H A I R C A R E
About Human Hair Extensions
Your Eye for Design (EFD) hair extensions are a valuable accessory to your look and easy to maintain. All you need to do is follow the basic care instructions as outlined below.
Human hair extensions are the easiest and fastest way to change your look within a few minutes to a couple of hours. From short to long, curly to straight, brunette to blonde, or red, hair extensions are a great way to give your natural hair a rest and to protect it from the stresses of daily hair care. If your hair is damaged from over-processing, or you’ve just had a bad haircut, human hair extensions are the perfect way to start all over, and still look fabulous while your own natural hair strengthens and grows.
Our human hair weft extensions are 100% Virgin Remy Cuticle aligned human hair extensions. Remy Human Hair is the highest grade of real human hair and is a preferred choice for hair extensions because the cuticles are kept intact and not stripped. Preserving the hairs’ cuticles and aligning them in a unidirectional fashion creates extensions that are completely natural in appearance and will blend seamlessly with your natural hair. This process ensures that the hair remains super soft, shiny, silky and tangle-free throughout its lifetime, if it is properly taken care of.
Daily Hair Care
Just like your natural hair, hair extensions can and may tangle, as all long hair does. Hair should be brushed often. Brushing prevents extensions from matting and tangling. It also spreads natural nourishing oil throughout the extensions.
We recommend brushing your extensions before and after use, as well as throughout the day with a paddle, detangling, or a looper brush. Always brush the hair from the ends to the top to gently loosen and smoothen any tangles in the hair. Hold the base of your hair as you brush so the extension doesn’t loosen. Never brush the hair when it is wet.
Do not brush curly hair once you have finished styling it. Brushing the curls will make the hair poufy. Use a wide tooth comb or your fingers instead.
Heat is the hair’s enemy. Avoid blow drying your hair extensions, instead let them air dry. If you must blow dry your hair extensions with heat, dry it at a low temperature. It will take longer but the shine and overall health of the hair will last longer. Heat protectant serum or spray should be used to prevent damage to your human hair extensions.
When going to bed, remove your clip-ins, do not sleep with them in. If you wear wefts, tape, or fusion extensions, braid the hair at night hair into two pigtails, or form a bun on top of your head and secure with scrunchies to prevent tangling and matting at the root area. Use a satin pillow or wear a satin scarf or bonnet to protect your hair and the extensions.
Remember hair extensions do not get consistent nourishment from the scalp like natural hair. It is important to keep your natural hair and your hair extensions moisturized and healthy. To moisturize the hair extension and your natural hair, use a tear drop size of Argan (Moroccan) oil or Biosilk (by Biolage) and apply to your natural hair and hair extensions. Use very small amounts as too much oil will make the extension heavy and remove all bounce and movement. Use alcohol-free and sulfate-free shampoos and conditioners. Alcohol and sulfate are ingredients that will dry out your hair extension, leading to frizziness, matting, and/or tangling. Use high quality products specifically formulated for dry and damaged hair, as they will help keep the strands healthy and nourished.
Washing Weft/Beaded Weft Extension
1) Before your hair gets wet, brush it to remove all tangles. Use one hand to hold a paddle brush and use the other to hold your weft/beaded weft in place. Brush your weft/beaded weft from the ends to the root and be gentle (pay special attention to the beads). Brush until your hair falls naturally without any tangles.
2) We are providing you with high quality hair so do not be afraid to wash it. But wash your hair extension the least number of times a week as possible, two to three times a week for Remy European wefts and every one to two weeks for Classic Brazilian or Indian wefts. This will help extend the life of your extensions. Using a great dry shampoo is a great alternative to washing it every day. It is best to use sulfate-free and alcohol-free shampoo and deep moisturizing conditioner when washing your extensions.
3) Stand upright in shower while washing, never bend over to wash. Massage the hair gently rubbing the scalp as best as you can. Do not scrub and tangle the hair as you wash. Using your hand as a comb, stroke through shampoo/conditioner from near the roots to the ends. This is why brushing before washing is so important.
4) After shampooing, spend extra time rinsing around the wefts/bead wefts. Carefully raise your hair at each row and let water gently rinse each weft. Leftover residue from the silicone beads molds can cause irritation and itching, slipping too.
5) Condition the hair with a hydrating conditioner. Let the conditioner sit for 5 to 10 minutes. Rinse hair well, do a cool water rinse to seal the cuticle and make the hair shiny.
6) A good leave-in conditioner can be used if necessary. Make sure that you also apply the leave-in to your braided hair as good as possible.
7) Allow hair to air dry completely. Do not blow dry your hair. If you must blow dry your hair with heat, dry it at a low temperature and use a heat protectant to prevent heat damage. The shine and overall health of the hair will last longer.
8) You can also do a co-wash in-between wash. A co-wash is when you wash the hair with a mild conditioner only. It keeps the hair soft, shiny, and more manageable.
A few extra thoughts. If you go swimming, wash and deep condition your hair immediately. Also, never go to bed with wet hair. The pressure and movement combined with wet hair will cause tangles and slipping.
Clip-in Hair Extension Care
Washing Clip-in Hair Extensions
Your EFD Human Hair Extensions over time will accumulate residue just like your own hair. However, this does not mean that you need to wash your clip-in hair extensions every day. To keep your extension set in optimal condition, it is best to wash the hair extensions as little as possible. The rule of thumb with clip-in hair extensions is to wash the hair when you notice your hair extensions have lost their sheen or is difficult to curl. It may have become dirty from the natural oils released from the scalp or excessive use of styling products such as hair spray. Oder is also a good reason to wash them.
We highly recommend applying a moisturizing sulfate-free and alcohol-free conditioner before and after shampooing. Sometimes, even skip the shampoo and only co-wash your extensions with conditioner!
Clip-in Pre-wash
Before the shampooing process it is imperative to remove any tangles present. Gently use a paddle brush to remove all tangles. If the hair is excessively tangled, spray de-tangler/conditioner on the hair, then carefully brush. Do not use force or like your own hair, you will experience breakage.
Clip-in Washing
After brushing out the tangles, carefully rinse each piece of your hair extensions SEPARATELY with lukewarm water.
We recommend using sulfate and alcohol-free deep moisturizing shampoo specifically formulated for chemically treated hair (your extensions were colored). The shampoo should be applied to each piece separately in a downward motion from the top of the extensions to the ends. Under no circumstance should you twist, rub or scrub your hair extensions, this will cause them to tangle, rip, or even mat. Gently lather shampoo until hair is visibly clean. Rinse thoroughly after 3-5 minutes. Once you have washed the first piece, set it aside neatly on a towel and repeat the same steps for the rest of the pieces.
Clip-in Conditioning
Styling Your Clip-ins
There are a million and one ways to style and groom your fabulous EFD clip-ins ! The possibilities are endless with so many colors and lengths to choose from. Whether you have purchased the straight or curly extensions you can now enjoy longer, thicker hair that will instantly transform your look. The results are fantastic. Eye for Design Human Hair Extensions are versatile enough to be colored, blow dried, hot ironed or curled by an experienced stylist to suit your individual needs. But remember just like your own natural hair, heat is the enemy, but doing this every once in a while is okay. Blow dryers, curling irons and other thermal tools may be used and hot rollers are a great alternative to achieve a more voluptuous curl. It is important to remember that Eye for Design Clip-In Hair Extensions are made of the finest Remy-Grade 100% Human Hair and may be damaged if the heat setting is too high, so to extend the life of your extensions, use heat as little as possible and use heat protectant/spray. The best way is to treat your extensions as if they were the hair on your own head!
Storing Your Clip-ins
Your clip-in hair extensions should be stored away when completely dry. It is best to store your hair extensions in the bag that it came in or purchase one of our EFD storage bags. You can store the hair any place at room temperature, away from direct sunlight, preferably in a dark place like a closet , cabinet, dresser drawer; in a safe place out of reach of children and pets, such as container a shoe box.
Curly Hair Care
- After you have washed your hair and it’s slightly damp, separate it into small sections and either use a brush or a wide tooth comb to gently comb out each section of your hair. Spray your hair now with a leave-in conditioner or curl activator solution. Regardless, your curls will naturally take shape so don’t put very much product in your curls.
- It is important to remember to NOT scrunch your hair with your hands to reform your curls. The reason why is because rubbing your hair against other sections of your hair results breakage of your hair cuticles. Instead run your hands through small sections of your hair at a time, from your roots to your tips. It should be fairly easy since you’ve already gently combed your hair. If your hair isn’t too wet, shake your damp hair back and forth to create more curl.
- During this process the goal is to prevent frizz and keep your hair healthy and strong. The best thing that you can do for your hair is to mostly let it air dry and remember that heat is your enemy because it dries out your hair and creates frizz. A diffuser on low is also a great way to dry your hair and enhance the curls. Conditioning your hair daily with a daily hair conditioner will keep your hair hydrated and moist. However, you don’t want to overdo it because your scalp and hair can become too oily. Deep condition your hair 3 to 4 times a month as well and it will help keep your extensions last a long, long time.
- Another tip: if you use your blow dryer with your diffuser set on low heat, your curls will also take form. Either way keep the blow dryer set on a low heat setting and on low power. The worst thing you can do is damage your extensions due to overheating your locks and hurting your tips. Harm to the tips of your hair creates split ends from breakage and lack of essential nutrients.
- Even with curly extensions you can straighten them with a hair straightener. Use a deep conditioning treatment after you have straightened your hair during your next hair wash or implement a product that protects your tresses while you straighten them. As soon as it is time to wash your hair again, or if you are getting tired of your temporary straight locks, simply wash your hair again and your curls will come back immediately as they dry naturally, and you have followed our above hair care instructions. With curls you can be sassy and sweet or switch back to being a diva going on a night out with her friends in a straight hair do. Extensions give you a variety of styles to choose from and whatever you decide (straight, curly, wavy,) treat your tresses with lots of love and they will stay beautiful and strong in return.
Tape-in/Fusion Hair Care
When using hot tools be sure to use a heat protectant spray! The more you use heat on your hair, the shorter the life-span of the hair extensions.
Do not use a flat iron directly on the tape tabs. This will weaken the bond and they will slip out.
When using sulfate-free and alcohol-free conditioner, condition from mid-shaft to ends only. Do not apply conditioner to your scalp when wearing tape in hair extensions, avoid conditioner on the tape.
When using serums or oils avoid contact with the tape, use on mid length to ends only. We use natural products such as coconut oil on the ends of the extensions to keep the hair healthy and shiny over time.
Never go to bed with your tape extensions wet. It can cause horrible matting to the extensions you’re your own hair.
Every 6-10 weeks, your hair extensions will need to be reapplied to move the bonds closer to the scalp and to keep your hair healthy.
Tape in and Fusion extensions are not best for those who have lost a significant amount of hair due to any illnesses or for those that have extreme hair thinning. Consult with your stylist about another option.
