African hair threading has been used for hundreds of years to style and protect afro hair. Raised in the UK; child of Ghanaian parents, my mother threaded my hair from ages 6-10 years. A hairstyle technique used by my grandmother and her mother before her. Many African women on the continent and in the diaspora, probably had this technique done on their hair at some point during their childhood.
Admittedly from age 11+, growing up in the UK, I didn’t appreciate the benefits or beauty of hair threading and stopped using the technique. Then the natural hair movement of the 2000’s kicked off! Many black women (including myself), embraced their natural hair texture. Learning all the new hair terminology that came along with understanding my natural hair, I also realised that my hair doesn’t like heat. I rarely blow dry my hair (probably 2-3 times a year – if that), but having 4C afro kinky hair, I usually wear stretched styles and make sure my hair is stretched after washing, to avoid tangles.
Sometimes I just embrace shrinkage (always liberating), which is best for certain styles, like wearing my afro out.
Like many 4C natural hair ladies, I use the traditional technique of African threading to stretch my hair without using heat. If you’d rather avoid or cut down on the use of heating tools, why not give it a try?! This is the type of thread I use, not sure if it has a special name, but it’s smoother /silky than normal yarn thread. You can use whatever thread you can get your hands on.
This video from Green Beauty explains why stretching is a useful technique for natural hair.
If you haven’t tried it, I’d recommend trying the African threading technique to stretch your hair. For me it produces similar results to a blowout. Below are some videos on how to do it yourself, from some of the YouTubers I follow. As always make sure you don’t pull your hair too tight!
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