“S-wavy” is what they call it in that Curly Girl book - hair that you thought was straight because it was straight when you were a kid and if you towel it and comb it it’s straight, but if you let it air dry there’s wave in it which you can theoretically bring out.
Every so often I try to wear my waves but it’s very frustrating - to keep waves in my hair I have to air dry it and use product and not touch it. If I let a brush or a comb or even my fingers near it, the waves will fall out. So I can either have cute waves or I can have hair that goes where I tell it to but not both. It’ll have these weird looking pieces, or look like I just got out of bed because the part is super-random, or whatever. Styling via tornado.
So how do other people do it? I’m sure it doesn’t help that my hair’s pretty short. It’s always somewhere on the “short” spectrum - actually it’s longer than I often wear it now, I’m growing it out for the wedding so it’s just past my ears.
You have the same kind of hair I do (never knew there was a name for it). Lately, I’ve been keeping the wave by washing it at night, letting it air-dry a bit, putting some gel for curly hair in it, and then putting it in two loose French braids before I go to bed. In the morning, I take the hair out of the braids and comb it with a wide-toothed comb, spritzing it lightly with water and scrunching it up if need be. The results look like my natural wavy hair, with the added bonus that the style lasts all day and withstands touching and combing. I wash my hair every other night, so on the second night, I just put the hair in dry braids again and comb out in the morning.
If I don’t do this, it only looks good if I wash it in the morning and let it air-dry (with certain cow-licked sections pinned up to give them shape) for several hours, which I can only do on the weekends. Then, once I sleep on it at night, all the waves are straightened out by morning.
Mine’s definitely not long enough to braid. Don’t you find that doing it that way makes it look flatter on top (since of course the braided parts have lots of curl)?
Mine may be a bit curlier than yours, but if I let it air dry and do nothing, it will be on the straighter side of wavy.
I use a bowl diffuser similar to this with my hair dryer (I dry bent over so that head is upside down) and a few products and it gives me massive curls.
I get compliments from strangers on my hair. It’s like the one thing I have going for me!
It depends on how I braid it, but if it’s really flat, I dampen the top layers and put them up in velcro rollers while I do my makeup, etc. to give them a fuller shape. That does straighten the top somewhat but the straight pieces kind of blend in with the rest of the wavy pieces, and then over the course of the day the wave comes back all over.
I dug out the diffuser my hair dryer came with this morning. It’s… well, it’s wavy. As in, if my hair could give me and everybody who looked at me the finger, that’s what it’s doing. It’s almost cute, but not quite “on purpose” enough to get there.
Currently mine is too short for the wave, but when it’s long enough for it and not so long to straighten from the weight, all I do is air dry it and fluff it up occasionally. Blowdrying makes me look like a dark brown dandelion; any gels or whatnot make me feel like the bastard child of a dandelion and a hedgehog.
Putting it into several braids* and letting it dry like that makes the waves more evident and, since the braids begin higher than if it was only one or two, the top doesn’t get flattened.
It is very important to work with and not against it, tho. If I insist on moving the part out of wherever it wants to be at the time, all I get is a headache.
When that Alanis Morisette clip came out, my friends were telling me she’d copied my style. It wasn’t “my style”, it was just my “at home hair”, though.
The secret is “product”. Sadly the product that works for you won’t be the same as the one that works for me. Hell, if there’s too much change in the humidity what works for me on Monday won’t work on Thursday.
My last haircut was at a salon where the stylist asked me a long list of questions about what I want my hair to say about me, how much time I’m willing to spend on it per day, how “handy” I am with my hair.
I ended up with a cut I really liked - should’ve started by saying I too have “s-wavy” hair - and a full on lesson in how to style it. One of the things I had said was that I want my hair to look more “on purpose”. The first tip she gave me was that I need to use more product than I have been. I’ve heard that before. After washing I blot out as much water as I can and then scrunch in product. The thing she taught me that makes my style look a little more intentional is to blow dry just a small section right at the front. It’s a small change for me, and takes about three minutes.
Products I’ve used and liked tend to be creamy rather than gels. Right now I have this Moroccan Oil stuff that I like quite a bit. I feared my grandmother would haunt me for spending $30 for a tube of goo, but it is really good goo, and I’ve been working on the same tube since before Thanksgiving.
I’ve also had good luck with Aveda’s Be Curly line, and Pantene Restoratives. Usually if I like something enough it becomes “new and improved”.
My wave comes out if I skip washing my hair for a day or two. It comes out in humid weather. The shampoo I use makes a difference, too - too much conditioner and softening, and it’s stick straight. Oh, and it’s straight on one side and wavy on the other! I have to drag out the curling iron and try to make both sides match. :-p
After ordering a few products recommended on the various curly hair sites - holy crap this “Kinky Curly Curling Custard” looks like something you might have found in my grandma’s bathroom but it sure does do something! Still not what you’d call “manageable” curls but damn does it keep the wave in.
