Former mathematician now making art with hair

Pushing the boundaries of what can be achieved with hair, Angel-Lee Morgan is making wearable art.

Morgan is the owner and operator of Angelleealexia Hair Artistry. After undergoing a stark career change from a life of mathematics to one filled with hair, Morgan took another leap to close her salon to become a hair artist.

"I like to term what I do as 'hair artistry'. I really like to just push the boundaries of what can be done with hair and how people envision hair to be because I feel like it was kind of missing from the Jamaican market," she said.

The 24-year-old said that though she was previously successful as a hair braider, she felt moved to pursue more creative passions.

"I got into this after closing my salon last year. I closed my hair braiding salon because I was just feeling like I wanted more. I didn't know what 'more' would look like, but I tried doing make-up. I tried a little creative direction, I tried a lot of different things to just find what it is I wanted to do or what would feel fulfilling to me," she said.

She continued, "Mi did 'fraid bad because at the time when I closed my business, actually exactly a year now, I had no plans. I did not know what I was going to do. But I'm a person who I move when my mind says move. Even though I don't have it figured out yet, if something doesn't feel good any more, mi gone. God will work something out for me."

Now the Mandeville, Manchester, native spends her days creating architectural wonders atop people's heads.

"The first piece I did was that Valentine's Day piece and I was just thinking, a bag of hearts, and I just reached out to somebody. I wasn't even sure who I was going to reach out to, but I reached out to somebody and say 'Yow, I sketched something' and I was like 'Yow, are you interested can we do this?'" she recalled.

She continued, "I think about things quite deeply. Every day gives me a chance to look at it differently. It's just kind of me listening to my intuition to tell me what to do."

Morgan said that while she is much happier flexing her creative muscles with the pieces she creates, turning her hobby into a hustle has its drawbacks.

"When I became a hair braider, honestly, it took off pretty fast and it was a very very successful business, and I was living pretty comfortably. Right now going through this transition of being a hair artist, it's not all a bed of roses. Just because you do something well, you still have find a way for it to pay the bills," she said.