Another ’90s style is back, with students wearing claw hair clips in a variety of colors and shapes.
Students on campus said the clips have made a comeback because the mothers of college-age women never stopped wearing them, even though the style peaked 30 years ago.
“My mom, it was like her hairstyle that I always grew up seeing her wear,” second-year psychology student Madelyn Montilla said. “And I think my mom is the most beautiful person in the world.”
A claw clip squeezes open and closed like a clip used to secure a bag of chips, but it has teeth on the bottom to hold hair in place.
According to Bear’s Meadow, an online retailer that sells hair accessories, the claw clip was invented in Italy in the late 1980s as “a practical hair accessory” that would securely hold hair in an updo without bobby pins or elastics.
“I feel like … my hair feels more secure,” first-year undecided student Maya Matute said. “I have very thin hair in general. So holding it with, like, standard elastic sometimes doesn’t keep it secure, and then just the style, I think it just looks cute.”
Business professor Stephanie Goldenberg said the clips appeal to women who like to wear their hair up.
“It’s really kind of behavioral,” Goldenberg said. “So people who want to have their hair out of the way, from like, temperature wise … or for just optional reasons, like doing art or working out, or maybe just, ‘I’m having a bad hair day and not doing anything about it’ … just, you know, pull it back.”
Claw clips, like other consumer favorites from prior decades, have made a comeback, in part, because so many women have been showing them off on social media, Goldenberg said.
“It’s kind of interesting to see how things come full circle, come back around, things that were popular,” Goldenberg said. “It’s true for many products, like … record albums. Now I hear … CDs are coming back, so it’s just that it’s almost cyclical the way things come back into trend.”
Students said they style their hair all the way up in a twisted bun using the clips. “I usually wear, like, a twisted bun,” Montilla said. “I never wear half up half down. My hair gets frizzy, so it’s always twisted up in the back, like military style. And then I put the two baby pieces in the front normally, and baby hairs on the sides of the ears.”
“I like [to] … just twist in … the bun,” first-year nursing student Arielle Lopez said. “I’ll [also] just, like, put in a high ponytail. It depends, like, that’s usually what I do at work, because I’m a lifeguard, so I like to get it out of my face.”
Although claws are a trending accessory for hair, it can be a hazard to drive while wearing them, according to media reports of injuries and lawsuits involving the clips.
Some reports have detailed drivers whose clips have sunk into their skulls when they bumped their heads hard against a headrest during a car accident.
Some students said they wear them anyway.
“I do, unfortunately,” first-year interior design student Julia Teitelbaum said. “I know I shouldn’t, but I do.”
“Yes, it’s dangerous,” Montilla said. “I know I shouldn’t.”
