00:00And look at this! This is... Can I say f***? I probably can't say f*** or if I already said
00:04it.
00:05Got it.
00:06Hi, my name is Monae Exchange from RuPaul's Drag Race and we're here in my wig closet!
00:16Wigs are very important to any drag persona because a wig has a lot of character.
00:21A wig is what type of diva that you're going to be that day.
00:23I normally start with the hair and then I figure out what the rest of the outfit is going to
00:27be
00:27because a wig can make or break a look.
00:33Now look at this good time girl. I like to call her Shaterika.
00:37She was your RA. Fresh from her sophomore year in college.
00:40But she would not write you up if she caught you, you know what I mean?
00:42She was a cool down chick.
00:44Lots of girls will wear natural hair in drag and I'm like, I love it.
00:47I think natural hair is beautiful. So I have lots of natural variations.
00:51Look at this top mount. Isn't it ridiculous?
00:52Ha ha ha ha!
00:57These bad two knots girl, when I have this on my head you cannot tell me it is not sprouting
01:01from my scalp.
01:02Okay?
01:03This is giving you Jada Pickett and The Matrix Niobe realness.
01:08This is Courtney or Ashley or Kelsey or Mary-Kate.
01:13See this, like, messy little top knot bun mome?
01:17I put this on when she wants to feel fun and frilly.
01:19I'm gonna have cocktails with the girls.
01:24If you watch RuPaul's Drag Race, you know what this wig is.
01:28This is my promo here for All Stars 4.
01:31I wanted to do something fun, something that I thought that no one else would do.
01:34And I'm very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very inspired by Grace Jones.
01:39I think that Grace Jones is a style icon in every sense of the word.
01:44My wig guy, Domino Couture, can literally create any hair.
01:48And we got this icy pompadour fantasy. Like, I'm obsessed.
01:56If I had to look at this wall of wigs,
02:00you can send a couple of your kids to college with all this hair up in hair.
02:05Hair up in hair.
02:06Oh my god, I'm gonna start a series. Hair up in hair.
02:09Thank you, Refinery.
02:10Again, if you're looking at this wall, you're looking at someone's tuition.
02:14I would guesstimate $50,000.
02:16My most expensive wig to date is $1,500.
02:19It is a full lace human hair moment.
02:23And it's about 60 inches long.
02:25Let's just give me a little sheer.
02:26Let's give you a little scissor.
02:29Let's go.
02:30Let's go.
02:33Let's go.
02:51Let's go.
02:54Look at this, girl.
02:55This is glam, honey.
02:57I don't know how to look, but I know how to look this.
03:03So this is the wig I'm gonna be putting on today.
03:06I'm gonna have my final beauty glam look for you.
03:19So I went to this drag competition called Cattle Call
03:22in New York City at Therapy Bar, hosted by Peppermint.
03:25And you had to be in drag for this thing.
03:27So I went down to MAC, got me a cold liner
03:30and a Ruby Woo lipstick, girl.
03:32And you could not tell me I was not the prettiest.
03:35I was like, oh, this was actually really fun.
03:37And the one thing led to another.
03:38I started going out more.
03:40I started doing more competitions.
03:41And I started working a lot in New York City.
03:43You know what, surprisingly, my first wig ever in drag
03:47was actually a pretty good one.
03:48And I had no idea what I was doing.
03:50But it was this like nice lace front.
03:52Now, I looked a mess, but the wig was fierce.
03:54And after I learned more about drag,
03:57I added some tracks in,
03:58because I mean, it was pretty bald-headed.
04:00Now, for the children at home,
04:02before you want to start investing in wigs,
04:05know this, they are expensive, okay?
04:08Especially for drag queens,
04:09lots of drag hair is custom.
04:23I've had lots of strong, powerful women in my life.
04:27So that's what my drag is very inspired by.
04:29I perform pieces that speak to women's empowerment often.
04:33I feel the need to, again,
04:35to not just wear long, silky straight hair.
04:37That's so boring and so vanilla.
04:39I like to do natural hair.
04:40I like to do things to show the beautiful kaleidoscope
04:43that all different women have.
04:44Some women have kinky hair.
04:46Some women have curly hair, straight hair.
04:47I like to do every single type of hair
04:49and make it look pretty.
04:50That is what my drag is really inspired by,
04:52because that's what I saw growing up.
04:53To me, that's what makes my drag, I think, special.
05:18RuPaul's Drag Race has become this very amazing
05:21and beautiful show,
05:23and it's becoming very prominent in pop culture.
05:25There are so many people of color,
05:26queer people of color,
05:27getting their stories told through RuPaul's Drag Race.
05:30Being a drag queen of color
05:31has definitely presented its challenges to me.
05:33I've been called everything in the book
05:35for no good reason.
05:36People shaming me for wearing Afro,
05:38shaming me for wearing braids and box braids.
05:41I'm like, again, those are beautiful hairstyles.
06:03Black women have definitely been instrumental
06:05in injecting wiggity into pop culture.
06:09Growing up in America, I was not proud to be Black,
06:11because I was taught through TV and through magazines
06:14and through all that stuff
06:15that being Black was not something that was fierce.
06:18Not until my early 20s when I left college.
06:20It was weird.
06:20I just woke up one day.
06:21I was like, being Black is everything.
06:24I love to get up, look in the mirror, see my skin.
06:27It was just an epiphany I had one day,
06:28so that's why in my drag I tried to do that so much.
06:31By wearing lots of African prints
06:33and wearing natural hair,
06:35and just doing things to accentuate the Black experience,
06:39and how that has changed my life,
06:41and how it has made me a much more informed adult
06:43of a human being.
07:14What I want people to take away from the Monet X Change experience is how proud and how unapologetically myself
07:21and black that I am.
07:26Hey, you guys. Thank you for tuning in to Refinery29 as we did a little wig talk with me, Monet
07:31X Change.
07:31This was so insightful. I learned a lot about myself, and I hope you did too.
