Addicted to Hair Trend Stories

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As we grow old and grey on the Internet, one thing will remain the same. There will always be trend stories about ladies' hair, whether it's about bangs, or lack of bangs, or partial Caesar-type bangs, or short new gamine cuts (how French!), or updos, or long-dos, or color (ombre, remember ombre?). There is no end to what women, and sometimes men, too, will do with their hair, and no end, either, to what media will do to cover those hair trends.

Today in the New York Post there is a lengthy, flowing, shiny, gorgeous, silky, perfectly kink-free piece about how ladies are obsessed—obsessed!—with getting their hair dried professionally by professional hair fixers. Adjacent to this MANE EVENT is another piece about how Nora Ephron turned the writer of that story onto blowouts and that writer never looked back. This is not one but two stories in the same paper about ladies and their hair proclivities. It's a hair-miracle, a double-whammy of hair (or Murdoch has stock in Louis Licari?).

Doree Lewak writes the main piece about this subset of society, the "blowout junkie," going deep inside the netherworld of women getting their hair did, stopping only at getting her hair did herself (or did she? How could a woman resist? Temptations are high at the salon, the hairdryers so near, so hot, so volumizing). She talked to at least four women who are getting blowouts all the time, sinking tens of thousands of dollars into their tresses. How far has this addiction gotten? Do self-professed "blowout junkies" need a hairtervention? Let's check the signs in Lewak's piece:

Does one feel she really needs the blowout, in order to feel good?

“I feel powerful and beautiful when I leave here,” says the Chelsea-based blow-dry addict Kate Herman, 29, who works in advertising.

If one goes too long without a blowout, does one become anxious?

“Now I feel like I can go out and go through the day,” [Gabby Fraenkel] declares — but not before booking an appointment for next Wednesday.

Is one the blowout, herself? Can one imagine herself sans blowout?

“I can’t remember the last time I washed my hair. I’ve been here every week twice a week for five years. This defines me; I’m so known for it,” says [Lauren] Pressman.

Does one's life revolve around blowouts—thinking about them, planning them, recovering from them—to the exclusion of other activities?

“I have to pick and choose,” explains Herman. “On a Thursday night a few weeks ago, I opted out of dinner with my girlfriends at the Lion, but, come the weekend, my hair will look amazing.”

Another Gurgov devotee, NYU senior Jennifer Chaplin of Kips Bay, doesn’t know on which coast she wants to live when she finishes school, but she does know where she’ll be next Tuesday. And Friday.

Does one feel ashamed about her addiction to blowouts?

“Nobody talks about it, but it’s this culture of girls who always get their hair blown out,” [Pressman] continues. “I started doing it before it was acceptable. Back then, I was embarrassed to tell people. I made [around $50,000] when I first came here — not that I make that much more now.”

How much money is one really going to spend on all of these blowouts? 

Fraenkel spends more than 15 percent of her $50,000 salary on biweekly $40-per-visit appointments plus house calls from a hairstylist who charges $65 to cure New York women’s “frizz emergencies.”

Can the blowout junkie acknowledge the addiction?

After calculating that her blowout addiction has cost her $10,000 over the years, [Pressman] pauses: “It’s scary to think about, but it’s worth it. It’s definitely an addiction: all the compliments and looking good, it spoils you,” she admits. “I’ve never had a guy compliment my shoes, but a million guys have complimented my hair."

You may be a blowout junkie if any of the above is true. Do your hair accordingly. I guess.

This article is from the archive of our partner The Wire.