Tag: haircut

Damage: How much is too much, when to cut, and how to prevent damage in the future.

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Damage to your hair happens every day. How much damage your hair takes, and what you do to prevent it is up to you. In this post, I will be laying out what hair damage means, what causes it, how to prevent it, when its too late, and how to save what you can.

What does it mean when your stylists refer to your hair as damaged? By the time your hair stylist has to tell you this, it’s already too late. Damaged hair looks like a reptile stroked backwards. If the scales were stroked in the opposite direction, they would stand up, and this is what broken hair looks like. Once the cuticle is damaged, the whole strand will fall apart. If you pay close attention to your hair, you can catch when you have “split ends”, which are often confused with frizz. Damage typically happens at the ends, and the best decision is cutting it off, but there are many forms of damage that affect the mid shaft area and even the roots.

What causes damage? Bellow are all types of damage, along with a rank from barely damaging at 1, to devestating at 10.

  • Environmental:
    • wind: 25
    • salt water 4
    • dry climate 2
  • Self inflicted:
    • Any hot tool 7
    • Box dye [dye anyone can get from Sally’s or Walmart] 8
    • Chlorinated water 4
    • Cotton pillow cases 3
    • Hair ties 2-4
    • Incorrect brushing technique 1-4
    • Incorrect washing techniques 1-3
  • Unintentional accidents:
    • Pulling hair by the roots 5
    • Catching hair on objects 6
    • Leaning against things 3-8

How do you prevent hair damage if it seems everything will hurt it? There are many ways to prevent excess damage:

It starts with care and maintenance at home. When you wash your hair, high quality products and proper washing techniques are essential to keep your hair from looking and feeling like hay. Proper hair care products include salon quality shampoo, and conditioner. If you live in a dry climate, or regularly have a frizz and breakage problem, start by adding a salon quality deep conditioning masque and a salon quality leave in conditioner.

After taking care of your hair in the shower, its important to prep it for the day. A light weight, spray on leave in conditioner will moisturize your hair without compromising style. If you plan on using hot tools, try to use tools that have the latest technology to help protect your hair. When using hot tools at home, always set it at three hundred degrees first, and do a test strand. This will be the lowest temp your hot tools will go while still holding the style for some hair types. Slowly turn up the heat until your hair can be styled appropriately- everyone’s hot tool temperature will be different. When you blow dry your hair, use the warm or cool setting rather than the hot setting to prevent damage from the heat of the blow dryer, and use controlled airflow down the shaft of the hair so you don’t upset the cuticle. Any time you use a hot tool, you should be using a heat protection. Its like sunscreen for your hair.

Hair ties pose a risk that people don’t often consider. The softest hair tie you can find will be a scrunchie or a hair scarf. You will want softer hair ties so they won’t damage your hair as much as hair ties that have rubber and metal pieces in them. I will be doing a whole post on alternative hair ties, and other hair accessories in the future.

Hair brushing is important, and often neglected. Improper technique can damage hair, and lead to conditions such as broken hair, dreadlocks and balding. In order to untangle and manage hair effectively, you should use leave-in conditioner, and brush from the bottom up. When you rake through your hair top to bottom, that crunching sound you hear is your hair breaking. Hair is the most fragile part of the body. Never brush your hair when wet, if you have problems out of the shower, brush before getting in, and after drying.

Once you are out and about, it is vital to keep your hair protected. If it’s windy, try putting your hair up with a scrunchy or a scarf, and hide the ends. When the sun is sweltering, put an extra layer of heat protection on it. Generally, the less your hair is out the more protected it is.

Now that we have covered protecting your hair when its dry, what do you do when its wet? Oceans and pools are damaging to hair by their chemical structure. Oceans have salt, and pollutants; pools have chlorine. Before going into public bodies of water, you should put conditioner, or deep conditioner in your hair to coat the cuticle with nutrients, then you should wear a swim cap in the pool and wear it up in the ocean. After getting home from all the fun, wash your hair immediately, and deep condition it for five minutes.

In your typical day, you are going to lean and lay on things that will damage your hair. Simply putting it in a loose bun will help. Another thing you can invest in is a satin or silk pillow case, which will cause less breakage during the night. If you are leaning against a wall or structure, putting your hair up, or putting a buffer between your hair and the rough surface will help prevent breakage.

I will cover this in another blog post but let me say it here as well- STOP! USING! BOX DYE! Box dye is the bane of my existence. It makes your hair practically untouchable. The chemical components in that dye can set your hair on fire if you try to dye over it. It’s not good.

Once your hair is damaged, and looks like the end of a used broom, its time to cut it. For most people, due to their lifestyle and hair length, a trim is required every four to six weeks. When growing out your hair, make sure you still regularly see a stylist to ensure a nice style, and products to keep it healthy. Your stylist will be able to help you with additional products based on your hair type and lifestyle.

The consultation: Why it matters and what you as a client can do to better communicate what you want.

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Before the consultation even begins, your hairstylist will get as much information as they can. Whether it is a cut, color, or blowdry service, your hairstylist should always ask for a current picture of the clients hair, a side profile, and the back of their head. These pictures need to be natural and unobstructed in the most natural light you can find- no headbands or clips, let it all hang out. If they are getting a color retouch, they should ask for a clear picture of the top of their hair where it is parted so they can see the line of demarcation, or where the color starts and stops. Your hairstylist will also request an inspiration picture.

The inspiration picture is not necessary for your stylist to complete a job, but they should be able to easily replicate any picture they see. Its like if you commission an artist to draw an apple- its easier for them to draw it when it is on the table in front of them. They will also ask what service you would like to have done, and what your budget is to ensure minimal upset during consultation.

The consultation is the first step in getting your hair done, and in fact is the most important part. Why? If done properly, it provides a seamless blueprint of what you as a client would like that day, what you hope for in the future, and an accurate hair history.

Here I’m going to go through an entire consultation process, detailing what your stylist should be asking you about, and how you can easier help communicate to make your hair dreams come true:

When your stylist greets you at the door, their first priority should be to make sure you are comfortable with them, with the atmosphere they have created, and make sure they are ready. For example, I will do this by sitting my client down and offering a refreshment and asking them ” Are you comfortable and relaxed?” “Is there anything on your mind before we get started?” I ask this simply because I care and so should your stylist. We are all human, and you never want to feel rushed into something you are not ready to do.

After your stylist has ensured you are comfortable, they will begin with that days service goals. Your hairstylist will confirm which service you booked them for, and start with the basics:

First, the stylist will analyze the inspiration picture with you in front of them to ensure what you want done can be done, and how long it will take. If a service cannot be preformed, your stylist should let you know pre-consultation. In some cases, they may not be able to see what they need, and they will need to explain that they can’t do the service.

After the stylist ensures the service can be done, they will continue their analysis, measuring various strengths and weaknesses in the hair. There are many reasons hair can be difficult to work with, but there is always a path to the service you are looking for- it just may be hard than you thought. For example, if you comes in at a natural black, and wants to go platinum blonde, it may take a few sessions to achieve their ultimate goal. If you use box dye and want to leave with a platinum blonde look, your stylist may suggest you rehabilitate your hair with a moisture and protein treatment before proceeding. Both are achievable, but neither client will walk out of their first session platinum blonde.

After your stylist is finished analyzing your hair, they will ask about your hair history. This is crucial to the consultation since it determines your stylists’ approach to achieving what you desire with minimal damage, minimal cost and minimal stress. In the hair history your stylist will need to know everything about what happened on the hair you currently have. For shoulder length, they will need to go back two years, and the longer your hair, the farther back they will need to go. The risk of lying to your stylist can be anywhere from asimple tone or cut deformity to going bald. Nothing you lie about should ever excuse a stylist from physically harming you (except for allergies), but you might lose all your hair temporarily. If you do have allergies, please let your stylist know, our products can contain many various allergens from coconut, avocado, tea tree oil and many more.

Once your stylist is caught up on your hair history, your stylist should ask about the inspiration picture, and what specifically about the picture you would like them to replicate for you. It is important that you as a client can verbalize what you like besides just “the color” or “the cut”, so stylists can use different techniques to achieve the goal on a totally different head. Since no two heads are alike, no one hair cut will ever be the same. Things like “I like how her hair looks like it flows, mine doesn’t do that it feels heavy.” would be a great indicator that you may like to try layers. If you like the idea of platinum blonde, but want it to look natural at the top, you may bring in a picture of someone with a shadow root and say something like “I like the platinum blonde here, and I want it darker at the roots, but I don’t want it as dark as the picture. I want it to look like my natural hair.” This will help your stylist choose a lightening technique unique to your request and your current hair. A good exercise before heading into the salon with your inspiration picture is to block out the face, and focus on the hair cut and color. In some cases either the client, the hair stylist, or both think that particular hair style or color is the wrong choice depending on many factors.

If all goes well in the consultation you are sure to have a happy experience and the hair you dream of.