1st Afro Shoot
The one thing I knew for sure about my book is that I wanted natural hairstyles on the cover. This was very important to me because I felt that besides the hair care information my book needed to make a case. To proof that natural hair was not difficult as it was perceived and that representative styling was possible.
So when my publisher first offered to use a meaningless colonial illustration and then an expired picture of me with extensions, I offered to take care of the cover myself. Thankfully he was open to it and allowed me to send him proposals.
Since I hardly knew any one with natural hair, I decided to the modeling myself. Naturally the first thing that came mind was an afro. The afro is my favorite hairstyle. It’s natural hair at its best and that is what I wanted to portray but that wasn’t the single reason, I choose to do an afro shoot. To be honest, it was the only style I really knew how to do. And so my first ever hair shoot became an afro shoot.
It was in October 2002 when my husband, armed with my unprofessional camera, took these pictures. Didn’t know much about modeling, didn’t try to model, I was just looking for one good shot that could be used for my book cover.
1st ever Afro Shoot
I didn’t give the overall styling idea a lot of thought. I just took my moms inherited earrings, they were also my favorite, a red strapless top, put on some eyeliner and lipstick and that was it. After I sent about 5 or 6 of these pictures to him, the publisher’s remark was that they were too stiff. Well that was too bad. My next step was to ask for pictures via http://kroeshaar.com, a site I launched to support my upcoming book and maybe being a bit more creative and hire a professional photographer.