Beauty supply stores hold a unique place in the lives of Black women. Whether they need kanekalon hair to complete a set of box braids, tracks to finish a sew-in weave, or something to sleek down their edges, it’s one of the few spaces where Black women and their beauty needs aren’t an afterthought. Often it’s where the best ideas for new hairstyles brew; where exchanging product recommendations or hair-care tips with other customers can change your mood around a certain technique or style; a one-stop shop for all things Black hair. Filmmakers Audrey Williams and Marissa Pina set out to capture this in their new documentary, Black Girl Church, which explores the relationship of Black women to the beauty supply store and why sometimes being there can feel like being in a sanctuary (hence the film’s name).

The idea came to Williams while she was aimlessly walking around a beauty supply store to clear her mind. “As soon as I went in, my mood changed. I started getting hype just thinking about what I could do to switch up my look,” Williams tells Teen Vogue. “And then it got me thinking about why the beauty supply felt this way, like such a safe space, and why, across the board, all of the Black women I'd ever met had such similar experiences.”

Soon after, she got Pina on board. “When I heard her pitch I immediately knew that this was a project we needed to put out into the world together,” says Pina. “We planned our team, which consists of Audrey, myself, and Joe Schaefer, our director of photography, and set out to tell a story that felt very much like a love letter to the beauty supply store and Black women, at first, but it evolved from there.”

In addition to covering why and how beauty salon stores have become a staple for Black women, the documentary also touches on some less-talked about problems within beauty supply stores, like lightening products, and the lack of beauty supply stores owned by Black people, despite their frequent patronage. The beauty supply store is a major resource for many Black women, but some of the items sold in these establishments can make these women, their core customers, feel like they aren’t good enough. “Beauty supply stores are these little spaces in our community that are specifically for us, for Black women,” Williams says in the trailer.

“But then you see the products that are reflecting messages from outside of the community. ‘Do you have nappy hair? Straighten it. Do you have dark skin? Lighten it.’”

Black Girl Church will start screening in New York City and neighboring cities in early April. Ahead of the release, creative director Micaéla Verrelien put together a fashion shoot of the same name to promote the film. Drawing inspiration from the music video for “Bills, Bills, Bills” by Destiny’s Child, which was set in a hair salon, Verrelien decided to stage the shoot at Pink Hair Salon, a Black-owned hair salon in Brooklyn, to showcase the beauty and ever-changing nature of black women’s hair. “For me, fashion and hair works hand in hand. We spend hours at the hair salon in order to look beautiful in our outfits later,” she says. “I took what the documentary was about and [translated] it on an editorial scale.”