How to Style Unwashed Hair
Picture the situation: you know it’s nearly time for a hair wash, but you’d been hoping to get another day out of it before having to reach for the shampoo…
You’ve got a busy day at work, and there’s no time to wash your hair before you leave. But when you wake up in the morning, it’s to discover that your hair has transformed itself overnight – it’s taken on the grease factor, bad.
By this point, you’re panicking already, and that panic only intensifies when you discover you’re all out of dry shampoo. Nothing can save you now, so you’re going have to do the only thing you can: style it suitably to prevent it from showing the harsh reality of its greasiness too badly.
Here are a few guaranteed grease-hiding hairstyles to try out today:
1. Cornrows
Cornrows aren’t just for 11-year-old girls on holiday. Search for them on Google – they’re super fashionable, and they look really effective when they’re done right. There’s still a bit of debate about who should be “allowed” to cornrow their hair, but we personally think that if the style appeals to you, there’s no reason why you shouldn’t experiment with it yourself.
2. Clipped back with oversized hair accessories
Greasy hair tends to look the most obvious at the top, so if you can clip this top part of your hair back from your face with a couple of oversized hair accessories, you will divert people’s attention to one of two things: the lower part of your hair, or the hair accessories themselves. And the good news is that hair accessories continue to make a resurgence in popularity every spring and summer, so you’ll be bang on trend.
3. Bedhead waves
The best thing to do with greasy hair that’s falling a bit flat is to add some volume and texture with a few basic styling tools. Use a curling iron to create soft waves, then grab your backcomb brush and work at fluffing up your parting. Spritz the whole thing with hairspray to keep it locked in place. Yes, the product will add more oil to your hair, but not on a noticeable level – and it’s totally fine if you plan to shower later in the day.
4. Slicked-back bun
There’s something oddly appealing about having a slicked-back bun with slightly greasy hair. Maybe it’s because last year, wet-look hair was genuinely trending amongst some celebs and runway models at some point (though to be fair, we never saw anyone styling it deliberately in public), and wet-look hair in a bun actually looks pretty neat. Just scrape your hair back and brush it evenly into place, removing any kinks, before securing it in a laid-back bun.
5. Braids
Like cornrows, when your hair’s looking past its best, there’s nothing quite like sticking it in a couple of braids. If you’re heading out into the wilderness for a few days, and you know you won’t have access to a shower, braids are the perfect hairstyle. You won’t even need to touch your hair, let alone hack at it with a brush, and if it goes a bit greasy, it’s less obvious. Now that braids are back in, you could totally keep your hair in a particular braid style for several days before letting it out to show off your waves, washing it, and repeating.
6. Embrace it!
We might naturally want to cover up our greasy hair because we’re worried about defying some sort of unwritten social rule by flaunting our hair when it doesn’t look its best. But here’s the reality: no-one cares! Sometimes it takes stepping back and seeing things for how they really are to realise that the greasy hair issue… isn’t actually an issue.
If your hair is looking particularly greasy today, challenge yourself to go outside with no greasy hair cover-ups at all. Put yourself in a public place (safely social distancing, of course), and wait for the comments. Wait for the whispers, the pointing, the staring. Guess what? It won’t happen. Realising that no-one actually gives two hoots about your greasy hair might just be the confidence boost you need. It’s totally okay to go out when you don’t feel that you look your best, especially now. So own it!