RUNNING ON FUMES, HBU?

Feb 19

Written By MERDE

NINA APRILE, THAT GIRL THAT DID YOUR HAIR, TAKES US BACKSTAGE DURING NYFW

Installation Five of NYFW 2025 Serial: SUSTY IS A MUSTY

by Amy Mazius

“Backstage tastes like hairspray,” says Nina Aprile, better known by her moniker That Girl That Did Your Hair. It’s fashion week in New York and hair stylists have 3-5 shows a day. It’s a sprint and a marathon.

Aprile, known for her BTS setting clips and ingenious Knotty brush takes Merde backstage during the busiest week of the year as she makes her rounds. “The trashiest thing about me is that I will be starting my day at Dunkin. They are always open when I need them,” Aprile says. “They say dress comfortably. I think I take that too far sometimes but I love to drown in my clothes. My inner child is a tomboy.” With 10+ years of NYFW hair experience, Aprile is onto a new phase of backstage, taking BTS content and gifting her viral setting clips backstage to the hair teams “with a mixture of new clips and clips I can't sell, like misprints– I don’t waste anything so if you see a clip that looks off… no you didn’t. It's art.” Aprile may not be both hands in on the hair, but she’s definitely NOT two hands out. “It’s cool to take a step back and capture the POV but I will get my hands in when needed. I can't help it,” says Aprile.

For the Vettese show, lead hair stylist Jaylin Seng, the day starts early, “At 4:00 AM the iPhone alarms are going off, I usually set about five to seven alarms five minutes apart. To ensure we don’t oversleep. Shower, get dressed, slam coffee and possibly a Celsius, depending on the energy level I’m at. Out the door before 4:30 AM, for the first call time of 5:00 AM. Each show is about three-four hours between hair, makeup, nails, styling and then the runway. Run to the next show to rinse and repeat. Usually doing this two-four times during the day when you have multiple shows to get to.”

Aprile says, “Shows typically are all over, uptown, downtown, and Brooklyn, so we are traveling in snow storms, rain or shine. Last season it was down pouring rain and I was SO late for a show. A cab driver hit me in the back of my car,” *YES Aprile drives in New York City, she is a real one*, “and I got out, I didn’t see a scratch, and I’m like you're lucky–and drove off because I didn’t have time to file a police report. I think that was the most NY thing I’ve ever done.” The speed bumps can be wild, but also are the best part. “Nothing goes as planned, which leaves room for magic!” says Aprile.

Other essentials Aprile shares, “I take two Excedrin Migraine before going to a show. It’s overstimulating. Two to three hands on one model doing hair plus makeup artist plus nail tech. It feels like being on a creative high seeing the vision come together.”

Dylan Chavles, hair lead for the Gabe Gordon show shared some of the inspiration from the beauty board, inspired by the Rubber Boyfriend concept. “Plasticine skin, intentional pieces of synthetic wigs, playful aspects like chearleader-esque twisted Americana, big beautiful cheer blowouts, giant crimped fluffy hand-in-the-electrical-socket with really beautiful details in front. It felt connected to the clothes, patchy and hand-done. We ended up in a place with big, dry, fabric-like hair texture, some clean refined swoops that were a hip-bump and a kiss to the 80’s, which the collection embodied.”

The shows present so many ideas through the beauty stories, from baby hair details to floor length braided art. Seng says, “hair in the salon is about perfection, pleasing the client. Fashion week and session styling is about perspective.”

The collections, which take months to build by design teams ranging in sizes from small ateliers to legacy fashion houses rely on the beauty to deliver their message. Together, it’s all a symphony, with weeks of all-nighters bringing forth a few minutes of fantasy. Aprile says, “You never know what vibe you’re going to walk into.This season, Gabe Gordon show was in Tribeca Synagogue but wasn’t completely closed to the community, so in the hallway, parents were bringing their kids to play soccer next door, [meanwhile] hair and makeup rooms were in the basement. Grace Gui was a presentation in a vacant office building, very intimate with the details. [In a past] season, hair and makeup happened in the streets of New York. As long as there is an outlet and a chair, the hair will be done.”

The work that goes on backstage, once your card for entry is stamped, is undeniably special. From creating and building worlds within themselves to being everywhere in one day, somehow the creative needs happen–against all odds– and the bonds forged can carry through decades, marked, of course, in biannual seasons.

Nina shares, “I started doing hair backstage with Cutler Salons. They curate the hair teams for NYFW backstage. Tyson and Rodney, the owners of Cutler, have been inspiring mentors to my career, giving me the opportunity to do hair in my twenties with no backstage experience or ever having worked in their salons. Now in my thirties, they’re bringing me backstage with my brand. It’s all about building the relationship over the experience. I have so much gratitude for them!”

As the season wrapped up, yet again, we asked Aprile what else she has in store for us with her brand TGTDYH, “I always wanted to bring fashion and hair together since my background is styling hair for NYFW, designer e-comm, and editorial for magazines. I always thought of taking scraps and making accessories out of them. My good friend Julie of Starface introduced me to @wear_HOTHEAD, a sustainable brand sewing with donated designer scraps. It jjust makes sense to collab together- I love when the stars align.” The collection launched during fashion week with XXL and XXS Scrap Scrunchies made from DSquared2 and Balenciaga deadstock fabrics.

In the end, once the music starts, every hair is in place–or perfectly out of place as conceptualized by the backstage artists.