Practical DIY Hair Care Ideas for Large Groups

I'm hosting a BNHC event this weekend--one different from our usual restaurant meet-n-greet style. I'm excited because it allows each attendee some personalized time to perfect basic hair care techniques like parting and detangling hair.

But, I needed to come up with a project that the ladies could work on while waiting there turn. It's a group of about 18, so individual tutorials might take some time. I figured some easy, diy take-home projects would be a great filler. They needed to be easy, quick, and because I'm footing most of the bill, cheap :)

I cut costs by asking the ladies to bring their own containers, by using products that can stretch, picked recipes whose base components were fairly cheap--i.e. olive oil, grape seed oil, aloe vera gel, and by choosing projects that used a water-base.

I borrowed these recipes from blackgirllonghair.com.

I'm creating 'stations' where the ladies can mix up these products:

Leave-In Spritzer

  •  ¼ cup water
  • 2 tbsp aloe vera juice
  • 2 tbsp glycerin
  • 1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
  • few drops essential oil (your favorite)
Spray on just-washed hair, style as usual.

Based on how much moisture your hair needs, you may want to add an extra tsp of glycerin, a bit more aloe vera gel, or a tsp of coconut oil. Play around to see what you like.


Heat Protectant
  • 1/2 cup distilled water
  • 1/2 cup homemade aloe gel
  • 2 teaspoons grapeseed oil
  • 4 drops of your favorite essential oil, for smell
Grapeseed oil has a very high smoking point (420ยบ F), so it makes it a good protectant against the heat of blow-drying. It stays in your hair, so you might like a few drops of your favorite essential oil for the scent. The EO can be left out if you think it will compete with the scent of other products.

Detangler
  • 1 cup distilled water
  • 2 T homemade aloe gel
  • 4 drops glycerin

The amount of glycerin is the key ingredient for the slip it gives; the aloe gel provides good slip as well, but as it thins out it gets sort of sticky, which doesn't help with detangling. Glycerin is actually the opposite; it’s sticky at full-strength, but becomes very slippery as it’s extremely soluble in water. If you find that you don’t get enough slip for detangling, more glycerin should help. Or you can even add a bit of a your favorite oil (olive oil or melted coconut oil).

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