Protective style
A protective style is a style that protects your actual hair from the elements. (sun, rain). and also from daily manipulation(combing and heat from styling). These styles are supposed to hide your hair all the way down from the root. Examples are locs (faux, butterfly, soft )and sew ins. Basically anything to bury your actual hair is an ideal protective style. Because of the nature of these styles, people tend to keep them in for a long time. It is necessary to carry out some good practices if you intend to keep them in for long.
But before that, know the difference between protective styles and low manipulation styles
| PROTECTIVE STYLES | LOW MANIPULATION STYLES. |
| Protective styles protect the entire length of your hair |
low manipulation styles, usually protect just the tip or some portion of your hair
|
| Protective styles does not give room for manipulation | low manipulation styles, do give room for manipulation to some extent. |
|
Examples are, locs(faux locs, butterfly locs, soft locs) and sew ins |
Examples are twists(flat twists, mini twists, fluffy twists, juicy twists), Braids(with or without extensions) |
Here is why braids with extensions are not protective but low manipulation styles. With braids, your hair is just mixed with the extensions. Your hair is not buried
HOW TO PREPARE YOUR HAIR FOR A LONG TERM PROTECTIVE STYLE.
- Wash your hair squeaky clean. Yes, the natural oils would be out but because your hair is going to be out for long, it wont hurt if it is so clean. To make up for the oils which have been stripped, take the next steps seriously.
- Do a hair treatment
Depending on the needs of your hair before protective styling, you should respond to the need/s in the prep process. Take a strand of your hair and stretch it. If it snaps easily, it needs moisture. To give your hair moisture, you do a deep conditioning treatment. An already made one or a DIY is fine. If the strand does not snap easily, but stretches and does not return to its original state, your hair needs a protein treatment. - Seal the moisture. So after doing treatments, rinse it off, apply your leave in per usual. Go ahead and seal the moisture with a heavier oil like Shea butter, baobab oil or olive oil. Note that hot oil treatments are not to be washed out. Except palm oil of course
How to find the right protective style for your hair.
- Know the thickness of your hair strand. If you have fine hair, high tension protective styles are not for you. We are talking long and tiny braids. If you have thick hair strands, you could do away with high tension (not the poles I beg) protective styles. The long and tiny braids but sis, this is highly not recommended. But if you do, be sure not to leave it in for long. By high tension styles, I mean tiny braids and the opposite is for low tension braids.
- Know your hair’s density, this step is for those who like to do protective styles with their own hair. That is without extensions so say twists. if you have high density hair, mini twists would look good on you. You obviously have the volume and so mini twists are not going to be looking scanty in your head. If you have low density hair, just know mini twists are not for you. You might even regret it if you do them. They are going to look small on your head. This is because, you simply don’t have enough volume for the style.
How to find the right extensions for your hair.
Using the right extensions for your protective styles goes a long way to make them last long. - Choose the right colour of extensions. Yes, take braids for instance, not every stylist can braid to hide your actual hair. If you want to keep this protective style in for long, you might want to choose the right color. Here is why, when your braids are done, your actual hair grows out of the braids after sometime. When you use the right colour of extension, it blends with your hair colour and the growth is seamless.(like the picture above.) For instance, your hair is not entirely black maybe it looks a little brown, braiding with black and brown extension mixed together, should do you the trick.
If you don’t intend to keep the style in for long, you could go ahead and play with colors!!!
Takeaway
Protective styles are the easiest ways to grow your hair. Making the most out of them is really important. also read https://alijosesays.allmediagh.tech/2023/02/27/292/
