While trying to write an immersive report on the difficulties that come with getting braids, I suddenly realise that I am living the report. “Braiding used to be a matter of convenience and low maintenance,” Nesrine tells me. “Many of us are told that we’re doing it wrong: not washing them enough, keeping them in too long, getting braided too tight, too heavy.” “[Black hair stylists] are expected to know how to do everybody’s hair, and you get penalised if you can’t,” she says. “When tariffs entered the picture, I was telling folks that this was actually going to hit black women very hard.”