I have a few clients who literally have half curly/half straight hair. Meaning, the hair that grows from their crown is straight, and the hair that grows underneath is curly (or the other way around)…two completely different textures. It creates a problem with cutting and daily styling. After getting an email from a girl with this type of hair, I thought it would be a good idea to post about it here! She and the girls I know can’t be the only bi-texturals!

This can be caused by damage, or nothing at all! I know some people who after doing the Keratin treatment a few times experienced entire straight sections, I know people whose hair was damaged from bleach and lost wave, but I also know people with perfectly healthy/virgin hair that just likes to do its own crazy wonky thing! Silly hair!

First thing, make sure you find the right hair cut. This is very important. The first time I saw a girl with straight underneath and curly on top, I thought she had been given the most uneven haircut ever. It turned out it wasn’t uneven, it was just cut wet. Once the hair dried into it’s natural state, the curly hair shrunk up, leaving a huge gap inbetween the length and the layers. She had been unintentionally *shelfed! I undercut the length on this particular girl to make sure she is never shelfed again. So, make sure you explain very well to your stylist how your hair behaves naturally. Have a real discussion about how the hair cut may fix it (or at least enhance it). For example, using a razor to cut internal layers on the straight portion can encourage wave!

For styling, unfortunately you can’t just go natural (unless you like the bi-textural look). My suggestion is to use a curling iron to blend the straight parts with the curly parts. You don’t have to do every section, just the most troubled! Curl a few pieces from the curly section as well to blend those with the straighties. So it doesn’t look like the photo of me below!

*Shelfed [shelft]

1. A situation where a hairstylist has intentionally or unintentionally created a severely chunky layer not coordinating with the client’s length, simulating a shelf.

2. A person(s) who became victim to a stylist whose refusal to blend heavy layers ends up in an incredibly shelfy and unmanageable hairstyle.

“Have you seen Lisa’s new haircut? She’s been shelfed!”

For our “Pins” segment, I’ll be covering a broader area than just pins. I’m including all the things I use to secure different styles. Before you get started, you want a pin case. This one below is great. I didn’t use my own picture because my pin case isn’t organized very well right now.
You can get this one here.

I like to bring a big clip to hold the hair while I’m blow drying/curling. This clip holds the thickest of the sections and never falls.

I make sure to always have lots of two prong clips for setting. Also, if you are doing a shoot or a show (or even a wedding) the make up artist will want to front of the hair pinned away so it doesn’t get in the way during the make up application. A lot of times I’ve used a piece of tissue between the hair and the clip to prevent a mark, but there are also special clips just for that purpose if you don’t want to deal with the tissue.

Bungees are the best way to get a smooth pony. They hold the hair tight tight tight! See my bungee tutorial here!

I go through these little bands like crazy. I use them mostly for securing braids and ponies. Make sure you have clear (pictured, but hard to see) for your blonde clients.

Japanese bobbies. I’ve written about these before. Normal bobbies don’t come near these guys. They are expensive, but one box comes with hundreds, and you non hairstylists will likely have a life supply by getting one. You hairstylists will likely have a few months supply. Let’s be real. We go through a lot of bobbies!

Last up is hair pins. I also like Japanese because they are easy to form without being too flexible. They are very comfortable to wear. The longer I do hair, the more I find myself using hairpins instead of bobbies. Go here for a quick hairpin tutorial!

Tomorrow I’ll choose a winner! Also, We have a new tutorial all edited and ready to go. I’ll probably post it Monday, but I just had to tell you!

All photos by Jacob Breinholt for Hairdresser On Fire. Except the top one.

I got an email from a young stylist asking for a peek into my kit. She wanted to know what I would bring with me on a job outside of the salon. I’m going to break this up into a few posts so that I can get into more detail with out it being too long and boring, but in the meantime, here is a peek!

I’ll be breaking it down into pins, products and tools.

Looking forward to seeing in the comments what other stylists bring along with them too!

Photo by Jake Breinholt for Hairdresser On Fire.

Me on the far right, in 2001. Addicted to the flat iron. (and bleach and lipgloss and cheerleading)

Q by Allie: Hey there Reagan! My name is Allie and i absolutely love your blogs. I am a teenager with a similar hair texture to yours except slightly curlier/frizzier. I feel like all teenage girls nowadays flat iron their hair daily which is obviously super damaging. do u have any cute hair ideas that dont involve too much heat!? hopefully u see this cause i really need some help here! thanks.

A by Reagan: Allie, I was a flat ironer too! The flat iron became really big when I was in high school, and I guess it’s never left the high school scene! In my experience, the flat iron is what destroyed my hair. Before the flat iron, my hair was so thick and perfectly healthy. Before I knew it, the flat iron had wrecked my hair so much that the only way for it to look smooth was to keep flat ironing it every day. It wasn’t until I finally cut off lots of length and left it alone that it got back to health. Pheeww! Bad memory!

Anyway, Allie, I love you. Do you know how much I hate unecessary damage on hair? Because of over-heat styling, overdue haircutting, over-processing color treatments or whatever it may be. Just treat your hair nice and it will be so much more glorious resulting in tons of boyfriends or girlfriends or jealous people! I am constantly trying to show my clients how to keep their hair healthy, so thank you for this question.

So to answer your question finally, I say look all over this blog! I am really into just enhancing your hair’s natural texture. Maybe by blow drying only the roots and letting your ends dry how they naturally would, or just curling a few pieces around your face to feel jazzy. You could also let your hair air dry before putting it in a bun, a pretty ponytail or a braid of some kind. And don’t be afraid to use product. Product is always a great way to cut down on styling time AND damage. As always, I love Redken Outshine for almost every hair texture and styling purpose. But I still think it’s freaking sick and disgusting that they call it polishing milk. Milk?? Are you kidding me?

I have an idea! What do you say you and I run around dressed like hamburglars and steal all of your friends flat irons so they are forced to stop doing it? No? That’s illegal?

I recently got an email about brides wearing bangs, asking if I thought it was a good look. Yes, I do! But I don’t know if I’m the type of girl who says you should completely avoid dating your wedding. I mean, it will be kind of fun to look back at the pictures and know know that what you wore was what you wanted, instead of not wearing what you wanted because you were too afraid of the occasion being dated. I wore my hair long, down and wavy with a nod to the 1940s (with sort of a victory roll on the side). I also wore a big champagne colored sash which will forever go down in 2007 wedding history. The point is, it was what I wanted to wear. (Actually, I got married in Vegas and it was the only dress I tried on. But I did my hair myself and I did like it.)

So, maybe sweepy bangs wont be around forever. Maybe you have Zooey Deschanel hair and that wont be around forever either. But if you love your bangs, and you don’t feel like yourself without them, you should just wear the bangs.

But..

..If you are afraid of looking like you are hiding under your big heavy bangs in all the pictures, then maybe you should try curtain bangs. Which is basically the beautiful bangs you already have, just parted down the center. You’ll have the comfort of the bangs that you know and love, but you will also be able to see your forehead!

So I know none of these above ladies are brides at the moment, but I do know that they all have the beautiful “curtain bang” that I love so much. I wear curtain bangs whenever they get too long to wear all the way down. They’ve been too long for that for several months, and I’ve enjoyed so much the curtain look.

I am interested to hear if you wore bangs to your wedding. Or if you will. My friend Maggie has had bangs as long as I’ve known her (6th grade) and she is getting married in just a few months. I am so curious what she’ll do with her bangs. Frankly, I can’t picture her without them!

PS this question came from Bosnia! Crazy!

(I love this picture because it was around 11pm last night, I had been asleep for almost an hour like an old person, and I woke up dying of thirst. When I came out of the bedroom, I saw Jake in the midst of a full blown photo shoot with a guitar as his model. I walked over to say hi and Jake took this picture. So, this is what I look like with no make up and an hour or more of sleep under my belt/beastie boys tee.)

So, here is my hair! There is no trace of pink in it. I guess it’s been about 3 weeks, and I have probably washed it about 4 times since it was colored. The pink only lasted one or two of those washes. A few of my clients have been visibly upset to come in for hair cuts and not see any pink. Sorry guys! Maybe I’ll go pinky-er next time!

So, I wanted to follow up with my last post about preserving your hair color. I got a comment that was something I had never even considered, so I thought I would address it.

Q: “I have another question. So you said to not shampoo your hair right after it’s been colored, so do you rinse it with cold water to wash out the excess dye? Do you keep rinsing the next couple of days and then wash it with color safe shampoo/conditioner? Also how do you feel about box dye? I know it’s not as up to par with salon work but I’ve used box dye on others before, and they’ve always worked pretty well. What do you think? “

A: Yes, you rinse and shampoo/condition when washing out the dye. Preferably with cooler water, especially if you are doing a gloss (but a gloss probably wont be shampooed out!). There are chemicals in hair color that need to be shampooed out or they will continue processing in your hair until the dye has oxidized completely.

As for continuing to rinse the next few days, I’d say no. You are trying to avoid opening the hair’s cuticle which is what is locking the color in!

Box dyes. So this is the main reason I wanted to answer this question. I feel very strongly against box dyes. I really really do. There are two main reasons I say to avoid box dyes forever, and here they are….

~You most likely don’t know what you are doing. Even if you follow the directions on the back of the box, there is so much more to it than a list of 5 steps. There are colorists that assist for 3 years before going on to the coloring floor, it is really best to keep it to a professional. You could over-process, over-lap and/or cause breakage and damage. A professional knows things that you don’t (like all professions!). That is not an insult.

~The products are very cheap! I’m telling you, there is a huge difference in quality of professional hair color, versus grocery store hair color. In a salon, they will tailor the developer and color formula to what your hair type/base color/texture is. A box has no idea if you’ve had a Japanese relaxer before or if you’ve been previously lightened, or how porous your hair is.

Color is not easy. It might seem like it is, but there is so much to it! There are very few occasions I’d say it’s ok to do your own color, and at that point I’d still say to never buy it from a grocery store. Always use a good quality professional line.

Great questions!

Q by Sarah: So one of my BFFs is getting married this June, and I am the Maid of Honor. This is the third wedding for our group of friends, and in both of the previous two weddings, everybody’s looked really classic and timeless as far as bridesmaid hair and attire go. For this wedding, we thought it would be awesome if one of my Maid of Honor duties was having a really of-the-moment, trendy hairstyle on the big day. Ie. one that will be dated later so that we can laugh at the pictures in 20 years. Any thoughts on really of-the-moment, trendy Maid of Honor hair? My dress is one of those one-shoulder deals.

A by Reagan: This is definitely a fun question. The first style that popped into mind when I thought of trendy wedding hair, was long, loose wavy hair. This is how every bride/bridal party seems to be wearing their hair these days. I admit, at my own Vegas wedding just over 4 years ago, I did long, loose, flowing waves. It is more popular than ever now. It is a very Victoria’s Secret look. I think the look will keep around for a while, but it won’t be popular forever! I think one day you’ll look at the photos and know it was a 2011ish wedding. Remember when everyone wore their hair up for their wedding? Up-dos were the big thing? Most people are wearing it down. Down hair is the trendiest of all wedding trends right now. Also, look at the red carpet these days, down hair is all over that business too.

If you want to accessorize it in a trendy way, the bride can wear a birdcage veil, and the bridesmaids can wear a feather/flower piece.

The second look I thought of, is the topknot. The topknot (bun right smack on the top of your head), is definitely a big look right now. It can be done a lot of ways. You can make it slightly fuzzy for a soft/romantic look, thrown together for a messy look, teased to make it big like my party bun, or slick and smooth for a formal look. You can do it in the middle or off-centered. Do the topknot!

(i know the Mandy Moore topknot is very similar to a classic wedding bun, but it’s the fact that it is so high up that makes it trendy!)

Thanks, Sarah! I hope I get a picture of the look you choose!

I got an email from a reader who wanted to know if she could still wear her hair long even though she is now in her 30s. She read something online that said no, and wanted my opinion. Well, my opinion is YES. Want to know if I think you can wear your hair long in your 40s? Yes! I think you can. I have lots of long haired clients in their 30s and 40s who I think look great. They keep it trimmed, healthy and styled.

If you are still worried, here are some pictures of beautiful ladies to convince you.

Reese-34.

Kate-37.

Jennifer-40

You want long hair in your 30s? You wear that long hair. And you love it.

(In case any of you are wondering, I would wear Jennifer’s dress everywhere if I had it. Club, party, gym, bed. Everywhere.)

Q by fluffy haired Julie: My hair is super, super, super thick and whenever I get it cut, I beg the stylist to thin it out with shears within an inch of its life. That keeps it flat for about 2 days. I finally purchased a pair of awesome thinning shears at Sephora and hacked away at my own hair and didn’t see any problem… but is this bad? Are there any tricks to using thinning shears that you can tell me? Should I stop doing this to myself and just see a stylist every week?

A by Reagan: Here is what I have to say about thinning your own hair…You are walking dangerous territory, FHJ. Dangerous. Please stop. Ok?

Here is what might be happening (in my expert opinion). You’re overly thinning your hair. You are creating lots of short hairs at the root which are then making a perfect volumizing “cushion” for the rest of your hair to poof off of.  The short hairs aren’t weighed down at all since there isn’t enough length to pull them down, so they are springing up, making your hair bigger. You are doing to your hair, what I do to women who have pixie cuts, and men who have faux hawks, when I want their hair to stand up on it’s own. To take out the weight in the ends, I texturize (by thinning) it so that it will stand straight up. I’m not sure if this makes sense to you, it is a little hard to explain.

My best advice to you, if you are planning on thinning you’re own hair, is to do it no more than every 3 or 4 weeks. Because you are just going to make chaos in your hair and destroy your stylists cut if you do it more often than that.

Here are a few tips for thinning your own hair:
1. Don’t thin any higher than half-way up the hair shaft.
2. Take small sections.
3. Start out doing the underneath part of your hair, thin each section starting half-way up, then gradually as you move towards the top section of your hair, thin farther down on the hair shaft. (for example, the hair growing out of the top of your head, will only be thinned on the ends. The hair growing underneath, will be thinned a little higher up.).

Also FHJ, don’t be so quick to grab the thinning sheers every time you have huge hair. It could be that you need a heavier conditioner to weigh down your thick locks, or maybe you just need to smooth it out with a blow dryer or flat iron!

Good luck, and thanks for your question!