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In 2003, after Coretta Scott King's celebrated television makeover, at least one person in Atlanta knew that the new coif would be only temporary.
Faye Burruss, who had styled King's classic tight curls for decades, knew what her favorite client was used to and knew that it would be only a matter of time before the new feathered curls gave way to the old, tight curls that she had made her trademark.
"[Burruss] loved how she looked, but she said Mrs. King wasn't going to keep it that way," said Burruss' granddaughter Brandee George. "Mrs. King liked it, but it wasn't her."
And so, as her old hairdresser predicted, King soon went back to the style she knew, loved and trusted. Few professional relationships are stronger than that of a hair stylist and her clients. And because King and Burruss' relationship was rooted in friendship and a common interest in civil rights, it was even stronger.
Burruss died in July at the age of 80.
"Like Coretta often said, the main thing about them was that they both believed in the same thing," said Pamela George, Burruss' daughter. "My mother believed in the cause. My mother was always an outgoing person. She tried to participate as much as she could. If they were having a march, she would participate."
Burruss was also part of Atlanta's elite black social class, having built an empire of beauty salons for women in Atlanta.
By the time she was 20, she had opened her first shop, Le Petis Beauty Salon in Gainesville. She followed that with Atlanta shops Faye's Beauty Salon, Faye's Salon de Coiffures and Faye's Charm School. She soon added the Fifth Avenue Beauty Salon, Faye's Plaza Salon & Boutique, Faye's Total Look Salon & Boutique and Faye's Hair Analysis and Treatment Center, which, because of its shape, was known as the Telephone Booth Salon. In 1965, she became the first black woman to be appointed to the state board of cosmetology, which she served on for 10 years, including two terms as vice chairwoman.
In 1980, she opened her own school, Faye's Institute of Cosmetology.
Although Pamela George is not sure exactly when her mother started doing King's hair, the time period spanned from the early 1960s through the mid-1990s. Initially, King would visit Burruss at one of her shops. But eventually, Burruss would do King's hair in King's Sunset Avenue home.
Often Burruss would take her daughters with her.
"Some people may have thought she was very formal. If you didn't know her, you would get the impression that she was stuck-up," Pamela George said of King. "She was always reserved, but, even as a child, I never felt uncomfortable around her. She wasn't a person that I remember you had to make a fuss around."
Later, Burruss would take her granddaughter, Brandee, along on her visits.
"I would just sit down and watch them and listen to the conversation. They were like two old friends," said Brandee George, 23. "I loved going over there. Going to her house was like going to a mini-museum, and she had so many pictures of her family. It was so personal, so she only invited people into her circle that she knew and trusted."
For more than 40 years, Burruss and King remained friends and talked occasionally on the phone --- the last time about a month before Burruss' death
Pamela George said that, after hearing about King's failing health, Burruss called to check on her. When Burruss died July 21, family members said, King was shocked.
"When my mother died, she called to console me about my mother," said George. "By then, I knew Coretta was ill, so I tried to get her off the phone. But she just kept trying to console me."
King did not attend Burruss' July 29 funeral, but sent a letter offering her condolences and apologizing for her absence.
"I knew she must have been really ill when she didn't come to the funeral," Brandee George said.
On Aug. 16, only 18 days after Burruss' funeral, King suffered her final debilitating stroke. King died Jan. 30 at the age of 78.
"When I heard she had died, I broke down, to tell you the truth," said Pamela George. "It was almost as if I had lost a second mother."
Burruss and King will always remain linked through the hairstyle.
"Coretta had a basic hairstyle that she wore all the time. Even when my mother would try to interest her in something else, she would never change," said Pamela George. "She was comfortable with that one style."
Which leads us back to the makeover.
Brandee George said the secret to her grandmother's style was to keep King's curls tight and toward her face. The makeover gave her a feathery flip, moving the hair away from her face.
"Mrs. King didn't like body," Brandee George said.
Copyright 2006 The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
