Winter — a curly girls' worst nightmare.
Dry ends, uncontrollable frizz, and flyaways. Flat roots, lack of volume and definition. Worst of all, the lack of moisture and hydration in our curls. So, how can we protect our hair? I have good tips to help you for your winter washdays.
Step one is to keep your hair moisturized. The rule of thumb is to deep condition your hair once a week. Even more so in winter! Deep conditioning will help lock in the moisture loss from the winter air and help keep the frizz down. I know what some of you are thinking - deep conditioning takes a lot of time. It's true that some deep masks can be up to 30 minutes of waiting, but there are plenty of masks with a short waiting time, as little as five minutes. You can either use the mask by itself or in addition to your regular conditioner, but be mindful not to overload if you combine them. If you use too much of one or both it could overload your hair and cause your hair to be weighed down by product. Start with a quarter size and continue to add product until you can see enough when squeezing the section you are working on.
Overall deep conditioning is really important to your hair year-round, but it will really help you during the harsh winter months when your ends are at risk of breakage and split ends.
What kind of mask should you get? Everyone's hair is different, so you need to look for the ingredients that your hair likes. Chemically treated and high porosity hair should look for hydrating/protein masks to help with restoring and strengthing their ends from the chemicals and harshness. Ingredients like Manuka honey, yogurt, baobab oil, and keratin can go a long way for dry hair.
For untreated hair and low porosity, you wanna reach for that moisturizing mask. My favorite ingredients that pack a moisturized punch: Jamaican black castor oil, jojoba, vitamin e and c, ceramides, shea butter, and argan oil.
If you want a mask in between that will give you the best of both worlds while hydrating and giving your curls life, the OHCURL 3-in-1 cream should take care of you. It has keratin which is the protein that helps with frizz, shine, and strength, cannabis Sativa seed oil (to help prevent breakage), jojoba oil and argan oil for moisture, tea tree oil, and rosemary, which helps with blood flow and controlling the ph balance of the scalp.
You can also do a once-a-month mask that targets your hair needs to a deeper extent. If you're low porosity use a protein mask once a month just to give your hair some protein and if you're high porosity use a deep moisturizing mask to help lock in moisture.
We hope these tips and tricks help your curls to stay protected from the elements and retain their moisture during winter!