Although many people desire having copious luscious locks of hair, it comes with a price: coarse and thick hair can be difficult to care for. However, with our top tips and recommendations on how to care for coarse hair, you can have the hair of your dreams and keep frizz to a minimum.
To help with understanding how to care for coarse hair, it helps to know a little more about the technical side of hair. There are two main parts of a hair: the follicle and the shaft. The follicle is the part under the skin that is responsible for producing the hair, and the shaft is the visible part, which can consist of up to three layers: the cortex, cuticle and medulla. Thick hair has all three of these layers, which is what makes it much thicker than medium or thin hair, which doesn’t have all three layers.
So, because of these extra layers, it can be more difficult for moisture to fully penetrate to the core, and moisture is just as important for our hair as it is for our bodies. When hair becomes dry, it becomes frizzy, which is much more likely for thick hair since it’s so much harder to soak in moisture – and when it comes to answering the question of how to care for coarse hair, moisture is key.
This makes it easier to understand that the top tips for thick and coarse hair are all about encouraging and maintaining moisture as much as possible. For example, blow drying coarse or thick hair should be avoided when possible – air drying and using a light moisturising oil in slightly damp hair is far better for coarse hair than the heat and motion of a blow drying, which strips the moisture and oils right out of your hair.
If you do need to use heat to dry or style your hair, always use a heat protectant spray or serum and use the lowest heat setting on the tool. To help replace naturally occurring oils, using deep moisturising hair masks once a week is recommended, but be careful not to use them too frequently as the masks can create build up.
Thick and coarse hair also benefits from using the right option of the many hair brush types that are available. Some brushes are more effective at distributing those naturally occurring oils from your scalp to the ends of your hair, such as our boar bristle detangling hairbrush, The Luxe Brush. These oils help protect your hair against heat and humidity, which can have adverse effects on thick hair – though if your hair is thick and curly, it’s better to use a wide paddle brush.
So, now that you know how to care for coarse hair, you’re free to style and experiment with your own locks and get the look you’ve always wanted! For more tips on different hair styles and hair products, check out the other article our blog, where we go into detail about all sorts of common problems to do with hair that we are frequently asked about, such as how to look after curly hair. Got any questions? Leave a comment below and we’ll try to answer it for you!
