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We’ve repeated over and over again the importance of matching your hair care routine with your specific hair type, whether it be finding a style that complements your hair type or a styling tool that provides the perfect amount of heat. This may shock you, but hair ties are also meant to be specific to each hair type as well! Read below and find the perfect hair tie for your hair type. Coily or Curly Hair: Spiral Hair Coils It’s no secret that coily or curly hair can be the most difficult hair type to maintain and keep organized and neat. Not only does this hair twist and turn in every direction and become easily snagged and tangled, those with curly or coiled hair are all too familiar with how fragile and prone to breakage these hair strands are. For these hair types, you’ll want to choose a spiral-shaped hair coil like this one from Kitsch. The phone cord shaped design is thick and rigid enough to hold curly hair in place while the coil shape easily blends in with a coiled hair pattern. Chemically Treated Hair: Silk Scrunchie For those who have chemically treated their hair, whether it be with a color treatment or a hair relaxer, you need to take extra caution with your hair tie of choice. Chemically treated hair is exceptionally fragile and porous, making it a prime candidate for easy breakage and split ends. The key here is to be as gentle and frictionless as possible with your hair tie, which makes a silk scrunchie like this one from Lily Silk a perfect option. The loose structure of the scrunchie provides a way to contain the hair without offering too much tugging or pulling, while the silk material creates a frictionless surface that prevents the hair from excessively rubbing and breaking.  Thick, Long Hair: Bungee Cord Tie If you have a long, thick mane of hair, you’ll need something a bit more heavy duty when it comes to keeping your hair tied and pulled back. A simple hair tie or scrunchie will prove no match for those with extremely thick hair, which means you’ll need to pull out the big guns. Enter the bungee hair tie, which is essentially a miniature bungee cord that you tie around your hair to safely and securely hold the hair in place while allowing for flexibility and stretch. This bungee tie bundle by Hotop offers multiple color options to blend in with all kinds of hair colors. Thin, Fine Hair: Hair Ribbon When it comes to thin, fine hair, you’ll want to use a hair tie that is wide enough to gather as many of your fine hairs as possible while being smooth and soft enough to avoid causing friction, which leads to the breakdown of the outer cuticle layer and can cause further dryness and hair breakage. With this hair type, a wide hair ribbon like this one from Kenz Laurenz makes a fantastic option to secure even the finest of hair types.  

Who hasn’t seen a movie or tv show where a character takes a tropical vacation to some humid climate and her hair explodes into a frizzy, weightless mess? For many of us, this comedic scene is all too real, with many of us suffering the effects of “humidity hair” when encountering a humid climate. While taking in the warm, tropical views of our travel destination, you may be shocked and a bit taken aback to notice your hair no longer looks like, well, your hair! With your normally flat, straight hair becoming more textured and dry or your curly, wavy hair becoming a massive beehive, it can be totally frustrating to try and deal with hair that no longer looks and behaves as usual. Thankfully, we’re here to bring clarity to this confusing condition as well as give you an action plan to prevent and treat humidity hair! Understanding The Hair’s Hydrogen Bonds In order to understand why humidity has such a profound effect on hair, it’s important to first understand the physical and chemical makeup of the hair strand itself. You see, hair is made up of the protein known as keratin, which also makes up our skin and nails. These keratin protein molecules are bonded together by two types of bonds: disulfide bonds and hydrogen bonds. Disulfide bonds are permanent and extremely difficult to break without intense chemical and/or physical treatments. However, hydrogen bonds are much weaker and more temporary in structure, breaking down every time they make contact with water and then rebuilding once the hair dries. This is why dry hair seems to be stuck in place when it comes to shape and texture, but after wetting it with water it is easier to style and reorganize, as you are resetting the hydrogen bonds of the hair and allowing the bonds to be rebuilt and fixed with the hair in a new shape and position. Humidity and Hydrogen Bonds Now that you understand the process by which hydrogen bonds break and rebuild themselves, you have a better understanding of how humid, water-rich air interacts with these same hydrogen bonds. When air is more humid, there are more water molecules floating in the air, and these molecules make contact with the hydrogen bonds in the hair, causing them to break. When these bonds break, the shape and structure that you set your hair when styling becomes reset, so to speak, causing the hair to be loose and unmanageable. Additionally, wet hair absorbs moisture like a sponge, causing it to swell and expand, making your hair look “bigger”. Treating and Preventing Humidity Hair With an understanding of how humidity hair works, you are on your way to preventing and treating this annoying occurrence! Here’s some key steps to keeping things under control when encountering a humid environment: Make sure your hair is completely dry when you step out into the open air, as still-damp hair will unravel far quicker than dry hair. Before entering the humid environment, make sure to seal the cuticle with an oil-rich serum or hair oil blend that prevents the cuticle from opening and allowing for swelling and hydrogen bond breakage. If all else fails, wear your hair in an updo or ponytail style for complete peace of mind, keeping it tied back and restrained to prevent the constant worry of untamable frizz!