Long hair systems can look incredibly beautiful and natural when properly prepared and attached. But that's exactly the tricky part: properly preparing it for a long-lasting, secure attachment.
Tackling the preparation of a long hair system just like you would any other regular hair system is setting yourself up for failure. Due to the increased length of the hair strands when compared to short hair systems, they have their own nuances that need to be accounted for.
And that's what today's blog entry is all about!
The whole point of this prep step is to get the hair out of your way so you can actually see what you're doing when you're trying to attach the system to your scalp.
Here's what you'll need:
- Your hairpiece. We're preparing your hairpiece for attachment, so it should be taped up and ready to go before we start. Don't worry, there are no fancy steps here, just tape it like you would any other hairpiece and it's good to go.
- A styrofoam head. If you have any sort of table clamp, that's gonna help a ton keeping the styrofoam head in place, so whip it out and secure it to your table.
- T-pins. Around 4 is good. These are for securing your hair system in place on the styrofoam head.
- Jaw clips. At least 4 of them, and not bigger than 1 inch as bigger ones add weight to your hair system. Large jaw clips just don't work the same as small ones. Throw in a smaller half inch jaw clip if your hair system has bangs.
- A comb. But not just any comb, one specially made for combing, styling and detangling hair systems and wigs.
So let's get started!
Step 1
Take one hand, place it on the base of your hair piece and just comb it through with your free hand. What we're doing here is getting rid of all knots and tangles that your hair system might have.
You'll know when you're done when you start feeling the comb effortlessly running through your hair system with no resistance whatsoever.
Step 2
Place your hair system on the styrofoam head, it's time to pin it in place. But don't star randomly pinning your hair to the styrofoam head, as you don't want to pin it through the tape.
Just part the hair apart with your fingers and you should be able to see where the tape is. And if you can't see it, you certainly can feel it, just run your fingers around the are and you'll pick up on it.
Once you've located where the tape perimeter is, push the pins just right above it. Place one pin on both sides, another one on the back and the last one the front. You can place more for added security, but really there's no wrong way to do it as it doesn't have to be perfect.
As long as you don't pin the hair system through the tape, you're doing fine.
Step 3
With the hair system pinned in place, the next step is to part your hair right at the top of the scalp in two parts, a front part, and a back part. Just comb the front half of your hair system forward and get a hold of it with your other hand, it doesn't have to be perfect so don't worry too much about it.
Step 4
Grab the front section and wrap it into a little bun on the frontal top part of the styrofoam head, around two inches up from where your forehead would be if you were wearing the hair system. With the bun all wrapped up, go ahead and place two jaw clips on it to secure it in place, one on the left and the other one on the right side of the bun.
Again, this is just the prep stage, so don't worry about it looking pretty. If you have bangs, go ahead and place the smaller jaw clip on the front of the bun, making sure you're getting the bangs along the way.
Step 5
Do the same exact thing you did on the front section, but be careful not to pull too much on the hair as you'll lift the tape perimeter off the styrofoam head, and that's exactly how it'll look on your own scalp.
Step 6
Spray a light mist of water around the edges of your hair system bun and lift any hair left behind to it sticks to one of the two buns. This is done in order to avoid hair getting stuck under the tape perimeter.
Step 7
Pull the pins out. Just work your way to them with your fingers and you should be able to get them out in no time. Take your time, make sure not to mess up the buns on this step.
There we go! Now you're ready to attach your long hair system to your scalp just like the pros do it.
Got any other question for us? Feel free to give us a call at our toll-free number 1-800-756-8585. We’ll be more than happy to help you with any other burning questions or doubts you might have!