There’s nothing like shiny hair to make you look healthy and well-groomed. This doesn’t always come naturally, so it may require a change in your beauty routine.

High-maintenance hair usually incurs the most damage because it takes more effort to achieve the desired affect. For the best results, try out simpler techniques and you’ll find out what works for your hair texture.

Keep it Conditioned

To cut down on split-ends, have it trimmed on a regular basis and hydrate your hair with conditioner to keep it in tip-top shape. Leave the conditioner in for several minutes to give it a chance to absorb.

Dove “Intense Moisture” shampoo and conditioner is surprisingly effective for dull, color-treated hair. It smells great and leaves hair clean and shiny. For about $3.20 a bottle, it’s a bargain.

If your hair needs more attention, apply a hot-oil treatment once a week. Don’t overuse the treatments because too much of it can cause hair to become dull and lifeless.

Cut Down on the Frizz

Frizzy hair is often lackluster because it doesn’t reflect the light the way straight hair does. You can get the shine back by controlling the frizz, but it’s not always that easy. Check out our Frizzy Hair page for some great tips to get the upper-hand on this common problem.

Give Your Hair a Rest

Our hair takes a beating with all of the styling appliances and products that we use on an everyday basis. Avoid using a hair dryer and let it dry naturally. If you must use a dryer, keep it on the coolest setting and use a diffuser.

Cut down on curling iron use and opt for hot rollers when you insist on curls. This is a gentler approach for luscious, wavy tresses. To prevent scorching, don’t spray your hair with hairspray before using any heated appliances.

Avoid weighing down your hair with numerous styling products. They can dry out your hair and take away the shine. Stick to one or two products, and use them sparingly. Over time, your hair will adjust and it will take less effort to pull off your desired results.

Styling Products for Shine

Test a few styling products designed to make your hair shiny. After washing it, pour some hair gel or leave-in conditioner in the palm of your hand and gently rub it in. Distribute it more heavily on the middle and ends than you do the roots so your hair doesn’t appear dirty or oily.

Preventing Split Ends
On the other hand, you can prevent split ends to some extent by keeping your hair from drying out. The main causes of split ends are time and dryness. Drying and aging hair tends to become brittle and break: keeping it in good shape can hold split ends at bay longer than usual, so treating your hair with kindness is a good rule.

Ethnic Hair can be prone to more split ends
African American women often have a tougher time keeping the split ends away: their hair tends to be thinner and fragile, easily damaged. Keeping breakage to a minimum involves avoiding heat, permanent or straightening fluids and daily styling with irons or hair driers. Coloring hair weakens its structure and makes it even weaker, so that women with black hair who want to use colorants run the risk of thinning their hair or winding up with bald spots. African American hair demands extra gentle treatment and frequent conditioning with rich emollients such as shea butter or coconut oil. These natural remedies are also ideal for keeping the scalp healthy. Keeping Black hair in its natural state is healthiest—forget straighteners or colors and your hair will be stronger and shinier. Tight braids can also damage your hair and may even damage the roots, which can cause you to lose your hair in places, so keep it loose as possible. If you must color your hair, go for henna, which smoothes the hair shaft and deposits the color atop the hair instead of opening the cuticle and adding the color inside the hair. Henna doesn’t last quite as long as chemically-based permanent colors, but it actually makes hair healthier when you use it: other colors make it weaker.

No forever solution to stop spilt ends for occurring
Eventually, all hair will develop split ends if it isn’t cared for properly. Most hair experts recommend getting a trim every 6-8 weeks, so ends don’t have a chance to dry out and split. The beauty of your hair really shows when it’s shiny, glossy and thick. Keeping the tips trimmed is protection from further damage: split ends tend to work their way up the hair shaft as it sustains further damage over time. The solution to split ends is to act quickly: don’t skip the trip to the salon, or get your hair stylist to teach you how to trim your own hair if you don’t like to go in that often.

Breakage and Frizzy Hair Texture is Not from Split Ends!
Don’t mistake frizzies for split ends. If your hair looks frumpy or frowsy, the ends might be just fine, but the hair shaft is roughed up from humidity in the air or dryness from harsh shampoos. If you’ve had your ends trimmed but still see a fuzzy halo around your hair, try using one of the new hair smoothing treatments. Usually consisting of a solution of dimethicone, these smoothers add a gloss to your hair that makes it shiny and more manageable. They don’t really do anything to nourish or improve your hair, but they coat the hair the same way furniture polish makes your tables look shiny, and they wash out with each shampoo.

Click Here for more Hair care tips

Chemical Relaxers for Really Curly Hair
For serious straightening of super curly hair, many African American women turn to chemical relaxers, often done in the safety of the beauty salon. Made with ingredients much like permanent solutions, chemical relaxers work by breaking down, reforming and then solidifying the protein bonds in the hair shaft. If you have a friend with lots of experience and a kitchen timer, you can probably do chemical relaxing at home with a product from a beauty supply store, but if you’re nervous at all about potential results, or if your hair has damage from previous stylistic explorations, you may want to work with a professional stylist to get the hairstyle you want.

Permanent Hair Straightening in a Professional Salon
The latest thing in hair straightening is called Japanese Thermal Hair Straightening, a process that combines chemical relaxers with hair irons, for a permanently straightened head of hair. Of course, since hair does grow, the straightened part will eventually grow out and need replacing, but since most hair grows at a rate of about a half-inch per month, many people don’t even need a touch-up until six months later—or more. Long hair will show the curl less, since the weight at the bottom will pull it down more than the ends of short or medium hair. Whether you want o get rid of a little wave or an all-out Afro, the process will work: for long, curly air, it will take longer.

But thermal straightening costs a lot—often more than $500—and you can’t get your best friend to do it over the kitchen sink, because we’re talking high-tech processing here. There are at least two applications of a perm-like fluid, the first to break the bonds of the hair, and the second to harden it. In between, the stylist smoothes and straightens small portions of hair with a special iron until all the hair is perfectly straight. Afterwards, there is rinsing and conditioning. Your stylist will tell you not to get your hair wet for the next 24-48 hours, or you could lose all that nice smoothness.

The people who tout thermal straightening are right in that the hair, when done right, is smooth, shiny and straight as can be. It is not impervious to humidity, and no matter how good it looks, it’s not “healthy”. After subjecting your hair to alkaline chemicals, heat extremes and a couple of blow-drying episodes in a process that lasts four hours or more, it would be silly to think that your hair won’t be drier, stressed and more likely to break. Deep conditioning is the answer, and avoidance of all things chemical. For perfect straightness, you’ll still have to blow dry it, but it will still be quite straight if you let it air dry. If you’ve always wanted a head of board-straight hair falling in a silky curtain to your shoulders, with very little upkeep, here’s how to get it.

Click Here for more Hair care tips

Semi Permanent, Temporary and Permanent Hair Dye
There are three main types of hair color: temporary; semi-permanent, and permanent. They are labeled by how long they last, which is an effect of their ingredients. Temporary hair color will wash out in 6-12 shampoos; semi-permanent may last up to 26 shampoos, and most “permanent” hair colors will last around four to six weeks. The difference between the types of hair color is the chemicals in the formulas. Temporary hair color deposits dye on the outside of the hair shaft, where it washes away relatively quickly. More permanent hair color relies on larger amounts of hydrogen peroxide and ammonia to move the color molecules inside the hair shaft, to the cortex of the hair.

Active ingredient in hair color products
Hydrogen peroxide is one of the main ingredients in most hair colors. Its role is to help develop the color and makes it last longer. Before hair color was widely available, many women used peroxide to lighten their hair, creating the epithet, “peroxide blond”. Because peroxide use removes sulfur from the hair, peroxide blonds also suffered from dry, fragile hair that broke easily. With today’s modern formulas, the action of the hydrogen peroxide is limited; conditioners used after coloring help restore softness and moisture to the hair.

The other main ingredient in hair color is ammonia, which opens the outer layer of hair so that the dye based color can be deposited in the cortex. Ammonia used to be the tell-tale odor behind new hair color, but new hair colors have gentler fragrances and downright delicious fragranced oils and conditioners to make the hair silky and perfumed. Other additives include essential oils and avocado or jojoba oils for adding softness and shine.

Apply an at home hair color product
The hardest thing about using a hair color product is getting organized and comfortable with its application. In addition to wearing the plastic gloves provided in the kit, you should have a hair clip, an old shirt that buttons, a damp rag for wiping up spilled drops of color, a mirror and either an old towel with a big safety pin or with a hole cut in it. Put on the old shirt and fasten the towel around your neck before starting to color, and make sure you’re not wearing anything underneath that you would have to pull off over your head. Apply the color as it says in the directions, separating portions of hair and getting the color down to the roots, then working outward. Use the clip to pin your hair up on your head while you wait the 25-45 minutes for the color to work. If you use this method, you won’t have problems when you go to shower the color from your hair.

If you try coloring your hair, you may find you’ve gotten a color that you don’t like and don’t intend to live with. When this happens, don’t re-color your hair! Take the package (if you still have it) or the information on the brand and type of color to a salon and have a professional do the correction. Removing unwanted color is a job for a specialist: those who have tried it at home have invented new and abhorrent shades of green and orange. And remember—hair color is an adventure in chemistry. Always use the patch test, and if you have any doubt about the color, use the strand test too.

Hair color doesn’t require a professional stylist, but when you’re choosing a product, keep in mind that most of them are made with dye that can cause allergic reactions in some people. If you have trouble with sensitive skin, you may want to try a natural hair color made of henna. Henna comes in a variety of shades, but it’s ammonia and dye free, and much gentler to the scalp than other hair colors.

Choosing the Right Shade for Yourself
What’s the right hair color for you? Part of it depends on your skin coloring, but a large part of it relies on your attitude. If you’ve always wanted to try the Goth look, black hair is a necessary part of your style and it doesn’t matter how it goes with your skin or eyes. In fact, the more jarring, the better, so if you’re an ice blond with cool blue eyes, you’ll get a huge effect from black Goth hair color.

But some people just want a nice color, nothing too dramatic, that they can wear to work, that will cover gray hair, with maybe a few highlights for summer. In this case, you’ll want to choose a shade that’s very close to your own natural hair color, maybe a shade or two more red or brown. Add caramel highlights for a slightly streaky, sunkissed look. If gray hair is turning your own color drab, consider going blonder. If you want to go blond as naturally as possible, choose a shade that matches your skin tone in warmth. If the undertones in your skin are bluish instead of yellowish, you are a “cool” blond and should get ashy, silvery shades, or even platinum. If your skin tones are reddish or yellow, you are “warm” and should try golden-hued blond colors instead. If you have very ruddy skin, try even redder hair: it can help tone down the redness in your skin.

Explore Different Dye Styles and Colors
And don’t be afraid to experiment to find the best color. If you want to try a brunette look but aren’t sure you want to commit, get one of the temporary hair colors that wash out in six or eight shampoos. Funky, chunky highlights can be rectified nearly overnight with another color, as long as you use the wash-in-wash-out type that aren’t made to last. If you’re going to play with your hair color on the weekends, never use the “permanent” variety and then try to reverse it in less than several weeks. The harsher chemicals in the permanent hair colors, if used too frequently can turn your hair to straw, and may even turn it a scary and unexpected color if you try to set more color on top of a recent dye job.

Blonds can have more fun with reverse-highlighting; adding deeper shades in wide or narrow streaks to their natural color. For bored brunettes, streaking or foiling is a great option, being dramatic and playful without going over the edge. Try streaking your brown hair with coppery red, or even a combination of red and gold highlights.

Fiery redhead, or a wannabe? People make assumptions about redheads that may or may not be true, but what is true is that if you go red, you may feel a burst of power. The new shades come in colors from strawberry blond to shriek red, to a plummy, deep, unbelievable purple red. If you’re feeling nervous, choose an auburn or a reddish brown that won’t scare you and work your way up to brighter shades as your boldness increases.

Face shape is crucial in getting the most flattering hair cut. Celebrity clients spend thousands of dollars on the best stylists at the best salons, but you don’t have to. The easiest way to find your face shape is to pull any bangs off your forehead into a clip, take a lipstick or a magic marker and outline your face in the mirror. Draw what you see, not what you think, and you may be surprised. Step back and consider the shape on the mirror as only a geometric design. Is it…

Face Shapes
Square
Rectangular
Oval (most common face shape)
Round
Heart Shaped
Triangular

If you Have an Oval Face Shape
If you look at most models and actresses, you’ll notice that their faces tend to be oval. Oval faces look good in pretty much any hairstyle, especially styles that show off that perfect shape. Don’t get bangs, and don’t wear your hair in your face. For everyone else, hairstyles may be used to create the impression of having a “perfect” oval face. But you can also use your hairstyle to play up your best features regardless of your face shape.

Hair Cuts for Round Faces
There are two ways to address hairstyles for a round face. One way is to accentuate the roundness even further, with a bowl-shaped haircut, which can be very beautiful on the right woman. There’s something widely appealing about transforming an unusual characteristic into a real feature, and playing up a round face is one way to be very much your own person, stylistically speaking. But if you don’t want your face to look as round, choose a hair style that lengthens the look of your face. Have the top layered for fullness and height, and thinned out below the cheekbones to give the illusion of a narrower chin line. Go with medium to long hair. If you don’t mind the extra time, running your hair through a straightening iron can be an extra sleek & sophisticated look.

Rectangular Face Hair Styles
A long, narrow face can be rounded a bit by hair that’s kept short to medium in length, with wispy bangs. Fuller sides from the forehead to the middle of the cheekbones widen the face, and layers add fullness and volume to the hair. Long hair and center parts accentuate rectangular face shapes, making them appear longer.

Flattering Hairstyles for Heart Shaped Faces
You can have a lot of fun with new hair styles. The key here is to get a style with more fullness lower on the face, around the chin, and less fullness at the forehead. Sweep your hair back to show off your fabulous cheekbones. Short hair doesn’t work as well on a heart shaped face, because it puts the emphasis at the top of your head. Keep your hair at least chin length, and light and wispy around the forehead.

Hair Lengths for Triangular Faces
If your chin or jaw is wider and your forehead narrower, add weight to the top of your head with layers that create fullness, thinning as it approaches the jaw. The shag was made for the triangular face! Short hair looks nice on a triangular face. Long hair doesn’t work as well, but if you’re attached to your hair and can’t bear cutting it, try styles that pull your hair back as it falls below your cheekbones.

Elongate a Square with the right Hair
The square face can be elongated somewhat by added height on the top of the head. Layers on the crown and parting your hair off center help to reduce a square look. Wispy bangs and temples soften the squareness too, and may add roundness. Wavy hair adds to the softening effect; straight lines, straight bangs and straight or flat hair are to be avoided. Short or medium hair looks nice. Don’t let any haircut end at your jawline.

People most likely to have damaged hair include those with fine hair and African Americans who use straighteners or keep their hair in cornrows (this tightness can damage the hair follicles and cause hair loss) . African American’s hair is very delicate –usually drier than Caucasian hair, and can be easily ruined by chemicals and heat.

How to Grow Out Your Damaged Hair
If your hair has been truly wrecked, sometimes the best thing to do is have professional advice and then cut off as much damaged hair and split ends as possible so you can start fresh. You know when to cut off your hair: it’s when you’d rather be bald than look the way you do now! A super-short haircut can be appealing if you go to someone who will shape the cut to your face. Understanding face shape is the difference between a ten dollar, ten minute hair cut and an admittedly more expensive, hopefully much nicer one.

Remedies for Dry, Damaged Hair
Home remedies for “hair gone wrong” include restoration of moisture to hair not too severely damaged and making way for regrowth. In the case of hair ruined by hot rollers or straightening, you may have a few inches of relatively undamaged hair on the scalp. Get a medium-severe haircut to get rid of the frizzled hair tips, or leave the damage right where it is and concentrate on protecting the good hair. Leave off the chemicals, avoid the blow dryer and other heated hair appliances, and use gentle shampoo as infrequently as you dare. Shampoo strips oils from your hair, making it more brittle, so if you don’t really need to shampoo, cut it down to once a week or so. And forget vitamins in shampoo: they don’t work. You can try taking vitamins internally to keep your hair strong as a side effect of your increased health, but there aren’t any vitamins that help when applied externally.

Home Deep Conditioning: Over the Counter & Natural Products
Buy deep conditioner hot oil products at the drugstore, or go the homemade route for less money. Hot oil treatments (actually, the oil is warm, not hot), work by starting with dampened hair, softening the cuticle and locking in the water by sealing the outside of the hair with a coating of oil. You can make your hair drier by using hot oil if you then go and wash it all out with a harsh shampoo. When you give yourself a moisturizing hair treatment, leave it on overnight and then wash it with a gentle shampoo the next day.

Deep conditioning home remedies and recipes for fried hair include mayonnaise, avocado and egg, but some of us prefer to eat our salads, not wear them. You can get the job done using any cooking oil (but peanut oil will make you smell peanutty!) Coconut suntan oil is a favorite, and it smells terrific, too. Rinse your hair with warm water, apply the oil from the palm of your hand, working it into your hair. Now comes the warm part: wrap your head in a towel or a plastic hair bag that comes with hair color kits, or in some cling wrap, and sit around in it as long as you can. Cover your pillow with a safety-pinned towel and sleep on it overnight. Next day, use a moisturizing or baby shampoo to wash out the greasiness.

If your hair has been ruined from color treatments, consider switching to a repairing henna, which has been used for centuries to keep hair shiny and bright. Unlike permanent colors, henna has no ammonia to strip your hair; the henna sits on the outside of the hair shaft, so it can’t do any damage. But test it first; some people are allergic to this all-natural herb!

Pre-swim steps for chlorine damage prevention.
Your first step prior to entering the swimming pool should be to thoroughly wet the hair. When hair absorbs un-chlorinated water there is less chance for major absorption of the chlorine into the hair shaft. Secondly you should apply a hair conditioner for moisture and protection. Thirdly a swimmers cap should be placed over the wet, conditioned hair. This is in fact the best way to protect and prevent chlorine damage. If you however choose not to use the swimmers cap then you will want to treat the hair post swim.

Post swim steps for chlorine removal
You need to rinse the hair thoroughly after a swim in chlorinated water. You can use club soda, which ceases the adverse effects of the chlorine. You can also rinse the hair in un-chlorinated water and it is advised to use a shampoo. Look for a shampoo that contains sodium thiosulfate. This ingredient is an antichlor, which removes the color and odor of chlorine from the hair. The chlorine in water can cause hard metals in the water, such as copper, iron and manganese, to attach to the hair causing a green coloration. Shampoos that offer aloe or glycerin can also be helpful as they are a natural moisturizer that can combat the drying effects of chlorine. If you experience severe drying and hair breakage you can receive a salon treatment that will reduce and or eliminate breakage for up to six weeks at a time. This is done with a product called Aphogee, which is fused to the hair using heat. The product hardens the hair and after rinsing and conditioning is completed there is a noticeable difference immediately. This product is for professional use alone; speak to your local hair salon technician for service.

Pre-swim, post swim step review

1. Thoroughly wet hair with non-chlorinated water.
2. Apply hair conditioner.
3. Cover hair with swimmer’s cap.
4. After swim rinse and shampoo hair.
5. Condition hair after shampooing and alternate each week from regular conditioner to a deep conditioner.
6. Dry hair gently with a patting motion with towel or on cool setting with hair dryer.
7. if severe hair damage is experienced seek a hair care professional for treatment.

Perhaps not surprisingly, there is a lot of truth to some of the lore and even those who are professionally dealing with hair each day at a salon do encourage women to wash hair with an eye to its overall health, and not just for cleansing. Of course, persuading busy moms and career women to take the time out to follow such instructions is difficult to accomplish, yet since many of these beauty treatments do not have to be applied every day, a workable frequency may be found.

Washing Hair After Relaxers, After Straightening, and After Permanent Hair Coloring
Those wondering how often to shampoo and just rinse will be delighted to learn that many special treatments may only need to be undergone after relaxers are used, after straightening, and after using permanent hair coloring products. In addition to the foregoing, many times these treatments simply take five extra minutes in the shower or with the head over the kitchen sink, and therefore the pursuit of beauty does not have to be as time consuming as many envision it to be.

How to Wash Hair with Extra Virgin Olive Oil, With Dish Soap, and More!
Definitely the most popular treatments can be summed up as follows:

* Undergo a hot oil treatment with extra virgin olive oil which is gently heated to a temperature that can be tolerated on the head. Over a portable tray, massage the oil into hair and scalp, leave it on for about 25 minutes, and then use everyday hair soap to wash out the oil. It will do wonders for dry hair.

* After cleaning your hair with dish soap, apply some lukewarm water with egg and massage it into the hair and scalp. Rinse out with lukewarm water. You hair will have a great lustre!

* Shampoo with baking soda and then shampoo again with regular hair soap. This will help to curtail excessive oiliness that weighs down long hair.

* How to clean your hair without shampoo and without water is simple. Have some portable devices (shallow pan or simply a paper sack) and apply some baking soda. After working it in, shake out the excess and then brush out the rest. The oil will be gone with the baking soda.

* Vinegar has long since been hailed as the perfect method for increasing the shine that so many women value on their hair. Some complain that in spite of careful rinsing the scent of the vinegar can still be detected, so it is wise to test this with the vinegar you are intending to use before the big evening out!

* What causes frizzy curls? Not even the best shampoo will undo the frizz if you perpetuate the one behavior that causes it: the blow dryer. To help get your hair ready for being shaped into the style you have chosen, the odds are good that using a hot air dryer is your preferred method of drying, but in so doing the hair is prevented to develop its natural curl. This of course makes your blonde mane incapable of following the layered look you have chosen.

* Another heat source that has your curls see red is the straightening iron. For it to work properly the iron becomes very hot and thus temporarily relaxes the spiral but doing so comes at a cost: frizz. Short cuts will soon show signs of breakage that leave the hair looking frizzy while long cuts will not show the breakage as clearly but before long will present with split ends. Although straightened hair is the preferred condition for application of highlights and color, it is not advisable to overdo this procedure.

* Two of the most commonly quoted tips revolve around the use of conditioning products instead of shampoo and continuing with the styling while the hair is still moist. How to style your curly hair depends on the cut; generally speaking, medium cuts may just need a running through with your fingers.

* Those who have artificially curled hair will appreciate the advice to invest in a high quality leave in conditioner. Permed hair is notorious for its dryness and you will do well to augment any natural oils with a leave in product that is highly rated for its long duration of supplying nutrients and moisture to the hair.

Weaves and Permed Curls May Need Special Help
Styling and hair care advice for curly hair types desiring to weave in foreign tresses and sometimes artificial ornamentation requires them to remember that curls do not fall the same way each and every day. Start slowly with just one section woven in and see if you like the result before spending a day at the salon only to not be able to replicate the result the next day.