Hairbrushes for the Daily Beauty Routine

Lately as I peruse an eternal selection of beauty and cosmetics application videos on youtube... I started wondering whether anyone still has positive feelings about their makeup and beauty regimen tools, or whether they've sadly come to accept them as part of a painful and strict regime they must go through. Or at least, they've talked themselves into accepting (!).

I always apreciated the retro and olde-time gay feeling that some traditional beauty implements bring me. Sometimes the journey is just as good as the destination?

I'm personally a huge fan of natural bristle hair brushes. Although the way my hair looks most days, you'd wonder how that could be LOL. Well because my hair is wavy and part curly I really don't get to brush it much unless I'm working to create a straight and shiney style. I always favor huge gap-toothed hair combs for before the shower and during the shower, and large tooth hair combs when the hair is wet and I need to start styling it, or even as I do a cursory dry through with the blowdryer to take some of the soggyness out.

I still am of the opinion that brushes are your best tools, along with your ingenuity and your creativity. Hot irons and other hurtful implements are mostly created for time crunched stylists at fashion shows, where hot and quick are musts. Are all our lives really that frantic that we can't stop to take care of our hair health for the long term? I guess many products will come to market soon enough, for those people who don't mind controlling the dry, crackly, and split hairs caused by all that high-tension and high-heat processing. Just get a good thermal ionic hair dryer with a nozzle and a diffuser. It'll last you ages and will be gentler and faster for rushed styling sessions. This is my hair dryer, Conair Infinity Professional, that I bought for $40 +tax when it was on sale at my favorite CVS pharmacy. Slick!

ROUND BRUSH

I use this brush to blow-dry straighten my wavy/semi-curly hair. I actually bought it at my old Mario Tricoci hair salon in Oakbrook, IL per the recommendation of excellent person, and hairdresser Michael. I've had this brush for years now and is my trusty hair buddy. I got it for $28 + tax but I've seen it cheaper on the Internet. Professional round,dense boar bristle, with wood handle.

FLAT BRUSH
Another good brush is this black one, which helps clean up hair from hair styling and other particles. It also gives a pleasant scalp massage sensation that I find very relaxing. It's great when I want to loosen the wave and create body. The shiney black body fits comfortably in my hand without slipping (unless I forget to dry my hands first!) and has both a hard white core and the black boar bristles around it. The red, padded back creates comfort and mobility of the bristles to accompany the contour of your hair and scalp as you're brushing.

I lost the small one I had so I bought the large one at Ulta last month. I used to have a French one my mom gave me just like this, when I was growing up. The cost for these brushes at Ulta are $16.99 for the purse size and $24.95 for the large size/regular size brush.

PRODUCTS

And of course, it's important to use the right products when you're heat-treating or brushing your hair. Don't use something tacky (sticky) or that hardens your hair (some root lifters, for example, or too much hair spray on the roots if you're trying to create lift) or else you're just asking for torn, uneven strands that cause unruly fizz, and damage. I would suggest a light spray-in conditioner and a gentle touch. My favorite spray-on conditioner right now is the black vanilla one created by Carol's Daugther, and I adopted this as I just finished my Ouidad botanical boost.

For blow-drying straight, then additional product can be layered on a little bit at a time. One good product I've found works great to soften and help strengthen while straightening hair (what a mouthful, try saying that three times fast!) is Carol's Daugther hair milk, or Ouidad climate control gel.

SILICONE

Another tip is that I always look for products with no silicone because my hair acts very moody and unruly whenever I do--I blame it on the porosity of the slightly-hair-colored and wavy characteristics within my hair. Even if silicone or some derivate passes by unoticed when I read the label (which I always do!) my hair always lets me know it was there.

Hope this rant proves useful to you! Thank you for reading! :o)

-J