Hairy Styles: Wiggle Plait & Backcombing

These are the last two techniques that we did before getting into creating our looks for the final assessment.

Wiggle Plait
This technique is very simple but also very effective. With these plaits you can create a pretty hairstyle that will look like you've spent ages to create, when in reality, it's so easy and quick.

You start with a normal plait. Don't make it too tight, but not too loose either. Then you hold one section and push the other two up. That creates nice 'wiggles' and then you can plait it again to make it longer or just pin it. I wouldn't use less hair than I did in the image below as I think it looks better with this size or even bigger plaits, rather than with tiny ones.

Normal plait

Wiggle plait

Backcombing

Backcombing is mostly used to give body and volume to fine hair. It is importaint to backcomb the right side of the hair. Always brush the hair before washing, if not, you will end up with a head full of knots!
First we did structure backombing, which is used to create big voluminous hairstyles. You hold a section and with a comb, gently press the hair down, going from the roots to the ends. If you do this the right way, you should be able to brush the hair as quickly as you backcombed it. Also, it always looks better if you cover these sections with hair that wasn't backcombed to give it a nice smooth finish and for it to look like it has natural volume.
We aslo gently backcombed the hair. This time we did it from the front, rather than from the back side of the section. This creates a smoother finish, but gives the hair less body.