Neat parts and beautiful braids are the precision that Mira McDavitt and Sylvia Akanno aim for. Both self taught, they provide braiding services for UC Berkeley students and the local community.<\/p>\n
McDavitt and Akanno first practiced braiding on themselves in middle school and continued into high school before launching their businesses in their freshman year in the dorms while in the African American Theme Program, or Afro Floor.<\/p>\n
\u201cAround three months in, everybody\u2019s braids were looking old, and would say, \u2018Oh my gosh, I need my hair done,\u2019\u201d Akanno said. \u201cThey couldn\u2019t find anybody, so they started asking me, \u2018Who did your hair? Who did your hair?\u2019 I did it myself.\u201d<\/p>\n
The first time Akanno braided someone else\u2019s hair, it took 24 hours and she only charged $60, but her skills began to grow after more clients and practice. Now, she has gained more than 700 followers, along with a loyal clientele.<\/p>\n
The difficulty her peers faced trying to find braiders in the area is what drove Akanno to start her business.<\/p>\n
\u201cA lot of people in the Bay charge up to $1,000, which I think is absolutely crazy,\u201d Akanno said. \u201cAnd then they\u2019re far out in the Bay in Hayward or Pittsburgh \u2026 these are college students. They don\u2019t have a car at this time. They can\u2019t really make that commute.\u201d<\/p>\n
Akanno added that she typically spends six to eight hours braiding a client\u2019s hair and described the end result as a \u201cbeautiful masterpiece.\u201d She loves taking her time to ensure her work is \u201cperfection,\u201d and she said she takes extra time to ensure her parting is crisp with no flyaways.<\/p>\n
Aside from braiding as a business, McDavitt defines it as an art and outlet that has translated to her pursuit of a career in psychology. Currently, she\u2019s working with a campus research lab that combines her passion for psychology with braiding.<\/p>\n
Focusing on externalizing and addiction mechanisms in the Black community, McDavitt said her lab has developed a braiding protocol for coarse and curly hair that has enabled more Black participants to be included in electroencephalogram studies. These studies test the electrical activity in people\u2019s brains by attaching metal electrodes to the scalp.<\/p>\n
McDavitt recalled a fond memory of when she was braiding her housemate\u2019s hair that bonded them closer together. The braiding session took almost 30 hours and required a trip to the beauty supply store halfway through.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a personal, personal experience,\u201d McDavitt said. \u201cThe braiders have the opportunity to open up and be your most vulnerable self because your hair is so intimate.\u201d<\/p>\n
McDavitt added that she loves to paint and draw, but it gets to be \u201cvery messy\u201d as a full-time student with extracurriculars. However, she finds braiding a more accessible and rewarding art form.<\/p>\n
Braiding has taught Akanno to not underestimate herself. While her braiding business was difficult to manage at first, she continued on. Akanno added that braiding allowed her to imagine more for herself, being able to better envision her goal of being a dermatologist researcher.<\/p>\n
McDavitt said braiding has made her feel more connected to her ancestry and her Blackness, particularly being from Humboldt County, California, a rural area where she didn\u2019t engage with the Black community on a daily basis.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s so important to emphasize that braiding is an art for sure,\u201d McDavitt said. \u201cIt\u2019s such a foundational way that Black women are able to express their creative self in both wearing the style or doing it. \u2026 It\u2019s an art medium that should be normalized.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Neat parts and beautiful braids are the precision that Mira McDavitt and Sylvia Akanno aim for. Both self…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":191918,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[89801,89800,89993,89991,143,145,144,89992],"class_list":{"0":"post-191917","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-oakland","8":"tag-african-american-theme-program","9":"tag-afro-floor","10":"tag-keanan-joyner","11":"tag-mira-mcdavitt","12":"tag-oakland","13":"tag-oakland-headlines","14":"tag-oakland-news","15":"tag-sylvia-akanno"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/191917","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=191917"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/191917\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/191918"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=191917"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=191917"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=191917"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}