Billie Eilish unveils lightest hair colour in years with strawberry blonde bob
Billie Eilish debuts her lightest hair colour in years (Billie Eilish/Instagram)
Billie Eilish has debuted a major new hair transformation, swapping her dark brunette locks for a shoulder-length strawberry blonde bob.
The “Birds of a Feather” singer unveiled the lighter look on Instagram on 5 October, breaking a brief social media hiatus with a photo dump showing off her new autumn-ready style.
In a mirror selfie, Eilish, 24, pulled a playful face for the camera while showing off her golden, dark strawberry blonde hair, which featured choppy layers, a deep side part and a shoulder-grazing length. She paired the new look with a dark navy knit sweater, khaki trousers, white socks and black trainers.
The new colour is considerably lighter than the chocolate brunette hair Eilish had been wearing since earlier this year, and brings her closer to her natural ashy blonde shade.
Her latest transformation also marks her first return to blonde territory since her platinum blonde era in 2021, when she famously swapped her black-and-neon-green hair for a dramatically lighter look around the release of her album Happier Than Ever.
Why did Billie Eilish go blonde?
At the time, Eilish said the platinum colour was partly motivated by a desire to become less recognisable.
“I couldn’t go anywhere with that hair because it was so obviously me. I wanted anonymity,” she told Elle in 2021, explaining that she had been concerned about paparazzi and stalkers.
The singer later reflected that being blonde changed how people treated her, telling Highsnobiety that she “didn’t feel sexy for one second” while wearing the colour.
“When I was blonde, people treated me differently,” she said, adding that she believed her more masculine approach to dressing had contributed to people taking her more seriously.
Since then, Eilish has continued to experiment with her appearance. She began moving away from her darker hair earlier this year, appearing with dark auburn roots before debuting a deep copper bob in August while filming the upcoming adaptation of Sylvia Plath’s The Bell Jar, in which she plays Esther Greenwood.
Billie’s hair history
Her latest photo dump also appeared to nod to her extensive history of hair transformations, including a blurry image of Eilish with the vivid blue hair she wore as a teenager.
Eilish first dyed her hair blue at just nine years old and has since experimented with shades including silver-white, lavender, blue, black and neon green.
The singer’s latest strawberry blonde look is officially another chapter in a long-running tradition of Eilish using her hair, as well as her wider aesthetic, to reinvent herself from one era to the next.
