How to dry curly hair

As most people around me, I also grew up drying my hair with a towel the usual way – rubbing the towel into the hair over and over till I made sure there was no water dripping from my head. After almost 20 years of commiting the mistake of ruining the curl definition and inducing a great amount of frizz, this is how I dry my curly hair after washing and conditioning it.

No Towels & No Rubbing – Use an old Tee.

I don’t use towels to dry my hair. They cause too much water absorption. Lack of water in my hair doesn’t allow my products to work properly.

Take an old tee(read husband’s :P) and make a cut in the front from the neck to bottom. That will give you one large piece to wrap your hair in.

I do not rub the tee onto my hair. This is very very important. Rubbing causes instant static friction, frizz and curl definition damage leaving a mass of unruly hair. Read this to find out how curl definition is ruined.

After applying products (How to apply products and scrunch curly hair),  you can dry your hair using the below ways :

Scrunching with a t-shirt to speed up drying

A trick to decrease your drying time and dry your hair faster is by scrunching with a T-shirt – How to scrunch with a T shirt to dry curly hair faster

Plopping

Plopping is a method to scrunch your curls and keep them in the scrunched position without using your hands – you use a tee instead. It is best suited for long hair as short hair can get crushed and lose shape. It is perfect to help decrease the drying time of your hair, enhance waves and curls and take care of wet hair till it is dry or semi dry. I plop whenever I have time – Plopping (Plunking) curly hair | How to plop + 5 benefits

You can also put your hair into this Net Plopping Bonnet from Hair Love.

Drying – Air drying or Diffusing

Stepping out of home soon after washing causes my hair to instantly poof up and frizz and so I always wash my hair at night.

I either let my hair air-dry through the night.  I wait for about 15 minutes after scrunching, pull my hair over the pillow (so that I don’t sleep on my curls and ruin them) and go to sleep *zzZzzZZzzzzz* – sleeping with wet hair will not work for everybody, especially those with short hair or people who toss and turn too much during sleep.

Or I use a diffuser to dry my curls, which is my absolute favourite way to dry my hair – Everything about diffusing curly hair – What, Why, How

Check this out – Why sleeping on silk is good for curly hair

As easy as that!

Here is a post with my full curly hair care routine – My curly hair routine .