I know this is kind of strange now that my head’s gone androgynous but I’ve never ever bought hairspray to particularly use on myself…until now because I have thick, wavy hair. Now that it’s cut short there’s a lot of lift at the roots which is great but not for a pixie-do. I’m not for the Peter Pan windswept pixie on myself, I like my “do” looking very French and Mia Farrow-ish, sleek and set in place. When I saw this bottle of Dove Style + Care Hairspray on a shelf flanking hundreds of others at S&R I didn’t particularly understand why I was drawn to it by instinct, but I was, and I’m ever so glad I followed the beauty lioness in me. One deadly swipe and it went down…into my grocery cart.
Now, let me explain because of my short hair. Prior to this I was using and still sometimes use Bench Fix’s Rock & Rule matte hair wax…which is great by the way, for Php35. In fact I’m on my second pot of that stuff which took me about 1 month to consume. However with that wax product it does take a lot of art directing with the fingers for several minutes, which I don’t mind on days where I’m not rushing, and that isn’t often. This Dove hairspray costs approximately 10x more than that Bench Fix wax at about Php295-300+, but it literally is more in a different form and smells pretty with a summer berry fragrance I don’t mind at all. This product cuts my primping time by about half. With this, I basically step out of the shower, towel dry my hair, brush it down to the shape I want in under 5 minutes. When the hair is between damp and dry I then use 5-8 spritzes of this all over about 6 inches from my hair, concentrating a bit more over my stubborn cowlick that lifts up from the roots on the left side of my head and on the hair by my ears, then I brush through again before it sets. What I like about this is it holds the style that I make with the brush very well throughout the day and it isn’t a “crunchy” sort of hairspray that turns your hair into twigs. You do get just a little of the expected hairspray “stick” stiffness at after it has just set (it has to generate hold somehow), but after an hour or two, when you press in a little with your hands, pat down and smooth it with your fingers you can gently press the stiffness away and it becomes SOFT and very touchable, but your hair doesn’t lose the shape you sealed in. It’s no Elnett mind you but it’s bloody amazing in the way it works for my pixie-do, otherwise my hair would be standing fluffy and I’d probably look like a schoolboy. This also adds healthy radiance to the hair, so just note that it isn’t a super matte sort of hairspray but it doesn’t make your hair look greasy either. Here’s a photo of me with the lovely, unsinkable Sophie Uy, owner/founder of Charm makeup brushes and the blogger behind beautynomics.com.
My best friend’s mother actually asked me how I got my hair to be “fixed” that way. She wasn’t just talking about the hair cut, she liked the soft-gloss texture and I like that she noticed because this helps lift my hair from being just a dull short cut with no definition to something more sophisticated. You can see where I concentrated the product on the sides of my head because it’s a bit more shiny but overall my hair doesn’t look like it’s being held captive like evil knievel’s helmet or the like and it looks soft. The second photo after shows me with my godson, Eli, taken at the baptism the other day. It kind of doesn’t make sense that I’m showing you these photos, I don’t speak for girls with long hair, but the only thing I can confirm for you Rapunzels out there is it gives a really nice soft texture if you spray from a distance, the nearer of course the more concentrated the spritz, the stiffer it will be. I can also test this on Mom when she arrives from her trip abroad and get some feedback from her. I don’t have the exact price with me right now, but it’s about Php295-Php350 at S&R if I’m not mistaken. This is a Dove U.S. product so I’m not 100% certain if some local groceries stock this, but if they do you’d probably have to check the imported personal care aisle.
