Nothing’s better for your hair than customized hair care products. Before you can make customized hair care products, you need to know what your hair needs.
Some of this may seem obvious, like heavy duty conditioning for dry hair. But it can get more complicated than that. There are a lot of different hair types out there, and even with these classifications, everyone’s hair is unique, and has unique characteristics and needs.
So, before you start making your own DIY hair care products, you need to know your hair type. If you’ve never thought much about hair type, this article will give you the insights you need to best customize your hair care.
Hair type by texture
Your hair texture might be the most obvious thing about your hair. You already know whether you have straight or curly hair, after all. But there’s a lot to know about hair texture. In fact, there’s 12 different classifications of hair texture.
Type 1 hair is straight hair. There are 3 classifications within type 1 according to how fine or coarse your hair is. 1A is straight and fine, 1B is medium, and 1C is coarse. The same is true for the other categories. Type 2 hair is wavy, and can have S-shaped waves or spiral waves. Type 3 hair is wavy, and type 4 hair is coily.
So you probably already know your curl pattern, but how do you tell if your hair is fine, medium, or coarse?
There are a few ways. First, hold a single strand of hair between your thumb and forefinger. If you can’t feel the hair between your fingers, you most likely have fine hair.
You can also lay a strand of your hair down next to a strand of sewing thread. If it’s finer than the thread, you have fine hair. If it’s thicker than the thread, you have coarse hair. In between is medium. This is not super reliable because there are different weights of sewing thread.
Finally, you may be able to tell just by having worked with your hair. If your hair doesn’t seem to hold a style or a curl well, you probably have fine hair.
This is important information in hair care.
Type 1 hair tends to be more oily, so folks with type 1 may want to avoid products that use heavy oils or ones that might lead to build up. These kinds of products may leave your hair looking greasy or weighed down. Avoid shampooing too much, though. Too much shampooing can leave hair dry, which is often a problem with fine hair. Instead, shampoo only 2-3 times a week. If your hair starts to look or feel oily in between shampoos, use a dry shampoo.
Great ingredients for type 1 hair
- Sweet almond oil and Safflower oil are very lightweight and tend to weigh type 1 hair down less.
- Glycerin is a great water soluble humectant.
- Jojoba oil is actually a liquid wax that closely resembles your own natural sebum.
- Cationic guar gum is a conditioning ingredient that won’t make hair greasy.
Type 2 hair is wavy, and can still be a little oilier than other hair textures, especially if the hair is fine. Use a good quality shampoo, and double washing may be beneficial. Before you even shampoo, though, make sure your hair is detangled. Detangle with a brush when hair is dry, and a wide toothed detangling comb if your hair is wet. You may also want to comb your hair while you condition. Speaking of conditioning, you want to make sure to let your conditioner sit in your hair for a few minutes before rinsing.
Great ingredients for type 2 hair
- Look for gentle surfactants in shampoo. Decyl glucoside is very gentle and great for hair.
- Cetearyl Alcohol is an emollient that is less likely to weigh hair down than oil.
- Cocomidopropyl betaine is a gentle surfactant that also has conditioning properties.
Type 3 hair is curly and finding the right products and routine for curly hair can be a challenge.
Curly hair tends to be less porous than some other hair types, so it can be hard to keep it from getting dry. Folks with curly hair may need to wash less than other hair types. Just wash your hair when you need to, when it’s too greasy or oily. You’ll want to wash a minimum of once every two weeks, but otherwise as long as your hair isn’t collecting a lot of excess sebum, just go by feel. Curly hair tangles easily, so it’s important to keep it combed. Because combing curly hair can cause frizz, you might want to wet your hair and apply a leave-in conditioner between washes to help you detangle without frizzing or damaging your hair. You may also want to condition between shampoos.
Great ingredients for type 3 hair
- Argan oil penetrates and softens the hair strand, helping prevent breakage.
- Hydrolyzed protein also helps strengthen hair and keep it supple.
- If you go a while between shampoos, a little aloe can help keep your scalp healthy.
Type 4 hair has tight or sharp curls, around the width of a sharpie marker or even smaller. These curl patterns may also be angled. This hair needs help staying moisturized, and can be prone to dryness and styling damage (even just from detangling). Choose a shampoo that uses gentle surfactants to leave more of your natural lipid barrier in place, and don’t forget to condition. In fact, folks with type 4 hair can benefit from regular use of hair oils and hair masks, too. Protein can help these strands be more supple and strong and help prevent breakage.
Great ingredients for type 4 hair
- Type 4 hair can stand up to coconut oil, and it helps keep it manageable and shiny.
- OliveGlide is a naturally derived silicone alternative that helps keep the hair shaft smooth.
- DL-Panthenol is a form of vitamin B5 that works as both a humectant and emollient.
Hair type and porosity
The porosity of your hair is another characteristic to keep in mind. Porosity refers to how readily your hair absorbs liquids. All hair is naturally porous to some degree. Hair with low porosity absorbs only a little moisture (or product), while hair with high porosity can absorb much more. A way to test porosity is to leave a hair in a bowl of water. If the hair absorbs water and sinks, it has a high porosity. If it sinks below the surface but doesn’t reach the bottom of the bowl, it has medium porosity. If it just floats on the surface, your hair has low porosity.
So what does that mean for your ideal hair products?
Very porous hair absorbs moisture and products easily. This hair can tend toward dryness, and it can get frizzy. So you’ll want to focus on adding moisture and keeping it in. Products with humectant ingredients, like aloe and glycerin, will help moisturize. Cationic surfactants, like our BTMC conditioning emulsifier, help to coat hair and protect it from dryness.
Low porosity hair can also be hard to keep hydrated, but for the opposite reason. The tightly closed cuticle makes it difficult for the hair strand to absorb moisture. Because product doesn’t absorb well into the hair, low porosity hair is prone to buildup on the surface of the strand, too. Sodium lauroyl methyl isethionate, or SLMI, is a gentle surfactant that is very water soluble. It cleanses thoroughly and rinses off easily.
Hair type by oil production
In addition to these hair types, some folks have hair that is naturally oily, and some have hair that’s naturally dry. While hair texture does play a role in the relative oiliness or dryness of your hair, sebum production from the scalp varies between individuals, and has a genetic component. So while you can’t change this tendency, you can take steps to help balance your own sebum production.
DIY hair care for dry hair
Dry hair can be really frustrating. Dry hair can be brittle and prone to breakage, which may manifest in hair that seems to grow slowly or not grow at all. Dry hair may appear dull or lifeless, and is also prone to damage.
Generally speaking, dry hair is often high porosity, so the moisture in the hair is lost to the air relatively quickly, and your scalp may not produce enough sebum to maintain a natural moisture barrier. The good news is that if your hair is porous, it’s easier to get hydrating ingredients to the heart of your hair strand.
Honeyquat is a cationic ingredient derived from natural honey. Honey itself is a humectant, which helps to attract and absorb moisture to your hair. The cationic charge helps to coat your hair, making it smoother, more manageable, and helping to hold moisture in. With its low molecular weight, it’s more easily absorbed by hair, and is a good choice for dry hair with low porosity too.
DIY hair care for oily hair
If you have oily hair, you might think that stepping up your shampoo schedule might be the way to go, but that may make your problem worse. Harsh shampoos or frequent shampooing may cause your scalp to produce more oil to help make up the difference.
Instead, stick to shampooing 3 times a week, or 4 at most. If your roots get greasy in between shampooing, using a dry shampoo will help a lot. When conditioning, don’t apply the conditioner to your roots. Instead, apply conditioner to the ends of your hair, or from the midshaft down to the ends if you have long hair. Using fatty alcohols, like cetearyl alcohol, can give you conditioning benefits while reducing the overall oil content of your conditioner.
Tea tree essential oil is also a great ingredient for oily hair. It helps to break up oil on the roots and scalp and wash it away.
Grey and damaged hair
Grey and damaged hair also needs some special consideration, but they’re not a hair type in themselves. They can happen to any of the above hair types.
Grey hair is hair that grows without pigment. Most of us get grey hair as we get older, and the age at which you start going grey is determined by a combination of genetic and environmental factors. Grey hair tends to be dry, coarse, rough, and almost wiry. This hair is less manageable and prone to tangling. It can also be brittle, making it prone to breakage. We love Argan oil for grey hair, because it’s particularly good at penetrating and softening the hair strand. This makes grey hair easier to detangle, less prone to frizz, and makes hair more supple so that it’s less likely to break.
Damaged hair happens for a number of reasons. It can be from styling products, heat styling, sun, and dry climates. The structure of the hair becomes compromised, which weakens the hair strand and allows more moisture to escape from the strand. For treating damaged hair, protein definitely helps. Hydrolyzed wheat protein can help strengthen hair and can form a barrier on the surface of the hair that will reduce the amount of damage from heat styling.
Now that you know more about hair types, take our What is Your Hair Type Quiz!
There’s a lot to know about creating your own customized hair care products. We’re able to provide these guidelines, but it’s important to test your products and see how they work for your own hair and scalp. Everyone’s hair is different, so what works for your hairstylist might not work so well for you. Research, experiment, and if something’s not working, change it up. You’re on your way to creating the perfect DIY hair care products for your own hair.
