Let's start with a number that should stop you mid-scroll: twenty years. That's how long it's been since Sephora put a hair extension brand on its shelves. Two decades of skincare drops, fragrance launches, and a thousand different serums promising to fix your face, and not a single braiding hair bundle in sight, until now. Ruka Hair, a Black-owned biotech beauty brand out of London, just broke that streak. And it didn't sneak in through some quiet, forgettable soft-launch ei

Just for a moment, let's face it: no one tells you that the actual work of getting braids takes place before you even sit down in the chair. You book the appointment, imagine yourself leaving with knotless box braids so clean they appear to have been produced by a computer, and then you turn up with damp, only partly untangled hair, the bag of unused braiding hair still in the plastic, and a stylist who is now quietly working out how many hours this appointment is actually go

Just for a moment, let's be honest. You didn't choose bohemian braids intending to spend your Tuesday night carefully unpicking each hair knot as if you were defusing a bomb. You picked them because they're beautiful, with that loose, wavy, effortlessly undone look that communicates "I woke up like this," even though you, in fact, did not.

Let's clear one thing up right away: the fact that you have braids doesn't mean you can go without washing your hair for two months or more without washing your hair. I know, I know, wasn't that the idea, huh? You could set it and then forget about it, just as if your scalp were a slow cooker. Unfortunately, your scalp doesn't function like a crockpot. It sweats, it secretes oil, it picks up lint from your hoodie and dust from your commute, and none of that vanishes simply be