Natural 4a Coily non-silky ladies Can You Rock Fully Shrunken Fro's Long Term?

BlackMasterPiece

BlackMasterPiece

Well-Known Member
I recently discovered Esperanza Spalding on this board and since then I've just been in love with her, her style and her hair:infatuated:. Here's a vid that gives you a great look at how she always wear's her hair http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qoOGcWd7rWc

I really love her and her style because she always wears her hair in its completely natural state, she seems to never manipulate it beyond doing a fro-hawk like she did in this performance at the Chicago Jazz Festival http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fG2INT6b3zk

She went to perform in front of the President with her fully Shrunken Fro and she was a vision http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-lNE7jWA5AE

So it seems she never does anything but let it be what it is, but when I try to rock my fully shrunken fro after about 3-4 days I have to take it down to de-tangle and I feel like if I rocked my fully shrunken fro long-term I would end up with knots:ohwell: Usually when I do my fro its a jumbo flat twist out that has stretched it somewhat to allow it to be slightly more manageable and less prone to tangles.

All my biggest Hair idols whom are all beyond APL and coily seem to manipulate it into a protective style at all times to retain length:scratchch

Does anyone have any tips on how to rock natural, fully shrunken 4a coily non-silky hair in a fro long-term without suffering a setback? Especially when you're almost BSL? Do you think its possible?
 
Hello, my cousin who has the same type of hair has been doing this since 2002. She rarely manipulates and does mostly wash and go's. Her hair is lovely but it has not grown much since she complains that she always has a lot of hair in her comb during wash day which is not a surprise. My hair on the other had which is manipulated and with product has grown more in one year than hers has grown since 2002. However, my cousin doesn't want long hair so it doesn't matter. I think if you have thick hair you will grow as much as you comb out but if you have fine hair it will be more obvious.

Best,
Almond Eyes
 
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Oh heck no!!! I tried that when I went on a cruise to the Bahamas. I did the fro for 4 days, condish washing daily. GOODNESS!!! My fro was a tangled MESS!! It took me about 3 hours to detangle and I lost so much hair. Never again!
 
You can do it, but it doesn't mean you should.

I actually did it for several months. I would rinse every day (or every 2 days) and wear a shrunken fro or puff.

As long as I detangled every time I got my hair wet, I didn't suffer from too many tangles/matts/locs. Skip detangling, and that's exactly what I got.

But the worst part was the single strand knots. I got so so so so many of them. SO many. And you can't do anything those but cut them off.

So for my hair (which isn't BSL as you can see in my siggy) letting it shrink completely everyday was not a good idea.
 
Oh wait, I'm confused. Are you talking about one 'fro one for continuous days or wearing a different 'fro each day?

If it's the latter, I've been doing that since I joined LHCF. I basically WNG everyday. So, I've been doing that for about a year now.
 
^^^I'm thinking like wearing your fro for like 4 days before detangling and washing again.

Also almondeyes, I think you're right I think she's a 4a silky, lawd knows that just aint me:lol:

I thought as much but I thought maybe I was missing something and someone could convince me otherwise:giggle: lol Oh well she looks uber fab though.....
 
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Afros REQUIRE a lot of work to look good and to be manageable. You gotta keep the lint out and keep the shape in. A linty badly shaped 'from is a disaster. It not as wash and go as it looks IF it looks good.
 
BlackMasterPiece, that woman's hair is off the hook. But then again I am obsessed with afro-textured hair of any length.

Best,
Almond Eyes
 
jamaraa said:
Afros REQUIRE a lot of work to look good and to be manageable. You gotta keep the lint out and keep the shape in. A linty badly shaped 'from is a disaster. It not as wash and go as it looks IF it looks good.
Click to expand...

Ummm actually afro's dont require that much work for me, I just do small to medium flat twist depending on how defined or big I want my hair to be the night before take it out in the morning and voila!:afro: Big Lush Afro Goodness:grin:

As for lint, thats more of an issue if you're heavy on the oils, not everyone is, I'm certainly not, so thats not necessarily the case.

But I will say its more then possible she has someone hookin it up for her on the regular however I remember a poster recently saying she read an interview with her and she said she does as little to her hair as possible....so yea but she may have some bangin products tho.....
 
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Uh...this is basically what I was doing before I joined the twist challenge. :look:


CoWash or Wash - style as a Wash n Go, sleep with a satin scarf, and in the morning spritz/fluff. It lasts a good 4-5 days "out" and I could probably go up to 7 if I put it in a puff or something.

I have seen a few single strand knots, but not many. When I detangle on wash day I would spritz with diluted con to soften and give a little slip. Then separate a section out with my fingers and oil it with Amla Oil. As I smoothed/finger comb it most of the shed hair will come out, then I can use a detangling comb.

I do 6-8 sections total, then hop into the shower to wash. I don't know how well this would work long LONG term though, like for weeks at a time, but for me it wasn't bad.
 
So do you twist it back up in the evening or sleep w/ it out? If you sleep w/ it out, that's where the work comes in.
 
I'm only APL but i gotta say no.

This falls in the categories of the LOOK vs. Health and knowing your hair. You can probably do it, just not the way you expect. I can get a similar afro look, but I have product in it. My hair is gonna shrink so it'll be a fluffy/movable fro, but I can keep the knots to a minimum. I wanna save you the agony of single strand knots.

What does your hair look like if you spray water/glycerine/oil/condish, plait your hair and take it aloose the next day BEFORE it's dried all the way? Meaning still pretty damp. Each morning after taking aloose the plaits, if the hair is still damp the hair is stretched a bit. It dries into a fluffy afro. I read in somebody's fotki that they prefer to take plaits down while still damp. And I love it!

IDK maybe because my hair's only APL it still looks like a fro. And I like this technique more because there's some curl definition.
 
i think it really just depends on your hair. my hair is coarse and dense and coils a little only on the ends, so it is really very easy for me to detangle whenever i wash. it's really more frizzy than coily. i see some similarities in her hair and mine. i have been wearing a WnG now for 3 days and I could really see wearing it the rest of the week without doing a lot to it other than sleeping on a satim pillowcase. i pulled into a large puff today, but just as easily could have worn it out. i usually wash once a week and haven't encountered a single strand knot yet.
 
Her hair and voice are the bomb!!! I know I couldn't do it, because I get single strand knots just after washing my hair before I'm able to braid it up!! Maybe if you moisturize it SUPER well and condition it ALOT and detangle it the first day. Maybe you should track her down and ask her how/what she does. I'm sure she probably gets a lot of questions about her hair.
 
I did it when I first went natural, after i FINALLY got all the permed ends off.

..There wasn't optimal retaining going on, but it wasn't that bad. I DID wet it nearly every day and use gel AND conditioner so that it wouldn't shrink fully. But as has been said, there were definitely quite a few single strand knots in the mix.. definitely more than most people would generally like.

It was fine at first but later when I wanted to start doing other things with my hair, the tangling became insane...and single strand knots in my experience tend to beget single strand knots, so it sa hard cycle to ditch once you've started it.
 
Overjoyed is one of my favorite songs ever! :love:

Back to her hair: I'm not sure that her hair is fully shrunken, especially in that last link. It looks like it might have been braided or twisted dry in large sections, let down, then fluffed. That way you get the stretch, but no definition from the braid segments.

Whatever it is, it's gorgeous. She's gorgeous.
 
I tried it this week. Absolute disaster!

I cowashed on Wedesday and let me hair airdry. Thursday and today just wet and pulled into a puff. I detangled tonight before adding moisturizer and braiding up and my hair was really tangled.

I cowashed in sections but didnt detangle before letting it dry. Maybe if I detangled it the result wouldve been different but then my coils wouldnt have been defined like I wanted.
 
I'm going back to this. I did twist/braid outs for a year and my ends suffered from dryness. The only real way I know to combat this is co-washing. So on my break between braids I am cowashing every otherday and basically rocking a slightly stretched out (less than six braids) twa. I get single strand knots very easily so if they start to creep up it will be back to braid outs.
 
Here's my routine:
I wash with Miss Jessie's Super Sudsy shampoo. The hair is sectioned off and clipped so I'm only washing the scalp.
I deep condition with Jessicurl Weekly Deep Treatment (no less than an hour)
I apply liberal amounts of Qhemet Biologics Amla and Olive Oil Heavy Cream.
I blowdry my hair on warm setting slightly with a comb attachment (just enough to elongate the roots). I then band sections on the afro at night. I don't band all the way to the ends--only the roots.
Wake in the morning and moisturize again by placing a small about of QB in my hand. I think plop it only my ends. I add a little oil for shine every once in a while. I fluff with my fingers.
Now, my hair only nape length, so I might used an afro pick to garner shape. However, because your hair is long, you shouldn't have problems just use your fingers.
I also think part of the reasons Esperanza is able to get her hair to get that shape is because she's more of a 4b than anything else. Her hair looks an aweful lot like mine: thick, cottony and fluffy. But, my tips should work.
What's everyone's deal with knots? I've not really had to suffer that problem.
 
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