For this Invisible braid styling, I used Janet New Yaky Straight Hair. You must leave some your relaxed/texturized hairline out. A hairstylist such as myself will have to perform the haircut. Braiders just put the hair in.
You can see the braids at the roots. Your hair gets blended in! I do suggest that you get your hair shampooed, treated/conditioned, blow-dried, and
flat ironed/straightened before getting any invisible braid service. Why? When your hair is not flat ironed/straightened, it looks thicker and is essentially less condensed. The braider seems to pickup less of your hair as she is braiding and more of the extension hair.
The extra weight of the extension hair on the less condensed strands of your own individual hair can cause breakage. You will be able to feel the heaviness from day one. If it is heavy from the first day, then you need to get them removed within a month. That seems like a expensive hairdo right? Yes. So I strongly suggest straightening your hair first to condense the strands so that more of your hair is in each individual plait. The hair should not feel heavy if less of the extension hair is attached to your own hair.
For this invisible braid styling, I used Boyhme Remi 20 inch Natural Wave hair (around $100 per pack) on top and front. I used Enstyle French Refined Wet and Wavy in the back. Yes. I was trying to save some money . .
My hair is not fully relaxed; I keep it texturized because I want to maintain the strength of the hair. The braiding process can be stressful to already weak hair. Invisible braids is not suggested for completely natural hair either. Because your hair is partly loose and mixed in . . . you do not want to have different textures showing up within your hair style. You can see the braids at the roots. I still recommend flat ironing/straightening the hair first before getting "wet and wavy" hair extensions as well. You may be asking why straighten hair if you are planning to re-wet it anyway? Again, you want more of your "condensed" hair to go into each individual braid in order to support the weight of the hair extensions. Once you wet the style, your straight hair will definitely blend in. Invisible braids are great to allow the hairline to rest. Just twist set the front hairline into the wet and wavy hair; then just watch it grow. You can keep it moisturized and oiled with VO5 conditioning hairdress and Carefree Curl instant Moisturizer. (See my separate article on "containing curly hair") These simple "old school" products seem to not weigh the hair down and seem to nourish the hair while sporting the braided extension style.
The invisible braids look like strand to strand, but there is no adhesive nor glue involved. My braider that I use charges around $150 Labor only and takes about six hours on average. I have to cut and thin out the final hairstyle for my individual, personalized look.
For this Invisible braid styling, I used Janet New Yaky Straight Hair. You must leave some your relaxed/texturized hairline out. A hairstylist such as myself will have to perform the haircut. Braiders just put the hair in.
You can see the braids at the roots. Your hair gets blended in! I do suggest that you get your hair shampooed, treated/conditioned, blow-dried, and flat ironed/straightened before getting any invisible braid service. Why? When your hair is not flat ironed/straightened, it looks thicker and is essentially less condensed. The braider seems to pickup less of your hair as she is braiding and more of the extension hair. The extra weight of the extension hair on the less condensed strands of your own individual hair can cause breakage. You will be able to feel the heaviness from day one. If it is heavy from the first day, then you need to get them removed within a month. That seems like a expensive hairdo right? Yes. So I strongly suggest straightening your hair first to condense the strands so that more of your hair is in each individual plait. The hair should not feel heavy if less of the extension hair is attached to your own hair.
For this invisible braid styling, I used Boyhme Remi 20 inch Natural Wave hair (around $100 per pack) on top and front. I used Enstyle French Refined Wet and Wavy in the back. Yes. I was trying to save some money . .
My hair is not fully relaxed; I keep it texturized because I want to maintain the strength of the hair. The braiding process can be stressful to already weak hair. Invisible braids is not suggested for completely natural hair either. Because your hair is partly loose and mixed in . . . you do not want to have different textures showing up within your hair style. You can see the braids at the roots. I still recommend flat ironing/straightening the hair first before getting "wet and wavy" hair extensions as well. You may be asking why straighten hair if you are planning to re-wet it anyway? Again, you want more of your "condensed" hair to go into each individual braid in order to support the weight of the hair extensions. Once you wet the style, your straight hair will definitely blend in. Invisible braids are great to allow the hairline to rest. Just twist set the front hairline into the wet and wavy hair; then just watch it grow. You can keep it moisturized and oiled with VO5 conditioning hairdress and Carefree Curl instant Moisturizer. (See my separate article on "containing curly hair") These simple "old school" products seem to not weigh the hair down and seem to nourish the hair while sporting the braided extension style.
The invisible braids look like strand to strand, but there is no adhesive nor glue involved. My braider that I use charges around $150 Labor only and takes about six hours on average. I have to cut and thin out the final hairstyle for my individual, personalized look.
Caution! Invisible braid styling is great for allowing the scalp to breath and allowing hair to thicken at the root. However, the loose ends that extend past the one inch braided portion is subject to breakage or being cut during removal process. Try this method for the purposes of thickening, and you will not be disappointed. I do suggest having the braider that put them in; to take them out.
ReplyDeleteI stumbled across this while looking for hairstyles for this and wanted to ask do the hair really break off with this type of style and current length of hair gets cut. I want this style but dont want my hair getting cut or breaking off in the process.
DeleteI personally refused to have any more invisible braids done because I did not want to lose my length. If have over 6 inches of hair, then you can run the risk of damaging the four or more inches left out of the invisible braid. I think that someone with two to four inches of their own hair length would benefit the most from invisible braid styling. I believe that you need at least two inches of hair minimum to hold the invisible braid styling. If you have longer hair, I would suggest the microbraids style where they braid all of your hair in so during removal everything below the knot is cut and none of it is yours. I hope that this helps.
DeleteI had a reader to call and ask me if I have a net in the front of my hair. The answer is "no." The pictures are all my hair texturized with braid extension hair only. No net. You have to be a good judge as to how close to get the braids to the hairline. If your hair is completely relaxed then it may be harder to blend. Patience and good judgement is required when it comes to the hairline. Also, a zigzag parting (i.e. messy parts) is best along the hairline.
ReplyDeleteWould tree braiding have the same effect on the hair as invisibles do?
ReplyDeleteHi Lynnette: I have had two tree braiding services completed on my own head of hair in the past. At the time, very few braiders in my area knew how to do tree braids or even knew what they were.
ReplyDeleteTree braids are tricky. Typically, curly synthetic hair is recommended. Also, the braider that I used braided my hair too tightly. I lost some of my hairline. I let her perform the service a second time, and she used less tension because she saw the damage from the first service that she performed. I kept telling her to ease off the tension, but she would not listen the first time. My hairline recovered, but removal time for tree braids is just as long as any other braid removal. Also, my hair seemed to lock in the braid because of the shampoos that I performed while the tree braids were in. This seemed to make removal even harder than the invisible braids. Pricing for invisible braids as well as tree braids were about $150 for my area. Time for both services were about the same 4 to 6 hours. The look: Similar but you have less control of styling the tree braids because it is loose hair hanging out of a braid. Not a solid foundation. Invisible braids have a solid foundation at the root. You definitely have a lot more styling control with invisible braids if you have longer length at the hairline and a zigzag parting versus a straight parting around the hairline. Shampooing as much as you want with the invisible braids seems to cause little to no locking issues.
So out the door with a fresh head of tree braids will give you a similar finished look of invisible braids, but the upkeep goes in a totally different direction.
On a separate note, someone with extreme breakage would benefit from the tree braiding because the cornrowing method would allow the short patches of hair to be skipped over forming a bridge allowing the short areas to get some hair placed in that area. I would limit shampooing with the tree braids.
I hope that this helps you with your decision!
It did the braider did a terrible job with the tree braids so Im just gonna get micros thanks alot for answering my pesky question lol
ReplyDeleteI love hearing from my readers! Enjoy the micros!
ReplyDelete