➿ Fantastic Haircare: Making Sense and Science of the Curly Girl Method (thread 2)

[botemp]

Offshoot thread from the Fantastic Skincare threads to document the trials and tribulations in order to make sense and science of the curly girl method. We don't necessarily follow it to the letter and are even critical of it in places. Nor are we especially knowledgeable at this point but we're learning as we go. Feel free to join in as we attempt to approach this with an interest in ingredients and try to not buy everything that promises us magical things…

Useful blogs:

Curly Cailín on the golden triangle of healthy hair
Science-y Hair Blog
The Mestiza Muse
The Beauty Brains (podcast/blog)

Understanding ingredients:

Commonly found ingredients in haircare

Useful information about cosmetic chemistry

Porosity:

(video)

Removing build up:

Shampoos which remove product build up

Cationic compounds (of interest to those with buildup prone and/or fine hair):

Cationic compounds found in cosmetics

Polyquats (of interest to those with buildup prone and/or fine hair):

Polyquat buildup

To polyquats or not

Silicones, polyquats and soap

Another cosmetic ingredient to be afraid of?

Protein/Moisture balance:

(video)

Extract and proteins in CGM, a biochemist explains

(video)

Hygral Fatigue

SPF protection of your hair:

UV protectant ingredients

UV damage of hair (pubmed)

Summers sun and your hair

Rice water rinses:

Rice Water Rinse

Elasticity:

Is it too late to improve your elasticity

Managing elasticity and porosity in hair

Hard and soft water:

(video)

Hard water and your hair

Olaplex:

How does Olaplex hair treatment work

Frizz:

Hair frizz science

What's your frizz type

How to tame your hair based on frizz type

Flash Drying:

Flash Drying

Next level nerdery:

Chemical and Physical Behavior of Human Hair (cosmetic chemists' textbook)

It is layered but long ones as I wanted to keep the length. I showed her some pics and I guess it's an inverted long bob!
I'm not quite sure about how she did it, wizardry I think she said I have lots of hair but it's very fine and will need protein little and often
Used my own products and some of hers so styling was moogoo protein shot, treluxe serum then treluxe and ecoslay gel mixed together
She used a denman brush to brush through the product then did small sections, brushed it and shook it before diffusing

I'll post a pic when I wash it myself as well but she did say I am more on the edge of wavy/curly than curly so to not co wash constantly

I'm so pleased you've had a positive experience Queen. Looks lovely! It's interesting re what Bo says re us being used to it being tighter. I wonder if it's because it was shorter.

I'm going to have mine coloured on Tuesday - my regular, local hairdresser. I'm 90% sure I'm going to ask her to square off the length. I'll post a pic in a minute (am on laptop and they're on my phone) to demonstrate.

Good luck for tomorrow Sophie. Let us know how you get on.

The ends are annoying me and I do feel they're too thin and wispy. In the second photo I've tucked them under. I think I'm going to have it cut like this on Tuesday. I wonder what it will do to my waves/curls though. I am finding that they don't last in the top half of my head around the fronts and sides. Possibly because I have a habit of tucking hair behind my ears.

I just feel I want a blunter shape. What do you think?

(Pics have obviously posted in reverse).

< swishes in with newly washed hair >
Just used moogoo protein shot as a leave in them Aussie instant freeze gel. Pretty pleased! Hopefully this cut is the end of my bad bad hair days

queen your hair looks lovely.

On a different note if anybody would like some Olew Curl Cream pm me. I finally splurged on a few more expensive products and after one use I've decided it's not for me. I'd forgotten that I've never found a cream I like, my hair definitely prefers gel. It also has a very strong smell which I'm not keen on.
I'm not selling it well am I?

Oh wow Queen the geometric shape has held up really well with your usual curl pattern.

I'm not that interested in the product piano but I must say that the jar looks lovely, is it glass?

I never really know what people mean with blunt, Ninny, as it's a cutting technique, but often referred to as a hairstyle like a Bob but a good Bob isn't blunt at all. I'm personally not a fan of it (the technique) on curly hair as it looks quite solid where I prefer a bit more tousled/whispy but I think it's a personal taste thing as opposed to what suits the health of curly hair better. Although, technically, blunt cut hair is more prone to mechanical damage so you have to get it cut more often.

Sophie are you crying in a corner because of your new haircut or, preferably, out living your best life with a fabulous new cut?

Should clarify when I say I don't like blunt cutting technique on curly hair, I'm using my own pattern as reference, I'm not really sure what the point of difference is on tighter curl patterns, maybe blunt is superior there.

So glad I had 2-3 inches off the ends. It just feels more forgiving, ie the curls and waves drop throughout the day but yesterday it just looked very beachy and relaxed and seemed to suit the shape better.

In addition we've decided that yesterday was my last semi-permanent colour. My hairdressser is a little older than me and for a year now she's been embracing her greys and just putting a few lowlights in now and then to break them up and her hair looks fab, and her colour is almost grown out.

I'm going to do the same. I appreciate that lowlights are still colour. But I think it's a good way to transition. It doesn't need to be so black and white. People can be so militant about it. I still only have about 20 to 30 percent greys on top and hardly any underneath/sides/back.

So having some of the length and keep it this length for a while will help in that regard too.

Sophie I hope you're happy with your hair.

PS Bo I don't mean blunt cutting technique. I just meant that the shape has a stronger, sharper finish.

Hello! Sorry I meant to update re haircut but got side tracked.

The guy seemed to know exactly what he was doing and explained it all very well before he cut (ie as to how he would start correcting the previous poor cut and what was wrong with the cut I had etc). But.... he didn't actually seem to cut much at all. My curly friend who came with me said the same and so we we both a bit puzzled afterwards. Happily, the little he cut seems to have made a positive difference to my hair and the straggly ends are much better and he added in some more layers between the short top layer and the bottom. Excellent price too! So will definitely go back to him next time I need a cut. He also did a hair treatment which was supposed to reduce frizz but I didn't notice any difference really (although perhaps my frizz wasn't bad enough after a year of being CGM? I've seen his before and after photos on IG and normally there is a big difference) so probably won't do that again.

Glad it was such a positive experience for you Queen. It really looks lovely.

Good for you embracing your greys Ninny. Do you have a lot of grey? I have a few whites at the front (which is annoying if I tie my hair back) and not ready to accept their presence yet!!.

Thanks Pianomano but I have far too many products already and postage here is just too expensive to be worth it.

by the way Bo, the jumpsuit you were wearing on the French fashion thread is gorgeous. Did you keep it?

Oh that all sounds positive Sophie and rather too little off than too much?

No I don't have many greys. Around 25-30% at the front. The rest of it is mid brown (with a little red) do embracing them fully isn't doable, really. I feel happy with this gradual approach

Sophie, that sounds great. I used to have a hairdresser that took very little off but transformed your hair nonetheless. She was brilliant but disappeared on me but I find when I trim myself this happens too, I don't need to take much off.

Wrt jumpsuit, I only tried it on, the bit of polyester in it put me off but maybe I'll go back for another look. I do like it but it didn't give me an I must absolutely have this feeling.

Yeah I guess the haircut was good. At least he didn't make it worse but still got quite a bit of growing out to do.

Ah think I misread your previous post Ninny.... thought you were just going to grow out your greys but now I see you're going to lowlight them

I'm not diffusing my hair much these days. I find diffusing so boring and time consuming and it's hot here now. Plus diffusing makes my top layer spring up too much and makes the difference with the straggly ends even more noticeable.

I am growing them out Sophie. Trouble is I've only got about 30% so we are going to add a smattering of low lights rather than have a blanket semi permanent covering (which I'm suddenly finding to be a bit odd looking. Which could be confirmation bias).

I've started a business around all this malarky .

Three months in and it's going well.

Ooh Ninny what's the business?

Hmmm. I wonder who reported me for spamming?

That wasn't my intention and I thought that would have been clear from my post.

That's weird ninny. Maybe you wrote something which triggers the system automatically? Can you try to post again?

I probably put too much detail in Sophie so it might have looked really spammy, but as you know I've been on this thread from the very beginning and I was just trying to say a bit about my business.

Anyway, I will try again with less info! Having struggled to find a big enough t-shirt towel over the last year, and leaving my job at a start-up in eTail in February I had a lightbulb moment and decided to start making and selling my own product. (I don't make them myself but they are handmade in the UK, from top grade organic fabric).

I'm Good Wash Day in all the usual places, and .com for my website.

Not trying to sell to anyone here lol. Just carrying on our conversation about hair and finding it quite interesting that it's led to a new direction for me!

Bowl method today which I haven't done in ages. I had some frizz at the end so I used a Denman to brush the mid lengths to ends then scrunched again before diffusing. Pretty pleased with it

Styling was bounce curl cream, kinky curly custard and jessicurl spiralicious

pawsqueen your hair looks lovely. I can never get the hang of using a brush.

Ninny how amazing. I really hope it works out for you,