Highland dancing hair styles for short hair

[sleepfortheweek]

My DD is 9 and has been highland dancing for 5 years.

She is highly sensitive to having her hair brushed and styled. We are in the very early stages of a ND assessment, but hair is a huge trigger.

She has been growing her hair to donate to the princess trust but it’s got to the point she can’t tolerate it any more and wants to get it all cut off. She wants to go to chin length.

I’m happy for it to be cut short, I think she will suit it and it will help her/us immeasurably with the drama and trauma of brushing and styling it.

My question is - she competes often and always has her hair up in a bun like all the other dancers. With the exception of one dancer I saw with short back and sides, all other dancers I have seen have the traditional bun(S).

If you have (or are/were) a highland dancer - how would you style short hair for a competition?

I’ve seen short-haired dancers use things like small twisted sections pinned neatly at the back, low mini buns, or soft half-up styles that still look tidy and appropriate without needing the full traditional bun setup. Texture sprays or lightweight smoothing creams can also help without lots of pulling or tight styling.

Thank you - I’m trying to google ideas but I’ve not been that successful in seeing photos. I’m quite good at doing hair but like to work from a picture or tutorial!

My kids did ballroom and needed buns for comps, one had short hair for a while. I was shown how to do a bun by back combing the hair once it was in a pony tail and then putting a bun net over and pinning it, so it looked full but it actually just had volume from back combing. If you don’t use too much hairspray, it wasn’t too bad to comb out after, I just removed the net on the way home and let the back combing drop out.