On Sunday, April 17th more than 400 attendees came out to Naturally ReDefined, Delaware's 1st Natural Hair Expo, held in Newark, Delaware at the Executive Banquet and Conference Center. Naturally ReDefined was hosted by deNaturalistas, a natural hair and holistic event planning partnership registered in the State of Delaware both owned and operated by co-founders Tywanda Howie and Latoya Watson. The event took place from noon until 7:00 p.m. on a beautiful Sunday afternoon.
Naturally ReDefined offered both general admission and VIP guests an opportunity to participate in workshops throughout the day with topics on Scared Healthy, Hair Locks and Locking and a Mixology Class facilitated by Christy Bazemore, Marion Council-George and Stacy Brown, respectively. Attendees were also able to shop and receive services at one of our many vendors: 2 Lite Creations, Allyn's Creations, Askia Printing, Between Proverbs and Poetry, Delaware Breast Cancer Coalition, Delawareblack.com, Desha's Designs, Design Essentials, Diva By Cindy, Front Street Video Productions, Intishative, In My Image Productions, Jewel Afrika Designs, Keys to Serenity, Lifeline Coaching and Empowerment, Master Pioneers, Moetleh & Sugar, theMPM, Nassie's Hope, Natural Transitions - Locks, Coils and Twists, New York Life, Organic Root Stimulator, Rapunzel The Future of Hair, Salon de Amour, SanJules Unique Art Creations, Shea Radiance, Something Beautiful by LadyG, SunnieWallflower Earrings, Taliah Waajid Natural Hair Products, Theresa Knox Photography, Traci Lynn Fashion Jewelry, The URBANEpoise Collection and deNaturalistas Naturally ReDefined brand.
If attending a workshop, shopping or receiving a massage, ear candling or henna tattoo wasn't enough, live entertainment was provided on stage all day by hip hop artists Richard Raw, Chills Mobley feat. Brandy Rodgers, H.I.T., Cannon; live dance performances by Dark Arts Performing Dance Company and Simply Steppin' N Sync, live spoken word by Poet Loschil, Stephanie Artist and Janiah Bradley; and song by Dioana Gayle graced the stage throughout the afternoon. Attendees were also encouraged to join in on live Zumba, ask questions during the one-hour Q&A panel featuring celebrity bloggers Shanti and Antoinette from Around The Way Curls, Danielle Larregui and some of deNaturalistas loyal members Akira Grenardo, Rosalind Grier-Jackson and Stephanie Artist. A live big-chop occurred earlier in the day where 8-month transitioner and bra-strap length hair wearer, Michelle Turner, had all her permed tresses cut off on stage by hair stylist Candace Larrea of Hair Is Our Passion and later debuted her new, natural coif during the Naturally ReDefined Natural Hair Show Competition hosted by Delaware's own Stephanie Dawkins. Stephanie Dawkins came out adorning some green colored hair with glitter to Willow Smith's "I Whip My Hair" with one of our youngest naturalistas Heaven Pritchett. Two local hair stylists premiered amazing natural hair styles: Toni V. from Salon de Amour and Marissa Wells of Phenomenal Beauty. Both stylist did an amazing job with Toni even doing some live styling on stage and after a tight vote from our expert judges the $250.00 cash prize, roses and an award plaque went to Marissa Wells of Phenomenal Beauty. Hair models came out adorning everything from funky color, locs, twists, braids, curls, updos and more.
A special thanks to our wonderful product sponsors: Beautiful Textures, Coco Curls, Curls, EDEN BodyWorks, karen's body beautiful, Kynx, Miss Jessie's, Mozeke, Newark Natural Foods Co-Op and Stylegasm for sending loads of product samples and even full size products (EDEN BodyWorks ;-0 ) for our VIP bags. The VIP guests loved them and their one-hour mix and mingle where they received a free cocktail and some hors de ouvres. There was more than enough to share with our volunteers and general admission guests, thanks to our sponsors sending samples o' plenty. Those goodie bags are all the talk over our Facebook Group Page, Twitter and in the blogsphere/videosphere from our local blogger/vlogger guests. Don't believe us? Check out these event recaps: http://www.acurlsbf.com/2012/04/event-recap-delaware-naturalistas.html , http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MjYZWsD0fs0 , http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qy-Bvk14RPY, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1R46MxF82o4 Hats off to our giveaway sponsors who sent full-size products, gift baskets and gifts to giveaway throughout the day by raffle: Curlformers, Greater Than AIDS - Deciding Moments, karen's body beautiful, LAMIK Beauty, Natural Girls Rock, Newark Natural Foods Co-Op, Rap-It-Up BET, SheaMoisture, shopALS. These companies and brands helped fill stage time with plenty of giveaways throughout the afternoon and evening.
Interested in seeing how things went for yourself? Visit Theresa Knox Photography at http://www.tfkphotos.com/ select enter site, select events and then key in the password hair to view more than 400 photos. If you're interested in ordering any photos for your personal or professional use, Theresa Knox is taking orders and will get your favorite prints to you personally! Thanks to DelawareBlack.com, The News Journal, Channel 28 and WVUD for pre-event coverage to assist in promoting.
A special congratulations goes out to Jocelyn Rhodes and Laura Velltz, winners of the deNaturalistas and Curlformers giveaway offered in celebration of the Naturally ReDefined Expo. These two lucky naturalistas will be receiving their choice of a Curlformers Kit!
Latoya and Tywanda of deNaturalistas would like to thank all our sponsors, partners, volunteers, supporters, vendors, hair stylists & models, family AND DJ TimDogg for providing our listening ears with music excitement throughout the day, Theresa Knox for capturing the day on film and Blake Saunders of Front Street Video for capturing Naturally ReDefined on video, interviewing our guests and premiering his latest video in the video series, "My Natural Beauty". Take a view at Blake's web series by clicking here Look forward to his video coverage of Naturally ReDefined in the coming weeks. Once again, thank you for showing us how Naturally ReDefined you are by being a part of Delaware's 1st Natural Hair Expo. We'll see you all next year for the 2nd Annual Natural Hair Expo and throughout the year as we continue to bring natural hair and holistic health events to the First State.
