Pop icon Billie Eilish, who broke into the music scene with her hit “Ocean Eyes,” also became known for a unique sense of style—and hair color. At 15, the singer rocked various shades of blue locks, which she later changed to neon green.
More recently, however, the “Bad Guy” artist has started experimenting with other hair colors — though they’re decidedly tamer than the color palettes she used earlier in her fame.
Eilish sported a golden blonde look on the cover of her Happier Than Ever album, a look she continued through much of last year when the music debuted. Now, she’s taken on a darker look with raven locks that contrast her electric blue eyes. The fact that Eilish has been choosing more “normal” hair colors isn’t a coincidence: According to the singer, there’s a very deliberate reason for the shift.
Eilish started dyeing her hair when she was nine years old
In a recent video she recorded herself, Eilish walked viewers through her after-show nighttime beauty routine for Vogue. In the video, she details her de ella skincare de ella (it’s non-negotiable and pretty thorough) along with her de ella favorite lotion from Laura Mercier. She also talked about her hairstyles from her and how they’ve evolved over the years. According to the Grammy-winning artist, she didn’t set out to make iconic hairstyles part of her brand.
“My hair — it has randomly in my life been a thing that I change a lot, and I’ve had many, many, many different hair colors since I was like 10,” Eilish said. “I didn’t even know that that was a part of me. I just did it. I never thought, oh, I want hair to be the thing that I do.”
Eilish first dyed her hair when she was nine—a blue hue she remembers even now. At 13, she bleached her hair and sported a white-haired look for a while. At the time, the fact that her parents de ella weren’t phased by the drastic hair color changes de ella gave her the confidence to keep trying new things.
“My parents were totally down for me to be like nine and grab a Manic Panic blue from CVS and throw it in my hair,” she explained. “They didn’t care at the time. So I felt really comfortable in that, and I just loved it so much.”
‘Normal’ hair colors are easier for Eilish to maintain some anonymity in public
Now, however, Eilish has changed her tune about some of the hair colors she’s choosing. She might still love bold colors in everything else, wardrobe included, but her rapidly expanding fan base made it much harder to stay anonymous if she wanted to leave her home incognito with a signature hair color.
Keep in mind: Eilish’s following on social media alone ballooned from less than 300,000 followers on Instagram when she was 15 years old to more than 6 million just a year later. Now six years later, she has more than 106 million followers, according to the annual interview she does with Vanity Fair. And while she’s in a very good place with her fans these days, it can still be a bit of a roller coaster.
According to the icon, the vibrant hair colors she was used to rock made her less anonymous than she wanted to be at times. “It’s much easier for me to go out in the world and be a normal person with a normal hair color for me,” Eilish explained. “It’s kind of a life-changer. When I had green hair, I couldn’t do s***. I couldn’t go anywhere.”
Her current black hair color feels ‘the most like me’ even though it’s not her natural hair color
In the video for Vogue, Eilish was standing in a bathroom by herself—no glam squad entourage included. According to the “Your Power” artist, she does all of her own hair and makeup from her on tour. That doesn’t mean it’s not specialized, though.
She has specialty products from a facialist and nail care expert on hand, along with a line of Olaplex products for her hair. The salon-quality brand is one she swears by, and when she filmed the video, she used the “bond smoother,” which she says she uses every time after she washes her hair and sometimes at night to give her hair some volume the next day.
Black [hair] is kind of what feels the most like me, weirdly, even though I think I’m naturally blonde,” Eilish said as she worked a pea-sized amount of the product into the ends of her dark strands. “I haven’t had natural hair color in a long time, but I think I’m naturally blonde.”
It’s not to say Eilish will give up bold hair colors forever, but feeling the most like herself — and blending into the crowd when she wants to — has got to be refreshing.
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