The Dark Side.(brown hair)

Byline: editor: Sarah Brown

Is brown hair the new blonde? All the best models and social swans think so. Lifelong brunette Marina Rust talks to the pros about the trend sweeping the country.

Fashion is feeling a seismic shift. New York's spring runways witnessed the familiar sea of lemony blondes filing past, but once everyone got to Europe, dark hair ruled the collections. At Balenciaga, Nicolas Ghesquiere, said to be moved by his muse, Jennifer Connelly, cast a bevy of brunettes: Irina Lazareanu, Freja, and a newly dark Natalia among them. At Gucci, even the icon blondes--Carmen Kass, Lily Donaldson, Raquel Zimmermann--appeared much more intense, their long hair tinted shades of warm caramel, chestnut, strawberry. Then Agyness Deyn--you know, she of the short white shock--went really dark.

How to explain fashion's turn to the dark side?

"It's the brunette thing," says hairstylist Laurie Foley. Deyn has, in months past, been spotted outside Foley's tiny East Village salon, L'Atelier de Laurie, checking her color in the light. Was she the one who took Deyn dark?

"No," replies Foley. "They did it in Milan for Armani. Fashion right now is about luxury. The rich look of the clothes. Designers use models who connote the clothes. Whether short or long, clean, shiny, polished hair goes with that luxury look. Rich sable-brown. It's money. High-end society. Gossip Girl. "

Gossip Girl ? I'm glad Foley brings that up. In Blair Waldorf, the CW has provided a postmodern Veronica Lodge, complete with a sweet, blonde, Betty-ish frenemy, Serena. Their struggle continues.