For those of us with fine hair, it’s essential to be extra mindful with our choices. Whether it’s with a strategic cut, a trusty supplement or some particularly clever styling, disguising those rogue gaps and patches around the head often feels like a full-time job.
Thanks to hairstylist Michael Douglas, though, we’re relieved to find a solution that’s as simple as it is speedy. Michael, who’s founder of mdlondon and happens to be Davina McCall’s hairdresser and boyfriend, shared a foolproof hack on Instagram for how to hide the dreaded holes or gapping that tend to appear around the ear area when curling fine hair.
His simple trick, he explains, not only fills those visible gaps where curls often separate close to the roots, but also gives a hidden layer of inner support that maximises volume in the bottom layer of the hair. The result? Hair that looks fuller from top to bottom.
How to curl hair to fill the gap
If you curl your hair at home, you’ll probably have been told you need to wrap the sections backwards, winding away from the face. That’s mostly true, says Michael, BUT when you have fine, gap-prone hair, you need to take one underneath section on each side, by the ear, and wind it forwards instead.
This creates a curl that supports the hair on top, and – because it’s going in the other direction to the rest of the hair – fills in any ‘hole’ around the front section.
Michael explains: ‘When I’m curling around the ear, I’ll put the curling iron – like the mdlondon Curl, £129 – just in front and wrap the hair around it coming forwards, then I do everything else going backwards.’
‘When you wrap all the sections the same way, you get a really good result, but it creates a hole that you can see through, just underneath the ear. By wrapping one section forward, it actually fills the little gap you can get in the hairstyle.’
Michael’s clever hack not only fills the hole but adds dimension, too. ‘This is a way of really supporting the hairstyle that sits on top of this section – you’ll see we’ve got this kind of volume here, and when the section sits on top of that, it gives you some body,’ he adds.
How to try this hack at home
When replicating this at home, start by separating the top section of your hair. Move it out of the way and secure it with a clip, as this allows you to work on the underlayer. Next, on each side of the face, take the two frontmost sections of hair surrounding each ear – wider sections offer thicker curls, which can give the illusion of a fuller head of hair. Now, curl only those two sections towards your face, rather than away from it.
‘It’s only ever these two front sections that are rolled forwards, everything else gets rolled backwards,’ he notes. ‘And you’ll find you get a much nicer, more balanced, natural looking result.’
When the bottom sections are curled, simply unclip the top layer and curl the hair in sections, backwards. The top layer will then sit on top of the two ‘secret support’ curls you’ve already rolled forwards.
The finished result will look far more seamless, having eliminated any unwanted gaps with (thankfully) very minimal effort.
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