Hair – Plastic Fantastic!!Written by Ron Fairfield Organic Hair Stylist

Consumers watch adverts that promise glass like shine and full luxurious hair full of body – plastic silicone and hair extensions …… smoke and mirrors, plastic fantastic.

Hair is made up of approximately 80% fibrous protein and 13% moisture, an internal glue made from a mixture of phospholipids and fatty acids, which grows from small pockets in the skin.  To strengthen or smooth each hair fibre requires a material that either adheres to the outside surface, or enters into the hair structure and attaches itself to the inner protein structure.

To understand how modern hair products developed to become the bewildering array of choice that we have today, we have to look back at the changes that took place in the late 50’s.

Developments in the cosmetics and personal care market were largely a general split between the European and American markets, and the “natural” or Plastics technologies.

Wide ranging developments in the creation of new plastic technology lead to the attitude of, “we can make it, so what can we use it in?” and at that time the cosmetics market was wide open for the creation of new products to match the new fashions in hair styling.

Cosmetic chemists were able to develop products to “style or set” the hair and products that “conditioned, smoothed or softened”

In the USA, chemists were creating products that utilised animal proteins made from waste animal products taken from the food industry, such as feathers, bone and meat waste – processed down into animal proteins small enough to be absorbed into the hair.  The opposite was the use of plastics created to act like proteins in and on the hair.

The advantages of plastics were the cost and the processing methods.  Using animal proteins required a much more vigorous clean process than that of plastics which makes it  a more expensive product.

Of course public attitudes changed during the 70’s and 80’s leading to a general distaste of products with animal ingredients – from a performance point of view these products were incredibly effective because animal proteins are very close in nature to hair.

The alternative plastic technology was “created” to mimic proteins and be engineered to perform in a targeted manner.  So what is the problem with using plastic?

Over time it has become apparent that plastics in hair work in the same way as plastics in any situation, they can become brittle or unstable under certain conditions.  Imagine that hair has been “filled” with plastic and then has extreme heat applied to it, ie straighteners  that heat up to temperatures of over 200 degrees… not hard to see a possible problem.  After applying that temperature which “melts” the inner structure, it then cools down to become a more brittle structure.  The result – weakened hair.

The most obvious point is that hair is a natural

Up close and scary - your split ends

material, whilst plastic is not! and can only emulate the properties of hair fibre.  Hairdressers have found, to their cost, the long term problems associated with the use of silicones to create shine and glass like gloss on hair!  Over time it builds up to create a barrier to colouring products and/or cause heaviness or dullness.

Because of these inherent difficulties manufacturers are experimenting with silk and wheat proteins and ingredients from oils, or plant extracts.   Of course to pander to today’s demanding consumers these natural ingredients get processed and mixed with man made chemicals to improve their performance.

This Post was written by Ron Fairfield Organic Hair stylist

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