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10 years ago today, Beyoncé’s sixth album Lemonade was born. While the beauty looks in the visuals spanned braids, from Nefertiti-inspired to jumbo twists and cornrows, one specific look took on another life. To the point, it was named after the album itself: Lemonade braids.
“Braids are big in this section,” Beyoncé’s Lemonade hairstylist Kim Kimble told The Cut in 2016 when the album first released. “She started wearing cornrows years ago and it has been a popular style for a while.” While she wore long, blonde straight backs on the album cover, Lemonade braids are the side-swept braids seen in songs like “Sorry” and the album’s final track, “Formation”.
While Lemonade braids are her most popular protective style yet, it’s not the first time she’s worn influential braid looks. In the early aughts of the 2000s, the then Destiny’s Child member wore micro-cornrows and pick-and-drop braids as her signature. She retired her braids temporarily in the late 2000s and early 2010s, which made her Lemonade era even more impactful.
After the album released, she wore one jumbo braid in a high ponytail to a TIDAL X red carpet and frequented fishtail braids, like at the 2016 MTV Video Music Awards. Then, for last year’s Cowboy Carter roll-out, she put her hair in silver micro braids in one shot. And, in another, she’s mounted on a horse in a braided bead bang, proving her braid moments aren’t limited to Lemonade.
In honor of the 10th anniversary of ‘Lemonade’, here are 10 times Beyoncé delivered iconic braid inspiration since 2016.