Nicki Minaj was a little wobbly Sunday as she tiptoed on stage in sky-high patent leather heels to accept her first American Music Award for best rap/hip-hop artist; but her hair, a cascade of fluffy pink pin curls, was pure perfection.
In the pantheon of new pop stars known for their signature style, Minaj is taking hair to new heights.
Yes, Katy Perry rocks pink hair, too. And Lady Gaga has had hers tied in a bow. But rapper Minaj has a wardrobe of more than 500 wigs that could rival Marie Antoinette, and each and every one of them is made by Atlanta resident Terrence Davidson.
The two-year partnership has yielded creations ranging from a long leopard print ’do to a relatively tame platinum blond Barbie flip. The only constant in Minaj’s wigs are bangs, a carryover from pre-fame days that Davidson decided worked well.
Davidson’s creations have inspired Halloween wigs, wig watch photo galleries online and possibly a reality series. Though it all seems to have happened overnight, Davidson, 41, has slogged for nearly 20 years to make his dream of being a celebrity stylist a reality.
His humble beginnings as a business management student eventually gave way to cosmetology, a field Davidson figured he would be in just long enough to make money to do something else.
“I just wanted to make money and invest in other things,” Davidson said in an interview hours before jetting to Los Angeles for the AMAs. “But as I got older, I realized with hair, each year I am taking a new path. Now, I feel I am on the right path.”
Growing up, Davidson lived between his birthplace of New Jersey and Marietta, settling in the metro area after high school graduation. Though he occasionally sketched hairstyles for the girls at school, his post-graduation plans ran more along the lines of running track at Norfolk State than styling hair. When his mother asked him to stay in Georgia, Davidson enrolled in business school at DeVry with plans to open some sort of business.
But one day, when he saw a line of people waiting to see his hairstylist cousins, he changed course. Davidson enrolled in beauty school, landed an internship at a nearby salon and worked for free during the week in return for being allowed to take his own clients on Saturdays. When the salon owner retired, Davidson, by then a licensed cosmetologist, inherited the business. He would open two more Atlanta-area salons before finding himself at a career crossroad.
In 1999, he had a taste of fame styling the hair of the late Lisa “Left Eye” Lopes for the cover of the now-defunct Honey Magazine. After another big break, styling rapper Trina’s hair for the 2001 MTV Video Music Awards, Davidson was officially sold on celebrity styling, but the Atlanta scene felt too constricting.
“I feel like everybody in Atlanta was chasing after the same bird,” Davidson said. So in 2001, a few weeks before Sept. 11, he headed to New York City.
Davidson spent the next decade paying more dues. By then, the father of a young son lived in a small basement apartment and picked up work where he could find it. Editorial shoots by day and the odd celebrity styling by night were his routine.
He looked up to stylists such as Oscar James (Tyra Banks) and Neeko (Halle Berry and others) and studied magazines to create his own signature style. Working with wigs had always been part of Davidson’s repertoire, but he sought to elevate his styling.
He no longer relied on sketching. He learned to look at a face along with a personality and visualize a hairstyle that would work.
Celebrities from Patti LaBelle to Jennifer Hudson landed on his client roster, and in 2009, an acquaintance introduced Davidson and Minaj. They talked about her ideas, his ideas and how they could work together, and she asked him to be her hairstylist. Now she is like a sister, Davidson said, albeit one with hair that requires constant maintenance, a lot of storage space and extreme creativity.
“With Nicki, I just knew I had to step out of the box,” Davidson said. “She has a young fan base who loves the new stuff. She has a fun side. I go into her closet and I see all this color.”
With Minaj, Davidson felt he had the chance to be part of creating something special. “I like to be there from the beginning,” he said. “People always ask if I would want to work for Beyoncé, but I don’t, because she is already branded.”
The Minaj brand is an adventure in rainbow bright colors such as lime green, bright pink and electric blue — sometimes all at once. Puffy ponytails, shaped Afros, a below the shoulders sleek mane in half blond and half blue are just a few of the duo’s greatest hits. Davidson cuts, colors and archives each wig at his home and makes multiples of her most popular styles. In recent months, his work has been getting a lot of exposure.
In September, Minaj appeared at New York Fashion Week with Vogue editor Anna Wintour — in a blond beehive composed of mini buns and with an animal hat atop her hand-painted leopard print blond mane. This month, she appears on the cover (and inside) of W magazine, sans bangs, in a classical art-inspired spread by Francesco Vezzoli. OPI released a collection of nail colors by Nicki Minaj earlier this year and she is the 2012 face of MAC Viva Glam, the HIV/AIDS fundraiser of MAC cosmetics, along with Ricky Martin.
All the attention has set Davidson on yet another path in his hairstyling journey.
A reality show may be coming soon, though ultimately, Davidson hopes to manage other celebrity stylists to give them advice and advantages he didn’t have.
“I love talking to students,” Davidson said. “It all stems from there.”
He also plans to tour beauty schools across the country sharing his story and creating a competition in which students can show their skills.
But first, there is Minaj’s next hairstyle to create, which no doubt will be bigger, better and more colorful than the last.
