Shirley Jane Wants Your Curls to Do Their Thing
Founder Jenna Satell is building a new kind of curl care around softness, simplicity, and the increasingly radical idea that textured hair doesn’t need to be controlled.
For a long time, the prevailing language around curly hair was really the language of correction. Tame the frizz. Control the volume. Define the curl. Smooth the texture. Even as the natural hair movement encouraged more people to put down the flat iron and embrace what was already growing out of their heads, an entirely new category of products emerged to help make that natural texture behave.
Jenna Satell knows that cycle intimately.
Before founding Shirley Jane, she spent more than a decade straightening her coarse, curly hair, getting keratin treatments, and relying on heavy products to make it feel more manageable. Eventually, she decided she wanted to stop fighting her natural texture. The problem was that much of the curl-care category still seemed to be fighting it for her.
“It felt like the entire curl care industry was about taming curls or masking them, not about giving them the care they need to thrive on their own,” Satell tells The Beauty Brief.
She wanted something lighter and more effortless. Products that could help her take care of her hair without making her feel as though it had become another problem to solve.
So she created them.
Care, Not Control
Shirley Jane is built around a deceptively simple proposition: perhaps curls don’t need quite so much managing.
“Our greater mission is to connect you back to yourself, starting at the root,” Satell says. “Curls represent culture, your roots, and are a part of your unique identity.”
It gives the brand an emotional foundation that feels particularly relevant as beauty begins loosening its grip on perfection. Across hair, makeup, skin, and even the imagery brands use to sell them, we’re seeing more room for texture, movement, individuality, and evidence of an actual human being underneath it all.
Hair is getting bigger again. Frizz is being allowed to exist and curl routines are becoming less prescriptive. The goal, increasingly, isn’t to coax every strand into precisely the same formation.
“I’ve been seeing a shift online of women who are excited about their frizz, volume, and minimalistic curl routines,” Satell says. “In the past, it’s been all about maximizing definition or completely getting rid of texture with a flat iron.”
Shirley Jane fits naturally into that evolution. The brand isn’t anti-definition or anti-styling, but it makes room for another possibility: curls that are healthy, hydrated, soft, and free to move.
Or, as Satell describes the desired effect of the brand’s bestselling Curl Crème: “that Carrie Bradshaw, free-flowing mane.”
We get it.
Simpler Ritual, Smarter Formula
Satell’s frustration with existing curl products eventually turned into years of product development alongside a cosmetic chemist who also had curly hair, an intentional choice that allowed the formulas to be tested across multiple textures throughout the process.
Rather than creating products that primarily coat the strand to manufacture an immediate cosmetic effect, Shirley Jane combines strengthening proteins with hydrating botanicals and oils designed to support the hair with continued use.
“I didn’t want to create products that sit on top of curls, but rather products that penetrate into the hair shaft to create lasting change when used consistently,” Satell says.
The distinction matters because Shirley Jane’s version of minimalism isn’t about stripping a formula down for the sake of a tidy ingredient list. Satell is interested in simplifying the experience of caring for curly hair while still asking the products themselves to do quite a lot.
“I like the idea of simplicity when it comes to routine, but not when it comes to ingredients,” she says.
That philosophy is evident in the Curl Crème, the first formula Satell developed and the product around which she eventually built the rest of the Ritual Set.
The leave-in combines jojoba, castor, and avocado oils with ingredients including blue lotus flower, vitamin E, and grapeseed extract. The intention is hydration and structure without the stiff, crunchy finish that has historically accompanied so many products promising curl definition.
“The result is hydrated hair that has structure, without the crunch,” Satell says.
Your Wash Day Does Not Need a Project Manager
Perhaps one of Shirley Jane’s most compelling ideas is also one of its simplest: textured hair does not inherently require an exhaustive routine.
For years, curl care has been surrounded by an almost intimidating amount of methodology. Layer this before that. Apply on soaking-wet hair. Section. Rake. Scrunch. Plop. Diffuse. Refresh. Clarify. Repeat.
There are people who genuinely love an elaborate wash day, of course. But complexity has become so associated with caring for textured hair that opting out can sometimes feel like doing it incorrectly.
Satell questions that premise.
“That textured hair needs an extensive routine” is the curl myth she would most like to retire. In her view, some of that complexity can become cyclical: products create buildup or dryness, which then creates a need for additional products to address those problems.
“Gentle care that respects the complexities of curls actually breaks that cycle,” she says. “Your curls don't need an elaborate wash day. They need to be tended to, delicately.”
There is a difference between treating hair delicately and treating it as difficult. Shirley Jane is interested in the former.
The Luxury of Being Considered
That sense of care extends all the way to the packaging.
Satell admits to spending an “unreasonable” amount of time getting it right, not simply because she wanted Shirley Jane to look beautiful on a bathroom shelf, but because she wanted the physical experience of using it to make sense for someone with textured hair.
The bottles are curved rather than sharply geometric, an intentional reference to the structure of a curl. Even the pump became a point of obsession.
Anyone who has attempted to repeatedly pump a tiny dispenser with hands already covered in styling cream can probably appreciate why.
“Textured hair usually needs to use more product, and I couldn't stand needing to pump a product 10+ times with slippery, product-soaked hands,” Satell says. Shirley Jane’s solution is a longer extension designed to dispense a generous amount in one pump.
It’s a tiny detail, but one that says quite a lot about who gets considered during the product-design process.
Satell sees an even bigger opportunity for that consideration within prestige retail. Shirley Jane currently conducts approximately 99% of its business online, something she hopes will change as the brand grows.
“One thing I’ve noticed is that curl care is left out of a lot of elevated shopping experiences,” she says. “There haven’t been products to match the identities of these shops before, but here we are.”
It raises an interesting question for beauty retail. As stores become increasingly sophisticated exercises in world-building, which consumers and categories are invited into that world?
Textured hair deserves beautiful bottles, sensorial formulas, thoughtful merchandising, and the pleasure of discovery in an elevated retail environment just as much as any other category does. Curl care doesn’t need to sacrifice function to participate in that universe. Shirley Jane is betting that the two can coexist.
Staying Close to the Original Idea
The beauty industry is not exactly hurting for new hair brands and Satell knows she is building Shirley Jane in a crowded category. Her response has been refreshingly uncomplicated: she tries not to spend too much time looking sideways.
The original concept for the brand emerged through meditation, journaling, time in nature, and Satell’s own relationship with her hair. As Shirley Jane grows, she combines that internal compass with conversations with customers about what they actually want from their curl care.
“I rarely look at competition because there’s space for us all as long as we stay true to that original vision,” she says.
There have already been moments that suggested the vision might travel further than she expected. Soon after launching, Shirley Jane received an InStyle Beauty Editor’s Pick Award, a particularly meaningful milestone for Satell, a self-described lifelong magazine junkie.
Then came a DM to Dancing With the Stars’ Mark Ballas. Satell had sent him the products and reached out on Instagram without expecting much in return. Instead, Ballas responded, loved the line, and organically shared it with his audience.
“It made me realize how we are truly one message or person away from what we desire,” she says.
For an emerging founder building largely online and attempting to carve out space in one of beauty’s most competitive categories, those moments matter.
But Shirley Jane’s most interesting opportunity may lie in something much quieter than a viral endorsement or industry accolade.
It’s the possibility of changing the relationship someone has with the hair they’ve spent years trying to change.
“The way I approach curl care is similar to how I’d approach any other daily habit or ritual: with care,” Satell says. “It’s about meeting yourself with curiosity and love rather than frustration.”
Perhaps that is the next evolution of curl care. Not another technique for getting every strand to cooperate. Not another standard for what a “good” curl is supposed to look like.
Just really good products, healthier hair, and a little more permission to let it do its thing.
The Beauty Brief Recommends:
As wavy girls who will choose an air dry moment every single time, The Curl Crème quickly became a Beauty Brief fave. It gives our waves the hydration and encouragement they need without weighing them down or making them feel overly “done.” We’re talking soft, touchable texture, natural movement, and definition without the dreaded crunch. Apply, scrunch, air dry, carry on. Exactly our speed.
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