Whether you got into Sailor Moon through its English-language TV broadcast version and think of the main character as “Meatball Head” or you’re a Japanese original purist who calls them odango, there’s no denying that anime’s most famous magical girl has aninstantly recognizable hairstyle. Not only is it iconic, it’s actually pretty cute too.
Even better, unlike many of anime’s most well-known looks, it’s pretty easy look to achieve in real life, as shown by this short instructional video of how to give yourself the Sailor Moon hairdo.
Yes, Twintail Day was last month, but that doesn’t mean you can’t enjoy the flowing tails and tiny hair buns of the Pretty Soldier herself. It’s a not at all uncommon desire for fans of the show, it turns out. “I remember about 20 years ago,” reminisces one Japanese woman online, “for my first day at elementary school, I told my mom ‘Do my hair like Sailor Moon!’ and I was so happy when she did.”
There are a lot of responsibilities we take on as we become older, though, one of which is having to do our own personal grooming. So if you’re too old to ask Mom to roll your hair into a set of odango or meatballs (or, we suppose, one odango and one meatball, if you’re feeling multicultural), it’s time to grow up and do your own magical girl hair-styling with this video from YouTube uploader Dakotakoti.
Let’s take a look at the steps Dakota demonstrates. While it may not be apparent at first, Sailor Moon’s hairstyle is actually made up of four tails, which Dakota forms one at a time.
Brush your hair behind one of your ears, then grab about half of what you’ve got tucked there and tie it up with a rubber band to form the first tail.
You can pull a bit of the hair back out of the tail to give it a little more play.
Repeat the process on the other side of your head. Try to keep it about the same height as the first tail, so everything stays nice and symmetrical.
Go back to the first tail, and brush the hair back towards your head to give yourself more volume to work with. Once you have enough, wrap the tail around itself to make a bun, and then add three or so hairpins to keep everything in place.
Now it’s back to the other side to make odango number two in the same manner.
With that, you’re actually done with the hard part, since all that’s really left to do is add a pair of simple ponytails, made with the rest of the hair you’ve got combed behind your ears that didn’t go into the odango. Brush it, gather it, tie it with a band, and maybe place a hairpin at the base, if you want to add a little life to it. You can also give the finished tails a couple of twists with your fingers to add just a touch of curling.
Finally, add Sailor Moon-style hair clips, which we’re just going to assume you have if you’re trying to copy her hairstyle.
And with that, you’re done!
Just bear in mind that since both magical girl Sailor Moon and her ordinary alter ego Usagi have more or less the same hairstyle, you might not immediately be able to tell which of the two you’ve transformed into. In order to be safe, we strongly caution you to shout, “Moon prism power, make up!” and power up before going out to fight evil monsters while sporting your new anime ‘do.