Ameenah Cheryl — Rich Roots Dialogue

Crown Work begins within.

Your Crown Is More Than Your Hair.

Rich Roots Dialogue helps Black and mixed-race women and girls develop healthier relationships with their hair, beauty, identity and self-perception — through education, self-regulation, faith and community.

Explore Crown WorkExplore the Rich Roots Ecosystem
A Black woman with a natural afro, eyes closed, hand resting in her hair
Cheryl Shaw — speaker at the Top 100 Most Powerful Black Women Virtual Summit, 19–23 October 2026

Coming up · 19–23 October 2026

Join me at the Top 100 Most Powerful Black Women in Business Summit.

I’m excited to share that I’ll be a featured speaker at the Top 100 Most Powerful Black Women in Business Summit, happening virtually from October 19–23, 2026.

I’ll be sharing insights from my work around Crown Work, self-identity, Black women’s hair, beauty standards and cultural healing—and how we can move beyond performing confidence to building a deeper sense of self.

The summit features 100 masterclasses over 5 days, with powerful Black women from different industries, and it’s completely FREE to attend.

I’d love for you to join me.

Find out more

“Your relationship with your crown is about more than your hair.”

Rich Roots explores what happens when we begin to understand the relationship between hair, beauty, identity, self-perception, self-regulation, self-worth, self-care, self-love, self-acceptance, faith and community — and address the outside and the inside together.

The bigger picture

Connecting the Dots.

For years, the questions seemed separate.

  • Why do we struggle with our hair?
  • Why does beauty affect our confidence?
  • Why can comparison become so powerful?
  • Why do some of us neglect ourselves?
  • Why can covering our hair sometimes become a reason to disconnect from caring for it?
  • Why do external standards become internal beliefs?

Rich Roots exists because these questions are connected. The ecosystem brings the dots together.

A mother braiding her daughter's hair in warm afternoon light
  1. Hair
  2. Beauty
  3. Identity
  4. Self-Perception
  5. Regulation
  6. Self-Worth
  7. Self-Care
  8. Self-Acceptance
  9. Community

The Rich Roots Ecosystem

Seven connected ways to do the work.

Haircare, a framework, coaching, youth programmes, an annual gala and a sisterhood — one ecosystem built around a single idea.

Explore the Ecosystem

Start where you are

Where are you on the journey?

Choose the sentence that sounds most like you. We'll take you to the right place.

Ameenah Cheryl Shaw

Speaker | Researcher | Self-Perception Specialist

Almost two decades of connecting the dots.

Ameenah Cheryl Shaw founded Rich Roots Dialogue from lived experience inside the Black hair and beauty space — and from years of noticing that the questions women and girls asked about their hair were rarely just about hair.

Read the founder storyBook Me to Speak

Impact

What women and girls tell us.

“I came for the haircare. I left understanding why I had avoided my own reflection for years.”

Participant · Crown Restoration Challenge

“My daughter walked onto that stage like she belonged there. Because she did.”

Parent · Lil' Sis Wear Your Crown

“Nobody had ever connected hair, faith and self-worth for our girls like this.”

Youth worker · Hair & Beauty Perceptions workshop

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Girls engaged

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Women supported

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Workshops delivered

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Communities reached

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Programmes delivered

  1. See yourself→
  2. Understand your story→
  3. Question the narrative→
  4. Restore the relationship→
  5. Care for your crown→
  6. Wear your crown→
  7. Help the next generation do the same

Begin within

Start your Crown Work.

My hair is part of my story — but my story is bigger than my hair.

Start Your Crown WorkJoin the Sisterhood