Hear me out: I have a bone to pick with slicked-back buns. It doesn’t matter if I follow every single prep step, secure one of the best boar bristle brushes, and use a flyaway toothbrush; the baby hairs around my ears never stay down. Within 30 minutes, even my extra-hold hairspray fails to do its job, leaving me with product-coated little hairs standing out at a 90-degree angle. Cut to: Mikey Madison arriving on the 2025 Oscars red carpet.
With the help of hairstylist Rena Calhoun, the Anora actress debuted my new gold standard for sleek buns. The center part and finger-touself texture were just the jumping off point—it was the free-floating baby hairs that solidified it as one of the best beauty looks of the night. “The baby hairs were very intentional,” Calhoun exclusively tells me over the phone, just as Madison walks the carpet. “A brush almost creates too much smoothness, so I just use my hands and a little bit of hairspray to blow dry them [in the right position].”
