma as well as in The Queen’s Gambit. In the first category, she lost out to Rosamund Pike in I Care A Lot. In her winning category she beat out a formidable group of actors—Cate Blanchett in Mrs. America, Daisy Edgar-Jones in Normal People, Shira Haas in Unorthodox, and Nicole Kidman in The Undoing. And her hair made me and my mom say, “Oh my god, is that her real hair???” 

Taylor-Joy has told Glamour in the past that she doesn’t own a hair-dryer, and prefers to let her hair dry up in a bun. I plan to suppress this information because I am in a codependent relationship with my Revlon One-Step, but do with it what you will. 

It’s a huge night for the side-part, embattled and weary after months of bashing by the militant middle-parters of Gen Z. Taylor-Joy’s hair isn’t only on the side but severely so, like circ-mid-2000s indie-rocker girl with a secret. Will people born years after the release of American Idiot see that having hair tumbling over half your face can be chic? It remains to be seen, but Taylor-Joy’s hair stylist, Gregory Russell, has made a strong argument for it. 

And on Instagram, her makeup artist, Georgie Eisdell, proved once again, that chess can be fashion: 

In an ideal world, women wouldn’t be responsible for growing and maintaining what is basically an extremely persnickety houseplant on their heads at all times. Growing three feet of keratin, bleaching it, and caring for it like a pedigreed dog should be an optional hobby, not a job requirement for women who want to be on screen. And yet, we enjoy it. “I don’t think my agent would let me shave my head just yet—but I’d be down to do it,” Taylor-Joy told Glamour back in March. For the record—we would love that, too. 

Yes, patriarchy is a prison, and yes, I want that prison to be made of Anya Taylor-Joy’s hair. 

Jenny Singer is a staff writer for Glamour. You can follow her on Twitter.

A Black woman’s relationship with her hair is personal. Some of us prefer the sleek look of straight hair. Others turn to weaves, wigs, or protective styles for ease of maintenance or freedom of expression. While others of us wear our kinks and coils big and bold. No one choice is “better” or “worse” than the other, and that’s the beauty of our hair: The versatile ways in which we can celebrate ourselves and our roots are endless.

But for years in Hollywood, the styles we saw told an entirely different story—one where only straight hair or long, shiny, Eurocentric-looking “beach waves” were something to covet. This, of course, was an ideal upheld by the traditional—racist—standards of beauty that have persisted in American culture for centuries. 

As Hollywood continues to diversify and more roles are made for people of color, though, things are changing. Celebrities are pushing back against prejudiced stereotypes of what “red-carpet hair” or “TV hair” should look like. “There was a moment after Grey’s [Anatomy] and Scandal and [How to Get Away With] Murder were all on the air, when we started casting and I started seeing actresses of color come in with natural hair,” said Shonda Rhimes at a Dove event for the Crown Act in 2019. “Five years ago, that never would have happened. Everybody had straight hair and looked a certain way. At a certain point in time, it just shifted. It was kind of wonderful.”

Still, it hasn’t been without a fight. Time and time again, Black celebrities make headlines as they speak out about their horror stories from behind the scenes—like being told their styles of choice are “too Black” (as recently happened to Gabrielle Union on America’s Got Talent) or being forced to treat their hair to make it more “manageable” (as happened to Revenge’s Ashley Madekwe). Even with the increasing number of Black stylists who are revolutionizing what Hollywood beauty means, there are still not enough professionals who actually know how to style Black hair. 

Just look at the comments on this viral tweet from Hair Love director Matthew A. Cherry. The responses are telling.

In a 2017 Glamour essay, Union reflected on her experiences as an up-and-coming actress. “I was like a guinea pig on set, and I didn’t yet have enough power to request a stylist who I actually wanted to touch my hair,” she wrote. “It got to the point that I would pay to have my hair done before I got to work and pray they didn’t screw it up.” 

That was years ago, and the issue hasn’t gotten much better. But one thing is sure: Celebrities will no longer sit in silence over it.

Paulina Jayne Isaac is a writer and editor based in New Jersey. Follow her on Twitter and Instagram @paulinajayne15. Additional reporting by Khaliha Hawkins. 

I first met Jen Atkin in 2015, a few short months before the New York Times would name her “the most influential hairstylist in the world.” We were crowded inside the latest hit blowout bar to open in New York City, where dozens of hairstylists had traveled from across the country—California, New Mexico, Florida—to watch her give a masterclass on Kardashian hair for a nominal fee of $450 to $1,100 a ticket. Selfie booths and mylar balloons (the same kind that had been at Kylie Jenner’s graduation that year) were set up for optimal Instagram shots, almost all of which were taken with the then 35-year-old stylist. The second she’d speak, grainy iPhone 5 screens would shoot into air to record her every move.

It was a new kind of celebrity—one that was completely unheard of for the world of celebrity hairstyling, which was known at the time for being secretive, highly competitive, and extremely male-dominated. And yet, there Atkin was, happy to extoll the hard-earned lessons she’d learned from climbing her way up, first as an assistant to Madonna’s hairstylist Andy Lecompte to personal stylist and close friend to Chrissy Teigen, Hailey Bieber, Bella and Gigi Hadid—and, of course, the Kardashian-Jenners. “I’d rather be collaborative and help other people learn what I have,” I can still picture her telling the room. “As women, we have to help each other out, right?” 

Five years later, trying to explain the influence Atkin has had on the hair industry is like trying to describe the Kardashians’ impact on pop culture. Her DNA is so ingrained in the trends we covet and the conversations we have on Instagram, it’s impossible to imagine what the world of hair would be like without her. She’s gone beyond being the most sought-after hairstylist to becoming a bonafide business mogul as the founder of Ouai, a hair care staple in Insta-girls’ shower caddies, and Mane Addicts, a community for hairstylists and enthusiasts. 

So it’s tough to think her fateful breakthrough almost didn’t happen had not she not listened to her instincts.

“I had an agent who highly advised me to not work with the Kardashians because they were reality stars, and everyone kind of turned their nose up at that back then,” she says of her early days working with the famous family. “I was just starting out and didn’t have the grounds to be telling my agent at that point [who I wanted to work with], but I really enjoyed working with them and said I’d like to continue on their projects.” 

It’s not hard to see why she had such an instant connection to Kim, Kourtney, and Khloé. In many ways, it almost felt like Atkin was a sixth sister of the Kar-Jenner clan—obviously in that she had the hair (her signature perfectly imperfect beach waves), but also in her personable, tell-it-like-it-is candor that will have you hanging on her every word. She’s as honest about the demanding work that goes into building a business as she is about her own beauty routine (yes, she’s had eyebrow implants and a nose job, and, yes, she’s talked about them on Instagram). 

Now, at 40, she’s on to her next chapter: as author of Blowing My Way to the Top: How to Break the Rules, Find Your Purpose, and Create the Life and Career You Deserve, a part-autobiography, part self-help guide that officially hits shelves today, December 8. In it, she leaves no topic untouched or filtered: money, power, or the facade of “balancing it all,” which she says she’s still learning to take her own advice on.