By ANGELA PIDDUCK Sunday, January 22 2012

“AFROBELLA” is a natural hair, beauty, fashion and make-up blog site which attracts thousands of internet users on a daily basis. However, what many people do not know is that the face behind the site is none other than Trinidad and Tobago-born Patrice Grell-Yursik.

It’s difficult to describe this 32-year-old woman who is so many things in one individual. At the present time, the interest she has generated on her site has catapulted her into the international limelight, earning her an opportunity to work as a red-carpet interviewer at the Academy Awards in Los Angeles between February 23 and 28th.

Grell-Yursik, who lives in Chicago, is first and foremost a writer, having graduated with A- level English from Bishop Anstey High School. The youngest of Patrick and Peggy Grell’s five children, who has been visiting her family at Westmoorings this past week, completed a Bachelor of Science degree at the University of Miami with a double major in Film Script Writing and Creative Writing, followed by a Masters in Creative Writing on full scholarship, while teaching freshman English and creative writing as part of the Masters degree.

It was at the UOM that she met Steve Yursik, a Chicago native whom she married on May 25, 2002, and has recently moved back to Chicago, where Yursik is a systems administrator.

For five years, Grell-Yursik worked as assistant calendar editor at the Miami New Times – part of the Village Voice Media chain. But says this extremely confident young woman, “I found that I wanted more of a creative outlet, and saw a void in the media where women like myself with natural hair, brown skin and not wearing a size two, were not in or on television. I knew if I wanted to see reflections of myself, there were other women who felt that way as well.”

So while at the New Times, she started a blog, went home and stayed up and wrote. The blog became quite popular very quickly, but when she was promoted to editor of the Calendar Section, it became clear a choice would have to be made at a certain point.

“So with my husband and a dear friend, Ehren, while sitting around drinking wine, Ehren suggested that since I had things to say and could actually write, let us all know that we are all beautiful. It was a very whimsical decision.”

Her husband came up with the name “Afrobella” and for the first blog in Miami on August 13, 2006, Grell-Yursik wrote about her natural hair journey, which had started from the day of her wedding.



“I am married and natural for a decade,” says Afrobella, who hates the process of relaxing her hair “the smell, feel, burning from the chemical, the way it makes everybody look the same”.

“It takes the life and character out of your appearance,” she added. She is careful to add “in my opinion ...Why are you going to continually and chemically fight what you were born to look like. This is what my hair is, so I have chosen to embrace it for what it is, learn what it needs and try to listen to what it is telling me, instead of forcing it to conform to an unrealistic standard of beauty by the use of caustic chemicals.

I am not against hair colour, it is the texture that must be retained. I believe in self expression and every woman has a right to be beautiful on their own terms, and I believe that we as a society love to tell people what they are supposed to look like, to be wearing, and to do with their lives”.

“I created my own avenue for self-expression through the blog, there was none before that, and that is the beautiful thing with the internet instead of waiting for somebody to give you an opportunity you can make your own.”

And this Grell-Yursik did through creating Afrobella.

“Brands approach me now and invite me to go on trips around the world and America, and since I work for myself I am able to do these things. It needs consistency, is hard work and needs a lot of drive that not everybody has,” says this well spoken young woman who definitely has her very own fashion sense.

In 2011 Grell-Yursik partnered with MAC Cosmetics to create her own Lip Glass called “All Of My Purple Life”, part of the Bloggers’ Obsession Collection which debuted on June 21, 2011, and sold out immediately.

“Nine of us bloggers were chosen to be part of it. This was such an honour and has brought amazing opportunities. Named after the first line of a song by Prince, All of My Purple Life was re-released, and it was the only colour from the collection which again completely sold out,” Grell-Yursik recalled.

Afrobella is listed in Ebony’s Power 100 list of the most powerful black people in America, a credit which reads: “All shades of beautiful” is the mantra — founder is Patrice Elizabeth Grell.” When she first heard about this honour, Grell-Yursik assumed it would be other writers or bloggers. “I didn’t think it was going to be people, generally, in the United States. It’s a wonderful honour to be listed with the likes of Barack and Michelle Obama, Oprah, and JayZ,” she said. Afrobella, who often writes about her homeland and in fact kept her fans abreast of her activities during her latest visit, has won more than ten online awards, including inclusion to the Black Weblog Awards Hall of Fame, and has been covered in The New York Times, Essence, Ebony, Glamour and Fast Company, while Grell-Yursik has appeared in ad campaigns for cosmetics powerhouse Lancome and hair care brand Cream of Nature, and has hosted events for Carol’s Daughter.

As Afrobella’s sixth anniversary approaches, Grell-Yursik, who returns to the US today, has been to New York Fashion Week four times to cover back stage, interview celebrities and attend the fashion shows. However, she will miss this February because instead she will be at the Oscars in Los Angeles to interview as many celebrities as possible.

What will she be wearing?

Three American designers have offered clothes so far, including the very well-known Carmen Marc Valvo. “It would be nice if an offer came from a local designer, which would give them a plug… These are interesting times because I am now being sought after”, she said.

Added Grell-Yursik, “I write about a variety of topics, culture, life — really whatever inspires me and whatever I think will inspire somebody else.

I have done some public speaking at Columbia College in Chicago, the University of Notre Dame in Indiana, and hosted my own event in Toronto — a conversation with Afrobella about natural hair, and next month will be the keynote speaker at Fro Fashion Week in Atlanta.

“It’s a blessing to forge your own path and I hope that even if I don’t live here, that my story will inspire girls like me who maybe don’t know right now what they are going to grow up to become.

Not everybody has to be a doctor, lawyer or accountant, creativity can be your career path.”

One thing she has learned from the blog is: “I have no idea what the future will bring but I know it’s going to be wonderful.

My future includes writing books, various on-camera activity on television. I never felt compelled before but am now trying to use my power for good by doing charitable acts.

And at the end of last year I went to a group home for abused girls and spoke to them about inner beauty and loving themselves, and taught them how to put on make-up.”

Grell-Yursik created Afrobella.com to fill a void and to celebrate the inner and outer beauty of women all shades of beautiful. Her award-winning blog “shines a loving light on natural hair and the wonderfully wide range of gorgeous skin tones and sizes women come in”. Some refer to her as “the Godmother of Brown Beauty Blogging”.