Ep. 208: The complexities and beauty of textured hair; why tech and data is so important with Texture Gap creator and Carra founder Winnie Awa

This week’s guest is the wonderful, award-winning entrepreneur and hair expert Winnie Awa. In 2020, London-based Winnie founded Carra, an online platform powered by data to give people with textured hair the world over the advice and product recommendations they really need. More recently, this June, Winnie launched The Texture Gap, an AI-driven report from Carra Labs that highlights the lack of consideration, innovation and awareness around Type 4C hair, the tightest curl pattern. In this conversation we discuss the intricacies of black hair, why brands need to wake up to the needs of people with textured hair; why some of us are going back to relaxing our hair and our right to choose exactly what we do with our hair. This is a conversation that everyone can learn from; from brand leaders to parents who are considering the styling options for their children so don’t hesitate to share this with anyone who might benefit. I really hope you enjoy this one as much as we did and I’d love for you to take part in the poll over on Spotify if that’s where you’re listening. Feel free to get in touch with feedback over in the DMs on Twitter or Instagram @beautymepodcast or email me [email protected]. Don’t forget, you’ll also find some video clips of our chat on Instagram @beautymepodcast or you can see it on TikTok @charissekenion. Did you know that you can now listen to BeautyMe on Amazon Music? Wherever you listen, I would really love if you could hit that subscribe or like button. Feel free to leave a 5-star rating over on Spotify, or write a review on Apple Podcasts. Don’t forget there’s also my newsletter beautymenotes.substack.com where I often share imagery from each episode. See you next time! Cover photo: Charisse Kenion Links Download The Texture Gap: https://carra.co/texturegap Winnie on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/winnieawa/ Carra on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/heycarra/ Read more about The Texture Gap: https://www.harpersbazaar.com/uk/beauty/hair/a44254061/texture-gap-type-4-hair-report/ Listen to The Hair Lab: https://open.spotify.com/show/5HbDzUfLcQayqRhxdvOvys?si=b5707555715c494c The Texture Gap in Vogue: https://www.vogue.co.uk/article/how-to-grow-afro-hair BeautyMe on Twitter: https://twitter.com/beautymepodcast BeautyMe on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/beautymepodcast/ BeautyMe newsletter: https://beautymenotes.substack.com BeautyMe on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@charissekenion BeautyMe on ShopMy: https://shopmy.us/beautyme