The cold, dry winter months can wreak havoc on our hair. But taking special care of those delicate tresses from November through March can help keep them healthy. We asked Bill Rowley from Philosophy salon his advice on how to keep the damage to a minimum:
Don’t overwash your hair.
“If you can get away with washing it two, three, four times a week [that would be better],” Rowley says. “If you do need to wash your hair more often, use a shampoo for dry hair or a moisturizing shampoo.”
Condition well, and consider using a weekly hair masque.
“Very much like you would have a masque for your skin that you would do maybe once every week or every two weeks, you have them for hair too. They’ll make a huge difference. You put your shampoo, rinse it out, put the masque on. Leave it in for five to ten minutes, or the manufacturer’s instructions. Rinse it out, then put a conditioner over top. Or what I like to do is, don’t rinse out the masque, put the conditioner right over top. It almost locks it in. That’s my little secret.”
Leave-in conditioners – not what they used to be.
“There are nourishing creams that are on the market now, or leave-in conditioners, that are much lighter than the old goopy ones. You can put them in wet or dry, and they’re also really good for static. So before you put in a styling product, put that in. And then you blow dry.”
Know your hair type.
“Remember that dry hair is very different from damaged hair or hair that has been altered because of chemicals. Those things need conditioners to close the hair cuticle to make the hair shiny. Dry hair is usually because our environment is so dry. That’s when the nourishing creams work well, anti-frizz products, even if your hair’s not that frizzy, they put a nice little coating on your hair to make your hair feel a lot more supple and softer. Even Static Guard sometimes helps when your hair gets so dry, a little can of Static Guard works really well. And the smell goes away really fast!”
No need to put the flat iron away.
“People are so worried about flat irons, curling irons, blow dryers, things like that. If used properly, they’re not going to bother your hair. Remember, if you flat iron your hair on Monday, and you don’t wash it on Tuesday, you can turn the heat on your flat iron right down to low if you need to touch it up. You don’t need to turn it up to high every single time you use it. If you don’t wash your hair, you can always stick your blow dryer on the cool setting, and with a brush fluff up your blowdry. If you use them correctly they’re not going to bother your hair at all.”