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I used to consider having curly hair a curse. Through high school and college, I would beat my curls into submission with Japanese straightening treatments, flat irons, round brushes, and hours upon hours of styling. Even into my early 30s, I didn’t know how to deal with my naturally thick, kinky, and sometimes frizzy hair. I distinctly remember letting my hair air dry before meeting some friends at a movie, only to have one of them gasp upon seeing me and exclaim: “What happened to you?!” Needless to say, my hair doesn’t exactly dry into the perfect ringlets people think of when they proclaim how much they wish they had curly hair.
Over the past few years, I’ve picked up a few styling tips that make it so that I can wear my hair curly without eliciting shock and disbelief from those around me. Part of it comes down to finding the right lotion or gel for your hair type, which is a conversation for another day. The other game changer for me was finding the best diffusers for curly hair to attach to my blow dryer.
You might be wondering, is it better to air dry or diffuse curly hair? It really depends on your hair type and how much time you have. Diffusing can help set your curls, cutting down on frizz and helping your ‘do holds its shape. I don’t mind my hair when I let it air dry, but the main problem I have is that you CANNOT TOUCH your locks as they dry unless you want to end up with a frizzy jumble on top of your head. I find it tough to go out with a sopping wet head and avoid moving it around, so I prefer to diffuse before I head out the door. Drying my hair also allows me to make any last-minute styling edits, like adding a little oil or curling a few ringlets that didn’t spiral the way I wanted them to. If you have curly hair that you want to wear naturally, it’s good to have both options to air dry and diffuse, and the tools on hand to do both. Here are the 10 best diffusers for curly hair to help tame your unruly mane.
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