A simple healthy haircare routine

with so much information online and new products coming out every day it can be a bit daunting trying to figure out what is the best haircare routine for your hair type, so first things first, establishing your hair type:

• is your hair short/mid/long?

• is your hair chemically treated in anyway?

• is your hair curly/wavey/straight?

• is your scalp dry/oily?

once you've figured this out the next step is to find out what you would like to achieve with this routine:

• smoothness and shine?

• volume, texture and body?

• strengthen, repair and hydration?

• colour longevity?

• wave and curl definition?

• overall healthy hair?

now that you have broken it down it will be much simpler when choosing products for your hair, but here are some simple tips:

step 1) cleanse (shampoo)

the first step is always to cleanse, just as you would cleanse your face, it is very important to remove any product build up, dead skin and excess oils to unblock the hair follicles and cleanse the scalp, it is important to not cleanse too often as you can strip the hair and scalp of natural oils, but it all depends on your scalp, if you have more of a drier scalp you should cleanse less, and oily scalp you should cleanse more often, you also want to make sure that the shampoo you are using is a professional brand shampoo, anything you can buy from the supermarket or Superdrug/boots will contain harmful chemicals and the ph balance will be off so it will actually dry your hair out and could strip your colour, I have linked some I recommend on my favourite products blog post.

step 2) condition

after you have cleansed, you would obviously follow up with your conditioner this helps rehydrate the hair after you've just washed the natural oils away and seal the cuticle, again you should choose your conditioner based on your hair type and what you would like to achieve, make sure before applying that you have squeezed the excess water out of the hair first, and whilst the condoner is on your work on detangling gently either with your fingers or a wide tooth comb.

I would also advise that once a week you work a hair mask into your routine, follow the same steps but with a mask you want to leave it on for longer anywhere between 10 mins to overnight then rinse off in the morning, this will give the hair a deep rehydration as conditioning masks are designed to enter the hairs cuticle

step 3) detangle

now this is where I see things go wrong the most, your hair is in its most fragile state when it it wet so you have to be super gentle when combing through, either using a wide tooth comb or wet brush you want to start from the bottom and work your hair up the hair, I would advise you put some sort of detangling spray in first just to encourage the knots out, basically the worst thing you can do it rip through your hair with a brush starting from the top this causes such bad breakage

step 4) styling products

the products you choose at this stage in your routine will make the biggest difference to how your hair looks and feels, so refer back to the start of this blog to see what you want to achieve, if your hair is coloured/lightened and/or dry and damaged I would highly recommended using an oil and leave in conditioner, if your wanting more volume and hold, I would still use something lightly hydrating along side a moose, I recommend water based moose as it doesn't leave you with that horrible sticky feeling, if it it frizz control you are wanting I recommend finding anti-frizz products and an oil, and curl definition you will want to search for curl defining products along side an oil, then go ahead a blow-dry and heat style your hair.

obviously If you are heat styling make sure that the temprecher isn't too high and that no matter what your hair type you are using some form of heat protecter, most leave in conditioners do have them in now but always double check

step 5) finishing products

after heat styling you may want to add some more product, whether it be for hold, shine, hydration or taming, for hold I would advise hairspray/dry shampoo/wax for shine I would recommend an oil/shine spray for hydration add a little bit more oil into the lengths and ends to seal any fly aways or split ends, and for taming frizz I would recommend a serum

thank you for reading, if you are stuck on products to use please check my top recommended products blog post, good luck and if you have any more questions please dm me on instagram!