NORTH LAWNDALE \u2014 A North Lawndale student whose pop-up bathroom hair salon became an online sensation is working to turn her passion for hairstyling and supporting her friends into a business. Jessica Thurmond, 17, has became famous on social media through a Feb. 3 TikTok video of her braiding her friend\u2019s hair in the girls\u2019 bathroom at North Lawndale College Prep, 1615 S. Christiana Ave., where she is a junior. The 18-second video got 3.6 million views and more than 500,000 likes, with commenters praising Thurmond\u2019s talent \u2014 and some wondering how she pulled it off during school hours.<\/p>\n
\u201ci love girls helping other girls \u2764\ufe0f,\u201d one person wrote. \u201cThe hairstylist that did everyone\u2019s hair in highschool turn out to always be the best . \ud83d\udd25 Keep going,\u201d another commenter wrote. \u201cmy five minute bathroom pass could never,\u201d one person joked. Encouraged by the support, Thurmond\u2019s family launched a GoFundMe this month to raise money for her to buy hairstyling supplies and ultimately launch her business. As of Thursday, it had raised more than $200 of its $10,000 goal. \u201cOne day, she hopes to own her salon shop,\u201d the teen\u2019s family wrote on the campaign page. \u201cShe loves to see when others are feeling good; it motivates her to keep going and never give up on what she wants to be!\u201d<\/p>\n
Thurmond was born and raised in North Lawndale. She learned how to do hair \u2014 cut, curl, braid and even dye \u2014 from her grandmother when she was 8, she said. Over the years, she\u2019s grown to become the de facto hairdresser for more than 10 family members, regularly styling hair for her mother, father, brother, cousins, aunts and grandmothers. \u201cEveryone really counts on me,\u201d Thurmond said. Thurmond also occasionally did her friends\u2019 hair at home. One day in September 2023, during her sophomore year, a friend asked Thurmond to help style her wig at school. The pair went to the girls\u2019 bathroom so Thurmond could get to work \u2014 though she was afraid she\u2019d get in trouble for missing class to do her friend\u2019s hair. Introduction to Jessica Thurmond’s Story NORTH LAWNDALE \u2014 A North Lawndale student whose pop-up bathroom hair salon became an online sensation is working to turn her passion for hairstyling and supporting her friends into a business. Jessica Thurmond, 17, has became famous on social media through a Feb. 3 TikTok video of her braiding her […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":17244,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rank_math_lock_modified_date":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[24],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-17243","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-education"},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i1.wp.com\/bcc-newspack.s3.amazonaws.com\/uploads\/2025\/03\/031825-Jessica-Thurmond-Hair-North-Lawndale-Colin-Boyle-6414.jpg?w=1920&resize=1920,1279&ssl=1","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/citystuff.com\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17243"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/citystuff.com\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/citystuff.com\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citystuff.com\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citystuff.com\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17243"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/citystuff.com\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17243\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17245,"href":"https:\/\/citystuff.com\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17243\/revisions\/17245"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citystuff.com\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17244"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/citystuff.com\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17243"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citystuff.com\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17243"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citystuff.com\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17243"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nJessica Thurmond, a student at North Lawndale College Prep, curls her classmate Jada Ervin\u2019s hair at school on March 18, 2025. Credit:<\/span> Colin Boyle\/Block Club Chicago<\/span>
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