How to Blow Dry Hair Without Causing Damage
Use a Shine Serum to Prevent Hair Damage by Blow Drying
Frequent styling with heat tools can really damage your hair. Sometimes, after blow drying your hair, you may find yourself left with frizzy pouf rather than voluminous shine. Luckily, there are some preventative steps you can take to make sure your protecting your hair, locking in it's natural beauty without causing excess over-drying and damage.
Prevent Damage Before Blow Drying
Properly treating your hair before you blow dry can greatly reduce the amount of damage cause by blow drying. Conditioning your hair thoroughly before blow drying can help prevent excess drying of the hair.
Using a shine serum or heat protector product in damp hair before blow drying will also help in minimizing damage caused to the hair. You can even make your own homemade hair protector by mixing 1 tsp jojoba oil with 1 cup water in a squirt bottle.
Some smoothing serums reduce the amount of time it takes to dry the hair. These are excellent products to use to help prevent damage to the hair caused by blow drying because not only to the protect the hair, they also reduce the amount of heat needed to dry the hair.
Towel dry your hair to remove excess moisture before blow drying. Gently pat the hair dry, never rub, as the friction can cause damage and frizzy hair. Squeeze out excess water from your hair with a towel. If you have long hair, wrapping your hair in a towel turban will help absorb excess moisture before blow drying. Applying makeup and getting dressed before blow drying your hair will give your hair some time to dry naturally before blow drying, thus reducing the amount of heat time your hair will be exposed to. Keeping the exposure time to heat is essential in preventing damage to the hair.
How to Blow Dry Your Hair with Minimal Damage
Reduce heat and air: Using the lowest heat and air setting possible will help prevent damage to the hair. If you need to spend some extra time smoothing out kinks of cowlicks, put the dryer setting to cool and low and go over the problem areas several times. If you ever need to spend some extra time in certain areas, reduce the heat setting so no one area of the hair is exposed to too much heat at a time. This will also prevent the hair from over-drying, which can cause the hair to become frizzy, brittle and unmanageable.
Use nylon and boar bristle brushes: Using metal brushes can cause the hair to get too hot, thus damaging the hair.
Pay attention to the angles your drying at: Following the natural direction of hair will help keep you hair smooth. If you blow dry your hair upwards, you'll be looking at a frizzy mess. If you want to put some extra volume in your hair, bend forward and blow dry your hair upside down. This will keep your hair smooth while lifting the roots away from the scalp, giving you some extra volume.
When using a round brush, pull the hair away from the scalp while drying. This will give you the hair more volume as well. Creating tension with the brush (but not too hard!) will help to make sure you really get your hair smooth.
Always move the air around: Never hold the dryer in one place for too long. Again, leaving one area of hair exposed to too much heat at a time is the best way to damage your hair. Keep the air constantly moving.
Finish with a blast of cool air: This will close hair follicles, locking in your style and smoothing out the hair.
When your hair is dry, stop!: You want to be careful to not over dry your hair. When your hair is dry, put the dryer down.
Allow your hair to dry naturally when possible: Whenever possible, skip the dryer and allow your hair to dry naturally. Reducing the amount of exposure to heat styling products is the best way to prevent damage to the hair.
Be sure your hair is getting enough moisture from your daily routines: Use gentle shampoos and plenty of nourishing conditioner. You may even want to reduce how often you wash your hair, especially if you have dry or curly hair, as the natural oils are essential in maintaining healthy hair. Do a deep conditioning treatment or hair mask a few times a month to renew and replenish shine and beauty to your hair.
Use these tips when blow drying your hair and you'll be sure to maintain it's health and beauty.