ANTM winner Adrianne Curry says Tyra Banks' makeover 'permanently damaged' her head, 'partially b...

&34;I think most of those makeovers were done just to torture us,&34; Curry alleged, adding that she had an &34;oozing wound&34; on the side of her scalp after the show. ANTM winner Adrianne Curry says Tyra Banks' makeover 'permanently damaged' her head, 'partially bald' 22 years later &34;I think most of those makeovers were done just to torture us,&34; Curry alleged, adding that she had an &34;oozing wound&34; on the side of her scalp after the show. :maxbytes(150000):stripicc()/JoeyNolfiauthorphotoba4923fec03a4027868306485696ef41.jpg) Joey Nolfi is a senior writer at .

"I think most of those makeovers were done just to torture us," Curry alleged, adding that she had an "oozing wound" on the side of her scalp after the show.

ANTM winner Adrianne Curry says Tyra Banks' makeover 'permanently damaged' her head, 'partially bald' 22 years later

"I think most of those makeovers were done just to torture us," Curry alleged, adding that she had an "oozing wound" on the side of her scalp after the show.

Joey Nolfi is a senior writer at *. *Since 2016, his work at EW includes *RuPaul's Drag Race* video interviews, Oscars predictions, and more.

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October 31, 2025 9:01 a.m. ET

Tyra Banks in Sydney in 2025; Adrianne Curry on 'America's Next Top Model'. Credit:

Don Arnold/WireImage; UPN

- *ANTM* cycle 1 winner Adrianne Curry says Tyra Banks' makeover led to an "oozing wound."

- Curry alleges that the painful weave she got left her "partially bald" 22 years later.

- "I think most of those makeovers were done just to torture us," Curry maintains.

*America's Next Top Model* cycle 1 winner Adrianne Curry allegedly suffered for her art, as the reality personality and fashion model has claimed that a Tyra Banks-led makeover she got on the program left her "partially bald" 22 years later.

More than two decades after winning the modeling competition's inaugural season, Curry claimed in a new Instagram video that Banks' vision to elevate her look at the time resulted in hair that "doesn't grow anymore" on a particular patch of scalp near her left temple.

Curry showed off the portion of her head in the video before telling the story behind it.

"The reason is, when I was on *Top Model*, Tyra Banks told them to put a weave in my hair," the *ANTM* star and eventual *Surreal Life* personality said. "The Black stylists that were putting it in pulled her aside. I heard them tell her, 'This white chick's hair is too fragile for this."

Adrianne Curry on 'America's Next Top Model'.

The 43-year-old alleged that Banks told them to "just do it," so they proceeded.

Curry said that "halfway through," she "had an oozing wound from the braid" and that "half my hair had been ripped out" of her head.

After winning the show, Curry said she traveled back to her hometown of Joliet, Ill., where she "had to go to a Black salon" to get the weave properly removed — but she couldn't tell the employees where she got it put in "because I was under an NDA."

She said it took "hours and hours" for the staff to remove the weave, and that she was "left with a horrific mullet, scabs all over my head," and that the staff told her whoever put the weave in her head must've been "someone who hates" her.

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"It's permanently damaged from that weave," Curry said of the current state of her scalp. "It was so painful. I remember [fellow contestant] Kesse on the show was trying to teach me how to itch it, but I didn't know. I didn't know any of this. Before that, she saw me [scratching it] with a fork."

Curry finished the video by alleging that "I think most of those makeovers were done just to torture us," and pointed out that she'd just trimmed her hair for one of the show's photo challenges days prior, so the fact that they wanted to change her look again on the makeover episode shocked her.

** has reached out to a representative for Banks for comment.

In *ANTM* cycle 1, episode 3, "The Girl Who Gets Rushed to the Emergency Room," Curry says in a confessional that she endured pain throughout the salon visit.

Andre Leon Talley, Tyra Banks, Nigel Barker, and Dania Ramirez on 'America's Next Top Model'.

Barbara Nitke/The CW/Courtesy Everett

"The whole process with the weave is very long and pretty painful, but I don't like to show anybody I'm going through pain, so I didn't say anything," she says. "It was definitely worth it, you know? I look a million times different."

Later in the episode, Curry suffers another setback as she's taken to the hospital after coming down with food poisoning, though she later returns to set in time for panel, where the judges praise her tenacity.

Following her victory on the show, Curry became critical of the program and Banks, though her opinion on the reality TV experience has softened over the years.

In a 2023 interview with EW looking back at some of the most shocking *ANTM* moments in history, Curry spoke about getting groped on the streets of Paris during filming (a portion of which the show documented on the air), and she alleged that she received prizes that paled in comparison to what the show promised contestants during filming.

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"What I won was to go to Revlon corporate, sit in a back room, have a makeup artist put makeup on my face for a team of about seven people watching me. Who the f--- would fight as hard as we fought for that?" Curry said, noting that she was "f---ing humiliated" by the job — which she said paid around $15,000 — a stark contrast to the "huge Revlon models" the judges told them during production that they'd end up being.**

Watch Curry discuss her *ANTM* makeover in the video above.

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Published: November 03, 2025 at 10:01AM on Source: ANIO MAG

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