[GUIDE] Turn your FLAT, STRAIGHT hair into VOLUMINOUS, TEXTURED curls and waves at home in 10 minutes
So lately I feel like there's a new post every day on r/AsianMasculinity from another Asian bro lamenting his pin-straight hair and how it won't hold its shape no matter what products he uses and how he styles it. I'm talking about posts like this, this, and this (literally saw this one as soon as I opened Reddit to write this post).
As an Asian guy who's struggled with the same problem for most of my life until after my college years, I'm writing up this guide to help out the community, because I know how frustrating it is every day to deal with hair that holds you back from maximizing the full potential of your physical appeal. And boy how I wish I could have known about this sooner.
What's this guide about?
In this guide, I'm going to show you how to use a mini curling iron and some hair wax to turn your flat, straight hair into textured curls and waves. Here's the before and after:
A little about me real quick
Over the past several years, I went through a ton of frustration figuring out how to turn my flat, straight hair into something appealing and suitable for my face. I had tried a myriad of different hair products and styling techniques (and various combinations of them), including gel, hair wax, perms, sea salt spray + blow drying + hair wax, texture powder + hair spritz, and more. But after I started using this mini curling iron method about 6 months ago, I haven't looked back. It's been the absolute best and most reliable way to style my hair.
(BTW, it's crazy how much of an impact your hairstyle can have on your visual aesthetic. In terms of appearance, I literally look like a 5 when my hair isn't styled but I'm an 8 when it is styled. That's how I feel, at least.)
However, I am fully aware that this curling iron method damages hair (as does anything else that applies excessive heat to your hair) and, in extreme cases, could increase my chances of hair loss. But given that literally no one in my blood-related family has experienced any form of balding or hair loss (if memory serves), even in their 80s, I think my hair genetics are decent and I'm willing to take the risk. After 6 months of relying on this method, styling my hair probably 9 days out of every 10 days, as well as being sure to take proper care of my hair, I haven't noticed any signs of damage. My hair still looks as healthy as it did before I tried this method, as far as I can tell. Hope I haven't just jinxed myself here.
What hair products and styling tools do you need?
To try out this method, you will need a few things:
- Heat protectant: I use TRESemmé Protecting Heat Spray (about 9 USD on Amazon at the time of writing, but you can buy this at places like Walmart in person). An 8-oz bottle lasts me around 3 months. Feel free to explore other options for heat protectant.
- Mini curling iron: You can probably use just about any curling iron or flat iron, but the one I use is the Terviiix Mini Flat Iron (20 USD on Amazon at the time of writing).
- Heat-resistant glove (optional but highly recommended): To avoid burning your fingers on the curling iron, I highly recommend getting a heat-resistant glove like Teenitor Heat Resistant Glove With Silicone Bumps (8 USD for a pair of gloves on Amazon at the time of writing).
- Hair wax: Use whatever hair wax or clay that you like or have readily available. I use GATSBY Moving Rubber Extreme Mat Hair Styling Wax (9 USD on Amazon at the time of writing), a whole 2.8-oz container of which should last me around 6 months. Small enough to bring through airport security.
- Hair spray or spritz (optional but highly recommended): I've been using GIOVANNI L.A. Hold Hair Spritz - Maximum Hold Styling Spray (10 USD on Amazon at the time of writing, and you can also get this at grocery stores like Safeway or Whole Foods). A 5-oz bottle of this probably lasts me around 6 months as well. There's also a 2.2-oz travel-size version of this hair spritz available online and at grocery stores.
All in all, this comes out to a one-time cost of 28 USD and a bi-annual recurring cost of 37 USD. Should be pretty affordable for the majority of us.
A few points before we get started
Before you invest too much time reading this post, let me share a few points that you might want to know.
- I'm not a professional barber / hairstylist / etc., so make sure to do your own research before following my advice 😉, because I'm just a regular guy who's happened to experiment with a wide range of hair styling techniques over the past several years and finally tried this method that's been working for me for over half a year now.
- This method only lasts you for the day (or until your wash your hair). The next time you wash your hair, your hair will revert to its natural state. This isn't like a perm that lasts you several months. HOWEVER, this does have its advantages over perms, and I personally prefer this method over perms as well. Later on, I'll get into the pros and cons of this method vs getting a perm.
- Heat styling can be very harmful to your hair. Using a curling iron like this will pretty much never damage the roots of your hair, which is an extremely good thing, but it can still damage your hair shafts and make them dry and brittle. Be conservative with how you style your hair; i.e., make sure to use the heat protectant spray, prefer to use the lowest heat setting on the curling iron, don't keep the curling iron on your hair too long, etc. Also, don't be lazy about proper hair care routines like using conditioner after you shampoo.
The TL;DR for this guide
The guide below might look pretty long and intimidating, but rest assured that the method itself is actually very straightforward and uncomplicated once you've tried it a couple times.
In a nutshell, the steps for this curling iron styling method are just:
- Prepare and protect your hair (1 minute).
- Prepare your styling tools, particularly heating up the curling iron (1 minute).
- Add texture to your hair by heating it with the curling iron (5 minutes).
- Lock in the texture and shape your hair using hair wax (3 minutes).
- Lock in the shape using a hair spray (1 minute).
Once you get used to this method of styling your hair, it could take you as little as 5 minutes every day (depending on the length of your hair). At my hair length, it typically takes me 9-10 minutes every day.
The longer (but helpful) version of this guide
STEP 1 (1 minute): Protect your hair with heat protectant.
Use your heat protectant spray to apply the heat protectant all over your hair until it's lightly damp. YOU MUST wait for your hair to become dry again before you start heating your hair with the curling iron. Being the impatient person I am, I like to lightly ruffle my hair with my hands to help the heat protectant dry. With my hair length, it usually takes about a minute to dry completely.
STEP 2 (1 minute): Plug in your mini curling iron and set it to the desired heat setting.
For fine, straight hair like mine, the lowest heat setting is probably already sufficient, which is 320° F (or 160° C) for my mini curling iron.
Wait for your mini curling iron to heat up to the desired heat setting. My curling iron takes about 1 minute to heat up from cold. In the process of heating up, the indicator light will continuously blink. Once it's done heating up, the indicator light will turn solid.
STEP 3 (5 minutes): Add texture to your hair by curling all your hair with the curling iron, one clump of hair at a time.
⚠️ WARNING ⚠️: As I stated before, you must wait for your hair to be completely dry before you start curling it with the curling iron.
Hold up your curling iron in one hand. Using the other hand, grab a thin "row" of your hair between your thumb and index finger and hold the row of hair up so that it's perpendicular to the surface of your head.
Near the roots of the hair, press the plates of the curling iron together to clamp the row of hair, and gently pull up and away from the roots to apply the heat to the hair. As you continue to clamp the row of hair using the curling iron and pull up and away, slowly rotate the curling iron to curl the hair in the direction you want.
For each row of hair, you should be clamping and pulling it with the curling iron for only 4-5 seconds. Of course, this depends on the length of your hair, but make sure not to clamp your hair for too long to avoid burning it.
Repeat this step for all other "rows" of your hair until your hair is fully curled or wavy to the extent you want. Feel free to go over the same sections of your hair multiple times if there are still some straight hairs. Just be careful not to overexpose any hairs to the heat, as they could eventually become damaged.
After you've finished curling all the hair on your head (or at least all the hair that is long enough to fit between the plates of the curling iron), your hair should look something like this:
STEP 4 (3 minutes): Lock in the texture and shape your hair using your hair wax or clay.
Use one finger to scoop out a little bit of hair wax or hair clay. For my hair length, I find that the appropriate amount of hair wax I need is about the volume of a nickel. Be conservative with how much you use, as applying too much hair wax will just cause your hair to clump together.
Next is very important: rub the hair wax between your hands, evenly spreading the product all across your palms and fingers until you can't see any chunks of the product anywhere on your hands anymore. If you still have visible chunks of the hair wax on your hands, it'll cause some parts of your hair to have too much product, and it'll clump together. But spreading the hair wax between your hands should only take 5-10 seconds, so don't overthink it.
Now, it's time to apply the wax to your hair. With your palms and fingers covered by the wax, use your hands to grab your hair in a scrunching motion. Do this repeatedly all around your hair with the goal of making sure all the hairs, especially the roots, are covered with hair wax. If you feel that some parts of your hair are still flimsy and haven't been covered with wax yet, scoop out a tiny bit more hair wax and repeat this step again for that section of hair.
Now that your hair is covered with wax, shape your hair into whatever form you like. With your hair now having both a ton of texture and hold, you'll notice it's way easier to shape your hair without it flopping back to its natural state.
Recently, I've preferred to style my hair like this, which is like a middle part but without a clear part:
STEP 5 (1 minute, optional): Lock in your hairstyle using the hair spray or hair spritz.
Although this step is optional, I highly recommend using a hair spray or hair spritz after shaping your hair with wax. The hair wax helps you lock in the texture so that you can shape your hair, but the hair spritz helps you lock in the shape so that your hairstyle doesn't undo itself throughout the day.
If you're using the same hair spritz I'm using, I recommend holding the nozzle of the bottle around 12 inches (or 30 cm) away from the section of hair that I want to spray. Try to cover the entire surface of your hair with the spray, with more sprays on parts of the hair that are more likely to lose their shape.
For my middle part style, the front-and-center arc in my hair is the part of my hairstyle most likely to lose its shape, so I give that part and the hair at my temples a couple extra spritzes. In total, I probably use 7-8 spritzes all around my hair. As similarly stated for the hair wax, I would also advise against using too much hair spray, as it can also cause hair to clump together in an awkward way.
Tips
- Make tweaks to this method to fit your preferences: If your hair still doesn't look how you want after trying out this method, don't give up. Keep trying this method and make small adjustments to improve your results every time. It probably took me 2 weeks before I found the right parameters (how big or small each "row" of hair I should curl at a time, the direction in which I should curl my hair, how much hair wax to use, how much hair spritz to use, etc.) and could consistently reproduce the exact hairstyle I wanted. Eventually, I figured it out and have been styling my hair this way for more than half a year.
- Don't style your hair after a steamy shower: If you've just gotten out of the shower and your bathroom is humid, the curls won't even last for a few minutes. Make sure your head and hair are completely dry so that the heat can work its magic and keep your hair nice and curly or wavy. If you're sweating due to the steamy shower you just took, the texture won't hold up at all.
Take proper care of your hair
This method is obviously very reliant on heat. Styling with heat damages and dries out hair, to put it frankly. To minimize the damage to your hair and and keep your hair hydrated, don't be lazy about applying the heat protectant before curling your hair and be sure to use conditioner every time you shower.
Why shouldn't I just get a perm?
I've permed my hair a total of 4 or 5 times in my life. Here's how I would compare getting a perm vs styling using a curling iron:
| Perming your hair | Styling your hair with a curling iron |
|---|---|
| + Takes just a couple hours at a salon and can last for several months | - Takes around 10 minutes (depending on your hair length and the style you're going for) but only lasts for the day (until you wash your hair); needs to be done every morning |
| + Strong winds, rain, or excessive sweating won't undo the texture | - Strong winds, rain, or excessive sweating could undo the texture |
| - Damages the hair shaft (the visible part of your hair)* | - Damages the hair shaft (the visible part of your hair)* |
| - Can potentially damage hair follicles at the root and lead to hair loss over time* | + Unlikely to damage hair follicles at the root* |
| - Hair growth after a month or two could start to make it look awkward, since the root of your hairs will have grown out straight, while the permed hairs will remain curly or wavy | + Hair growth generally won't lead to your hair looking awkward, since you would re-style it from near the root of the hair every day as your hair continues to grow every day |
| - If the perm doesn't turn out quite right at the salon, you're pretty much stuck with it for at least a few months or unless you cut it off | + If you mess up the styling, you can just wash your hair to start over from scratch |
| - Leaves you with fewer hairstyle options | + You have much more control over how you want to style it, so you have more hairstyle options every day |
^(\ Again, I'm not a professional, so take these statements related to hair damage with a grain of salt. These statements are just based on my own understanding and research and may not be 100% accurate.)*
Overall, for someone like myself who can typically spare 10 minutes every morning, styling my straight hair with a curling iron on a daily basis is preferable to getting a perm every half year.
🏆 BONUS 🏆: Knowing how to style your hair using a curling iron, you won't be afraid of bad haircuts anymore. As long as your hair still has a bit of length, you can save it by styling it with this method.
Personally, I actually cut my own hair now, and I'm absolute trash at cutting my own hair, but that's exactly my point here.
Why do I write such long posts?
I'm hella verbose because
- I have a habit of explaining things in too much detail, and
- I want to help out all my Asian brothers out there. If this guide helps you, I hope you'll pass on the knowledge to the fellow Asian bros in your lives who could use it.
If you have any questions for me or want to offer some feedback, don't hesitate to leave a comment.