The Stunning Hair Transformation Of Katy Perry

When it comes to bold fashion and beauty moments, Katy Perry is definitely one of the first celebrity names that come to mind. Ever since her breakthrough in the mid-2000s, Perry has been in the spotlight not only thanks to her catchy hits but also her ability to dramatically change her look. And by that, we don't only mean swapping grunge fashion for retro '50s styles but also transforming her hair in ways many wouldn't dare to. Of course, not all of the hair transformations happened on her actual hair, as Perry is also a huge fan of wigs and extensions. Nevertheless, as she wears them in the spotlight, they certainly also count as bold transformations, even though they might not be as permanent.

In fact, Perry has had some of the most dramatic hair changes in pop culture history, whether due to going through a breakup or simply getting bored of seeing the same hairstyle in the mirror every day. "Katy is a very creative person, so normal hair isn't fun to her. She makes for a great canvas to work on," one of Perry's hairstylists, Rick Henry, revealed in 2018 to Us Weekly. "No one wants to have the same hair every day when they're on the red carpet all the time, so we're always trying to find that look and change it ... We're always trying to figure out what the next look is gonna be." And over the past two decades, Katy Perry has undoubtedly proven that she is a major hair chameleon!

California-born and raised Katy Perry — whose real name is Katheryn Hudson — spent her youth in a strict Christian home. "My childhood was just the Jesus train. It wasn't expansive and it wasn't curious," she told The Irish Times in 2020. "From birth, it was pure Bible thumping."

Of course, with strict parents, there wasn't much room for having fun with her look, but once she became a teen, Perry's love for hair experimentation became undeniable. "I've had my hair colored about every four weeks since I was 15," the musician revealed to Glamour. And in the mid-2000s, right before her big breakthrough, Perry decided to lean into a rockstar aesthetic by going for a fun Y2K shag haircut. Unlike the shag of the 2020s, the star's interpretation of the iconic '80s hairstyle was a lot more messy and stringy, adding plenty of edginess to her otherwise feminine style.

With her 2008 hit "I Kissed a Girl," Katy Perry caught the attention of the international music scene. Her strong vocal skills and the at-the-time controversial lyrics put her in the spotlight, and just like that, the singer we know today was born. In the late 2000s, Perry swapped the messy shag for vintage Hollywood curls, serving a retro look that she often accessorized with funky hairpins. The hairstyle was a major change from her previous aesthetic, and it worked perfectly with her bubblegum pop sound.

In a candid interview with Glamour, the musician revealed that she always looked up to famous women when it came to beauty. "'Clueless' was a fabulous inspiration to me in the '90s! So were the cool chicks of that era like Shirley Manson, a young Gwen Stefani, Madonna, and Courtney Love. Now I idolize Dita Von Teese, Agyness Deyn, Bjork, Natalia Vodianova, and always Lolita," Perry admitted in 2009.

While Katy Perry's hair was always stunning, the singer turned her hair game up a notch in the early 2010s. For her third studio album, "Teenage Dream," Perry decided to live out all her childhood hair dreams by rocking lots of colorful looks. "I've tried a lot of looks and still continue to do so. I take lots of chances. Sometimes people are inspired and sometimes, confused!" she told Glamour, hinting at just how fearless her style was going to become. "I never regret much of anything, though — I think everything I have [tried], for better or worse, has been a creative expression of what I was feeling at that moment in life." Some of the bold colors apart from blue and pink that the musician rocked during this period include lavender, copper, pink roots with blond, and colorful highlights on black hair.

In 2011, Perry's hairstylist Danilo revealed that a lot of the hairstyles the musician rocks come from her own ideas. "The great thing for me about working with Katy is that she has such a great sense of her own image and I listen to her, I don't fight her," he admitted to Glamour. "Some people you need to help them, but she sees herself very clearly and very playfully and I've learnt to trust her instincts for her." While there are numerous looks the star has rocked, a fan favorite was undoubtedly the bright blue wig she rocked in the "California Gurls" music video. In fact, brightly colored wigs were a major part of Katy Perry's look at the time.

Once Katy Perry unlocked all the fun bright and bold hair colors can offer, there was no stopping her. In 2012, the musician rocked a variety of fun hair colors, from a purple ombré to a colorful ponytail. "The color of my hair is just however I feel like expressing it. It's just me having fun imitating a troll [doll]," she said in 2012 (via Irish Independent). "I would not advise people to do that to their hair, unless they were using a professional. I had to slowly, slowly go from black to pink, which was my first crazy color. Or my hair would have fallen out. But you can always wear a wig," Perry added.

And even though funky hair colors aren't for everyone, Perry was rocking them with full confidence. "I kind of feel like I'm a walking cartoon sometimes, but really, when I walk into the room, I want to set the tone," she said. One of our favorite bold Katy Perry hair moments was from the 2012 Nickelodeon Kids' Choice Awards. The singer — who was wearing a bright lime green outfit — showed up on the red carpet with blue hair that had purple highlights! In an interview with PopSugar, Perry revealed just what inspired her colorful hairstyles. "I want to give credit where credit is due, and I believe the Harajuku girls and the Japanese culture — especially in Tokyo — were the pioneers," the singer said. "I was looking at them first."

By 2013, it seemed as if Katy Perry had tried out every hair color under the sun, whether by actually dying her locks or simply rocking wigs. In fact, in early 2014, the singer even rocked a green ombré. "To be able to pull off a slime green color is really fun," she told PopSugar a year later. "It's not necessarily the color you'd think to try. And it worked. I looked like a happy Oscar the Grouch. That was one of my favorites." Eventually, the singer seemingly got tired of the bold hair and decided to go back to the color she rose to fame with — a rich midnight brown. While there doesn't seem to be a shade that doesn't suit the musician's hair, the dark color looks particularly stunning on her as it helps bring out her beautiful blue-green eyes even more.

Of course, just because Perry went back to a more traditional hair color doesn't mean her hair was boring. In fact, the musician kept things interesting by rocking a variety of hairstyles, like the Princess Lea-inspired braided ponytail she went with for the 2013 NRJ Music Awards or the fun crown braid and hairband she wore to the 2014 ARIA Awards.

In the mid-2010s, Katy Perry was still mesmerizing us with her stunning hairstyles. For the 2015 Harper's Bazaar Icons Event, the musician decided to go with a stunning copper shade, a hair color that ended up looking very natural on the star. And, of course, we have to also mention her 2016 Golden Globe Awards hair. For the prestigious event, Perry decided to take things up a notch in the glamour department by rocking a retro-looking pompadour, one that instantly made us think of Priscilla Presley. "I have an as-seen-on-TV Bumpit in my hair," Perry revealed that evening (via The Hollywood Reporter).

Even though Perry temporarily turned away from unusual hair colors, the star revealed to Glamour in 2015 that dying her hair is one of her favorite ways to accessorize any look. "I'm naturally the most boring dishwater squirrel brown," Perry revealed. "So I've been playing with colors since I was 15. I loved the grunge green, and shocking blue was fun. Colored hair is such a huge accessory that you don't even need to add extra stuff."

2017 marked a major hair change for Katy Perry as she not only decided to cut her hair into a short pixie but also dye it platinum blond. Even though Perry admitted that the haircut was partially due to the fact that the bleaching caused a lot of damage, she did admit that it also helped her "redefine what beauty means to [her]" (via Glamour). 

"Now I can't hide behind it," Perry told Byrdie (via W Magazine). "I wanted to know that I could still feel beautiful and love myself without it. It's fun, it's freeing, it's liberating, and I don't think that 'sexiness' and 'femininity' is just one thing — long hair. I suppose the goal is to redefine what femininity means to me." The star also admitted that styling her hair is so much easier now as she doesn't need to spend countless hours dealing with long locks. "I can just get up and go. I feel so liberated with this hair now," Perry told W Magazine in 2017. With the hair change, we also noticed a shift in style for the singer, who was never afraid of being bold. Since her hair was short, Perry began experimenting with even bolder and darker makeup looks, and statement earrings became her go-to accessory as there was no hair that could cover them. During a live stream in 2017, Perry revealed that having short hair helped her gain confidence. "People talk about my hair, right? They don't like it or they wish that it was longer. I so badly want to be Katheryn Hudson that I don't even want to look like Katy Perry anymore sometimes," the star revealed (via PopSugar). "I really want to be my authentic self."

Even though the musician's pixie haircut looked stunning, Katy Perry eventually got tired of it and let it grow into a chic French bob. "Changing my hair definitely was the biggest physical transformation I have experienced as a woman," Perry told Paper in 2019. "When you don't have long hair, you really can't hide behind it. Everything is exposed."

The star kept her hair platinum blond — a shade that softened her features and gave her a youthful look — and the chin length allowed her to have fun with different hairstyles again. For her Fight On concert in Australia in early 2020, Perry decided to rock a fun half-updo with flipped-out ends, which were very popular at the time. As expected, the singer showed that unlike what many may think, a bob haircut is actually very versatile in terms of styling.

In 2021, Katy Perry once again embraced long dark locks. However, the star revealed on social media that the hair wasn't actually hers. "Everything is fake," Perry wrote alongside a photo of herself with short blond hair, which she posted on Instagram Stories (via FM 104).

Of course, it was clear that Perry's new ultra-long hair had to be either extensions or a wig, as nobody's hair can grow that fast — no matter what amount of rosemary oil for hair growth they might be applying. While hosting "Saturday Night Live" in 2022, Perry's luscious hair was in the spotlight. "The inspiration for Katy's look came from her recent music video for 'When I'm Gone,'" hairstylist Jesus Guerrero revealed (via The Zoe Report). "We wanted to create a very textured and messy yet perfectly shiny look for her stage performance. Working with Katy is always so fun, she has such radiant energy that makes styling her hair so fun," he added. While the star has rocked dark and long hair before, this time around, the loose, messy waves and middle part combined with the waist-length of her hair caused fans to point out comparisons between Perry and Megan Fox — and we definitely see it!

In 2023, Katy Perry continued rocking long dark hair. While the star still gave us plenty of variety, one trend we couldn't help but notice Perry jumped on was the '90s updo á la Pamela Anderson. The key to achieving the look was the messy face-framing pieces that helped the hairstyle appear so nonchalant. In fact, if we didn't know better, we might even think that a hairstyle like this could be quickly achieved simply by gathering your hair in a loose, messy bun. Of course, the reality is that the face-framing pieces are meticulously pulled out and positioned, and a style like this often takes more time to create than a sleek bun.

In 2023, Perry also experimented with micro-bangs — a hairstyle that few can pull off. While we can't be 100% sure, it's most likely that the '50s-inspired micro bangs were simply clip-ins that allowed the musician to switch things up for a bit. Just days after she was spotted rocking them at a Wimbledon tennis game, the musician was seen without them.

When we first heard of Katy Perry in the aughts, no one could have predicted just how fun and bold her hair journey would become. While it's no secret that pop divas love switching up their hair, not many do it as boldly and courageously as Katy Perry. "People have really strong feelings about my hair," the musician told E! News in 2024 after she showed up to an "American Idol" episode with a bob haircut. "For years, they have." Perry even shared a video of getting her hair chopped into a short bob by her hairstylist, Jesus Guerrero, on Instagram. However, during the "American Idol" episode, the singer came clean. "Big shoutout to all my KatyKat fans who think I got a haircut. They're traitors," Perry said (via Byrdie). "This is a wig."

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If there's one thing we're sure about, it's that Perry will truly never let us know her next hair move. Instead, she will simply surprise us with a fun change. And while Perry has established herself as a pop powerhouse and fashion icon, a journey through her hairstyles over the years clearly proves that the singer is also a major trendsetter when it comes to hair colors and cuts!