My Hair Blog: My Hair Design: Step by Step

Equipment:
- Pin tail comb
- Hair elastics
- Crimper
- Paddle brush
- Hair grips
- Hair clips
- Padding
- Red hair spray
- Orange hair spray
- Sheets of paper

Step by Step:
1. You first section off the bottom section, starting at the top of both ears and curving up in the centre. Secure this in a loose ponytail to keep out of the way.

2. Using a crimper, crimp the rest of the hair outside the ponytail. Do this in sections going upwards to make sure all of the hair is crimped. Try to go as close to the root as possible.

3. Bush out all the crimped hair using a big paddle brush.

4. Using a pin tail comb, create a section in the middle of the head, roughly keeping to the width of the model's eyebrows. The section starts at the front of the head and ends right up until the back ponytail. Make this as straight and even as possible.

5. Create a french plait on this middle section and secure at the end of the french plait with a hair elastic. Split the hair coming out of the french plait into two equal sections. Plait each section and secure at the end with hand elastics.

6. Using a pin tail comb, create a french plait on either side of the head, roughly the width of the french plait in the image below. These sections will run all the way along the edges of the ponytail section.

7. Make sure the sections left are even and big enough to be able to use padding on those areas. Continue the french plaits on each side of the head into regular plaits and secure them at the end with a hair elastic. The image below is what the hair should look like from the back.

8. Split the padding sections into 3 equal horizontal sections. Put the top two thirds together to make one section. Split the bottom third into two. Clip the bottom section and top section away to keep out of the way. Do a french plait on the middle section and continue it into a regular plait and secure with a hand elastic. Turn the end of the french plait back on itself to create a layered look, like shown below. Secure this with hair grips.

9. Secure the padding onto the overlapped plaits with hair grips and make sure it is very secure as there will be a lot of hair going on top and I don't want the padding to look saggy. Take the bottom section of hair and smooth it over the padding. Take two fingers and wrap the ends round your fingers to them tuck the twisted hair under the padding. Pull this hair tight so that it acts as extra support for the padding.

10. Take the top section of hair and smooth it over the padding. Make sure none of the padding underneath the hair is visible. Do the same technique with wrapping the hair, flat, round two fingers and pushing it underneath the padding. Try and make the top of the padding flat with the head and try to keep the bottom of the padding looking neat. Repeat this on both sides, trying to make them as equal as possible.

11. Put the very bottom section into a tight ponytail, about half way up the head. Smooth any flyways with hair spray. Split the ponytail into two equal parts and twist the two section round each other, trying to keep it tight, and then wrap the twisted hair round to make a bun shape. Secure this bun with hair grips.

12. Take an A4 sheet of paper and hold it on one side of the french plait, then use the red hair spray to spray along that side. Put the sheet of paper on the other side and spray the red colour down that side. Spray the red hair colour down the centre of the french plait very carefully so that no colour gets on the padding. Spray the colour until about 2/3 of the ways back and then fade it out slightly. Take orange hair spray and, using the same sheet of paper technique, spray the rest of the way back until the hair elastic at the end of the french plait.

13. Take a sheet of A4 paper and make a hole on the middle for each of the plaits to go through, push the plait through the hole and hold the paper as close to the head as possible. Get the orange hair spray and spray the plaits on both sides so that the plaits are completely covered. Get another piece of paper if the hair is longer than the top piece of paper to spray the ends with colour. Do this technique to cover all 4 of the plaits in orange spray.

14. To remove the paper from round the plaits, rip the paper and gently pull the paper away. Be gentle because the hair spray can crack and fall on the rest of the hair design.

15. Wrap the two middle plaits around the bun at the back, wrapping them outwards. Secure these with hair grips and make sure the hair elastics aren't visible.