In sixth grade, I tried my first ever heatless hair curler—a set of 36 leopard print foam strips that I meticulously rolled one-inch strands of hair into. They crowned my head in big, awkward circles, and to make it all worse, each one had a hard button that pushed into my head at every angle.
When my alarm went off at 6 a.m., I essentially swore to never wear a heatless hair curler again. Any small hope I held onto that they would look good enough to make the two hours of sleep worth it was crushed when I saw the kinked, overly-bouncy-yet-flat-at-the-same-time curls.
As a side sleeper, I was never tempted by another heatless curls method until I saw a video of the “unicorn” method, using the long satin-encased foam curlers from brands like Eternal Muse and Kitsch. It appeared the people in the videos wrapped their hair around the curler almost like a braid, which seemed perfect for me. After a couple failed attempts to use a thin fabric robe tie, I decided to buy Kitsch’s satin heatless curler set.
On my first try, I left my hair (long and fairly thick) damp, as the videos instructed, letting it dry about 50% of the way. The best way to describe how to put it in is to align the curler along your part and wrap your hair around the strip like French-braid, using the curler as the third strand. When I woke up, after a full, easy night of sleep and excited to take it out, my front layers were curled, and the rest of my hair was as damp as I left it last night. The wet strands made any of the curled strands fall fast.
Onto take two. I decided to wrap my hair on second-day hair, where I typically only wash my curtain bangs and rest stays entirely dry. I wrapped it exactly the same way, and the next day, I was thrilled to discover the exact curls I was hoping for. Bouncy and big.
After almost a year of using the curler now, I spent a while troubleshooting how to make them last on my long, mostly unlayered hair. I tried applying mousse before wrapping my hair into the curler, but it made it sticky, easy to tangle, and hard to part in sections to wrap. For now, I’ve settled on a small layer of hairspray immediately after taking it out. The curls fall to a soft wave by the end of a long day, but for not having to curl manually with heat, I’m okay with that.
Certain activities make the curls fall faster, like a workout or a windy walk, so when I really want fresh curls for something, I try to leave it in as long as I can and find creative ways to hide the ‘horn,’ as my partner calls it, sticking out from my head. Lots of hoodies, hats lifted strangely off my forehead, but it works fine to take my dog out. It’s worth it for how it’s now feasible for me to have curls before a day in the office or an early brunch.
Now, it’s feasible for me to have curls before a day in the office or an early brunch, and the only planning I have to do is when I wash my hair or let it fully air dry. I hope my sixth grade self would smile to herself to know that I figured out how to do heatless curls and get some sleep at the same time.
Autumn Rose Bellan 