The Hair Tools Behind Meghan's 'California Cool' Look

The hair tools behind Meghan’s “California cool” waves are, refreshingly, not a closely guarded secret. Her longtime UK hairdresser built a whole retail range around getting that exact loose, undone texture at home, and it has been sitting on Boots shelves since 2021 for the price of a nice dinner rather than a salon visit. No smoke, no mirrors, just a specific curling iron, a specific technique, and a stylist willing to explain both.

That stylist is George Northwood, and the tool at the centre of it all is a £65 curling tong with a longer-than-usual barrel, designed from the outset to avoid the tight, springy curl and land instead on something looser and more lived-in. It is the tool equivalent of Meghan’s off-duty hair itself: considered, but never overworked.

This piece is about the hardware: the tongs, the dryer, the straightener, and what is actually inside them. The technique Northwood uses to wield them, and how to recreate it step by step, is a story for another day on Court & Capital.

Meet George Northwood, the stylist behind the look

George Northwood is one of British hairdressing’s quieter success stories, a London-based stylist whose client list has long included Alexa Chung and Rosie Huntington-Whiteley, and who became Meghan’s go-to hairdresser during her years as a working royal. He was first brought in to style her hair for the evening reception at Frogmore House on her wedding day in May 2018, creating the softly undone low bun she wore to greet guests that night, and was reportedly invited to the celebration himself afterwards, a rare mark of trust for a stylist rather than simply a supplier.

From there, Northwood became a recurring presence around Meghan’s most photographed appearances, styling looks across royal tours and public engagements for roughly two years. He has spoken warmly about their first meeting, saying he and Meghan “hit it off straight away,” adding that “as soon as I met her, she was just like my California girl clients.” That throwaway line, in hindsight, explains a great deal about the texture he chose to give her hair rather than the polished, more formal blow-dry royal hairstyling had traditionally favoured. It was Northwood’s eye for that relaxed, faintly undone finish that eventually became a product line of its own.

From salon chair to Boots shelf: the Undone launch

In 2021, Northwood took the leap most in-demand stylists eventually consider and launched Undone by George Northwood, a haircare and styling-tools range sold exclusively through Boots rather than in salons or on a standalone boutique site, a distribution choice that put his signature look within reach of anyone doing a weekly shop rather than booking a Mayfair appointment.

Of the collection’s guiding idea, Northwood has said: “We wanted it to be refined imperfection, that’s what sums her up,” a line that reads as being as much about Meghan’s off-duty aesthetic as it is about the brand itself. The styling side of the range launched with three heated tools built around that same brief: the Curl It Tong (£65), the Blow Dry It hairdryer (£65), and the Straighten or Wave It flat iron (£55), a trio designed to be used interchangeably rather than each solving one narrow job.

Northwood was explicit that the tools were not an afterthought bolted onto a haircare launch. “My collection would not have been complete without my tools,” he said at launch, “these will help you to achieve the look of some of my much-loved muses,” and muses is the operative word for a range so visibly shaped by Meghan’s own hair.

The Curl It Tong, specification by specification

The Curl It Tong is the piece most directly tied to Meghan’s look, and its specifications explain why. It has a 26mm barrel, longer and slightly wider than the 19-22mm tongs typically marketed for tight ringlets, which is the single biggest factor in producing a loose, open wave rather than a defined curl. Heat runs from 120°C to 210°C, controlled through a rotary dial with an LCD display, so fine or previously coloured hair can be styled at the lower end of the range while thicker hair can go higher.

Practical details round out the design: a spring-activated lever at the tip clamps hair ends in place without a separate clip, a cool tip at the end of the barrel is there so styling doesn’t mean burnt fingertips, and a fold-out safety stand lets the tong rest on a bathroom counter between sections without scorching the surface. It also shuts off automatically after 60 minutes of inactivity, a small but sensible feature for anyone who has left a styling tool plugged in and dashed out the door. Shop the Curl It Tong.

How the barrel shapes the wave

Barrel length and diameter do most of the visible work in any curling tool, and the Curl It Tong’s proportions are a deliberate rejection of the standard salon curling wand. A shorter, narrower barrel wraps hair into a tight coil that reads as a curl the moment it cools; the Curl It Tong’s longer 26mm barrel wraps a wider section of hair more loosely, so what drops out once released is closer to a wave than a ringlet, the exact quality that made Meghan’s hair read as undone rather than styled.

Northwood’s own guidance for using it leans into that effect further: tong the section away from the face, then gently pull the curl open with your fingers once it has cooled, rather than leaving it tightly coiled. The result loosens further still, landing somewhere between “just back from the beach” and “just left the blow-dry bar,” the two reference points Northwood has repeatedly cited as his actual brief.

It helps to work in generous sections rather than the thin slices a tight-ringlet tutorial would call for. The wider the piece of hair fed into that 26mm barrel, the softer and less uniform the resulting wave, which is precisely the point. Alternating the direction of the tong from section to section, rather than curling every piece the same way, also stops the finished look from reading as a single continuous curl pattern, keeping it closer to hair that simply dried that way.

The rest of the Undone range

The Curl It Tong does not work in isolation, and the wider Undone by George Northwood range fills in the rest of the routine. Alongside the three heated styling tools, Boots stocks an Undamaged Shampoo and Conditioner for coloured or heat-styled hair, a separate Unparched Conditioner aimed at dry lengths, a Moisturising Cream for taming frizz without weighing hair down, and a Volume Spray for adding root lift before any heat tool comes near the hair. Every product in the range is built around the same 250ml-or-so retail format and sits at accessible, high-street pricing rather than premium salon-brand rates.

It is a genuinely complete system rather than a single hero product with accessories bolted on: wash, treat, protect, then style, all under one name, all available in a single Boots trip. For anyone trying to recreate a specific look rather than assemble a routine from five different brands, that coherence is arguably as useful as any individual tool’s specifications. The haircare side also matters more than it might first appear: the loose, glossy texture Northwood is known for depends as much on well-conditioned, frizz-free hair going into the styling stage as it does on the tongs themselves, so the shampoo and conditioner are less an afterthought than the groundwork.

Does it actually work? What the reviews say

Independent reviews of the range have been genuinely useful reading, and mostly complimentary. Refinery29’s side-by-side test rated the Blow Dry It hairdryer as the standout of the three tools, finding it noticeably lighter than a premium salon dryer nearly two-and-a-half times its price and capable of cutting drying time significantly while still leaving hair smooth. The Curl It Tong earned solid marks for producing genuinely relaxed, wearable waves rather than curls that needed brushing out, though the same review noted the wave held less well across a full day on very thick hair, a fair caveat rather than a dealbreaker for most hair types.

The Straighten or Wave It flat iron was the most divisive of the three, with reviewers finding its plates better suited to fine or mid-density hair than to thick sections needing multiple passes. Taken together, the reviews paint an honest picture: a well-designed, thoughtfully priced range with one genuine standout, one dependable core product in the tong, and one tool worth trying before assuming it will suit every hair type. None of it reads as a celebrity name slapped on a generic factory tool, which is more than can be said for a good many high-street ranges that trade on a famous stylist’s client list rather than genuine product development.

A wave that travelled from Frogmore House to the high street

There is something quietly democratic about a royal hairstylist choosing Boots over a boutique for his own product launch. Meghan’s hair, during her working-royal years, was as closely studied as her wardrobe: endlessly searched, screenshotted and asked about. Rather than let that curiosity stay locked behind a stylist’s diary, Northwood turned it into something anyone could actually buy. The Curl It Tong will not make a stranger’s hair identical to Meghan’s; hair texture, length and history all matter too much for that. What it offers instead is the same starting proportions and the same loose, unfussy intention that made the look recognisable in the first place, which, for a £65 curling iron sold a few aisles from the toothpaste, is not a bad piece of royal-adjacent history to own.

Frequently asked questions

Who is George Northwood, and what is his connection to Meghan Markle?

George Northwood is a London-based celebrity hairstylist whose clients include Alexa Chung and Rosie Huntington-Whiteley. He styled Meghan Markle’s hair for her wedding evening reception at Frogmore House in May 2018 and became one of her regular hairdressers for roughly two years afterwards, across royal tours and public engagements.

What is the Undone by George Northwood Curl It Tong?

It is a £65 curling tong sold exclusively at Boots as part of Northwood’s Undone haircare and styling range, launched in 2021. It has a 26mm barrel, longer than a standard curling wand, specifically designed to create loose, undone waves rather than tight curls.

How much does the Curl It Tong cost and where can I buy it?

The Curl It Tong retails at £65 and is sold at Boots, alongside the rest of the Undone by George Northwood range, which also includes a £65 hairdryer and a £55 flat iron.

What temperature should I use to get loose waves like Meghan’s?

The Curl It Tong heats from 120°C to 210°C via a rotary dial. Finer or colour-treated hair generally styles well nearer the lower end of that range, while thicker, more resistant hair may need the higher settings to hold a wave.

Did George Northwood style Meghan Markle’s wedding ceremony hair?

No. Meghan’s wedding ceremony hairstyle was created by a different stylist; George Northwood styled her hair for the evening reception at Frogmore House later that same day, creating the softly undone bun she wore to greet guests.

What other products are in the Undone by George Northwood range?

Beyond the Curl It Tong, the range includes a Blow Dry It hairdryer, a Straighten or Wave It flat iron, an Undamaged Shampoo and Conditioner, an Unparched Conditioner, a Moisturising Cream and a Volume Spray, all sold through Boots.

Is the Curl It Tong good for thick hair?

It performs well on most hair types and is specifically built for a looser wave, though independent reviews have noted the wave can hold slightly less well across a full day on very thick hair compared with fine or mid-density hair.

How do you use the Curl It Tong to get an “undone” wave rather than a curl?

Northwood’s own guidance is to tong sections away from the face and then gently pull the curl open with your fingers once it has cooled, rather than leaving it tightly wound, a technique that loosens the finished wave further and softens any defined curl shape.

Product specifications and pricing for the Undone by George Northwood range are drawn from Boots’ own listings and contemporaneous UK press coverage of the 2021 launch; independent review findings are drawn from published third-party testing. Some details, such as exact review scoring, may vary slightly between sources over time.