The Gold Bobby Pins That Saved Me From Awkward Hair-Grow-Out Stage

Racked is no longer publishing. Thank you to everyone who read our work over the years. The archives will remain available here; for new stories, head over to Vox.com, where our staff is covering consumer culture for The Goods by Vox. You can also see what we’re up to by signing up here.

I know this is a weird thing to have a strong opinion on, but Ban.do’s $12 Everyday Bobbis are the best bobby pins I’ve ever come across.

A year into growing out a pixie cut — I can put most of it in a ponytail now, and when I wear it down, it’s so close to my shoulders — I still need all the help I can get. (There’s only so many days in a row I can wear a half-bun!) About a month ago, rummaging through my junk drawer of makeup and random crap in search of a barrette, I found a small acrylic case of golden bobby pins I bought and forgot about well before I had reached the awkward phase.

But in the time since, these things have been clutch. For one, they’re way thicker than the kind you’d normally pick up at CVS; this means they don’t break or get bent easily, but also that they look substantial enough to just stick one or two pulling my once-bangs to the side, and it’s a whole look.

But the real reason I love them is the color! They come in rose gold and black, but I like the yellow gold best; it feels more like wearing jewelry than just a method for plastering your unruly hair to your head.

If you don’t want to spend $12 on bobby pins (I get it), you can find similar-looking ones at H&M for $2.99. But it’s worth noting here that Ban.do, a company that, for me at least, is now synonymous with graphic T-shirts, pins, and patches bearing cheeky millennial slogans, actually got its start selling hair accessories. So there’s a reason why these are so good — they’re made by the experts.