Dry hair happens for a variety of reasons. Saltwater can dry the hair, sun or other environmental exposure, and some styling products are common culprits. Some people also just have dry hair naturally. Dry hair can make hair more fragile, resulting in more breakage. Dry hair is often frizzy, and may be dull in appearance instead of shiny.
Dry hair presents some challenges, but with a little research you can help make your dry hair look healthy and gorgeous.
The right shampoo for dry hair
Typical shampoo cleans your hair and scalp using a mix of surfactants. Not all surfactants are created equal, though. While more powerful surfactants work great for folks with normal to oily hair, you’ll want to try one that’s extra gentle for your dry hair.
Sodium cocoyl isethionate, or SCI, is a particularly gentle surfactant that can clean with less risk of damage to your hair or scalp. It’s so gentle, in fact, it’s often used in baby products.
Our foaming noodles are a form of SCI that’s less likely to cause dust that can irritate the airways during formulation, and they’re really easy to measure, too. They’re used in our Sweetheart Shampoo Bar Project.
Because dry hair is often subject to damage, you can also include some protein to help strengthen your strands.
Hydrolyzed protein is particularly good, because the proteins are broken down into amino acids, which are more effective in strengthening hair.
We love Liquid Silk, a hydrolyzed silk protein, for use in both hair and skin projects. It leaves hair feeling silky and looking lustrous.
Great conditioner for dry hair
If you have dry hair, using a great conditioner is a must. Conditioners are typically an emulsion of water and oil based ingredients, bringing emollient oils to help protect your hair, and water to make the product much easier to rinse out. After all, you don’t want to shampoo your hair after you use conditioner.
Some oils that we recommend for DIY conditioner for dry hair include argan oil, which is great for penetrating and softening hair while improving elasticity. Jojoba oil has a lot of the same qualities as your own natural sebum, which means it’s great for keeping both skin and hair healthy. For folks with coarse hair, you can use heavier oils without weighing your hair down. Coconut oil has been hugely popular for hair care, and for good reason. It contains fatty acids that are great for conditioning and protecting hair.
You’ll need an emulsifier to make sure your water and oils don’t separate. For DIY conditioner, BTMS-50 is a fantastic choice. Not only is it an effective primary emulsifier, but it has conditioning properties that will improve the effectiveness of your conditioner.
Leave-in products for dry hair
There are a variety of leave-in conditioners that benefit dry and damaged hair. Leave-in conditioner helps keep your hair manageable, reducing tangles (which cause damage to hair) and it provides an emollient layer that helps protect your hair from drying winds and other sources of environmental damage.
For heavy-duty protection, DIY conditioning balms are fantastic. These are more solid than cream conditioners, and sometimes are anhydrous, meaning that they contain no water. To get the firmness of a balm, you usually want to use a wax. This can be beeswax, which is an excellent emollient, or you can substitute beeswax with candelilla wax for a vegan option.
Cream leave-in conditioners are a semi-fluid, similar to rinse-out conditioners. That means that they’re a mix of water and oil phases. That gives you some more options, because you can use water-based ingredients. Aloe and glycerin are both great options for leave-in conditioners because they have hydrating and conditioning properties.
Hydrating hair oils for dry hair
Hair oils are a type of leave-in product that’s made of oil and oil based ingredients. They’re a semi-viscous liquid, and the viscosity depends on the oils you use. Hair oil can soften hair, hydrate it, add shine, and improve elasticity and strength. It can also help tame frizzy hair.
This is probably one of the easiest products to make on your own. After all, it’s just a mix of oils that are great for your hair. Coconut oil is a very popular ingredient for hair oil, and fractionated coconut oil has the benefit of remaining fluid at room temperature. Sweet almond oil is a very lightweight oil and can keep your DIY hair oil from weighing hair down, making it look limp and flat.
You can apply to your scalp and roots to help nourish a dry scalp (healthy hair starts with a healthy scalp, after all), or you can apply to the midlength to the ends of your hair to help hold in moisture, improve manageability, and prevent tangles.
Hair oils are both a conditioning product and sometimes a styling agent, because they also help with flyaways and frizz.
Perfect masks for dry hair
A hair mask is a lot like a mask for your face. You apply the mask, leave it for 10-30 minutes, and then rinse off.
Many masks are heavy duty conditioners, and can offer a lot of benefits to dry hair. This also means that they’re typically an emulsified product, so you can use both water-based and oil-based ingredients.
DL-Panthenol is a form of vitamin B5 that comes in a water-soluble powder. This vitamin has benefits for your hair, helping to condition and strengthen. Just add it to the water phase of your DIY hair mask and stir until dissolved.
Hyaluronic acid is a well-known skincare ingredient, but it is great for your hair, too. This ingredient is a powerful humectant that sinks into the scalp and hair strand and helps keep it hydrated. Using this in a mask gives it time to work its magic.
These tips and recommendations are sure to get you started making your own DIY hair products for dry hair. With the right ingredients and formulation, you can turn your dry hair into beautiful, shiny hair.
If you want an easy way to start, check out our Carrot Hair Conditioner Project. You can also try our organic shampoo base and organic conditioner base. These are all ready to customize with extracts and other ingredients and start using. All you need is your creativity!
