Plopping Techniques for Perfect Waves & Curls
Hair plopping is a heatless and gently drying technique where your hair is compressed and scrunched while drying. This mimics the gentle diffusing effect, encouraging your natural curl pattern to activate and define itself beautifully. Plopping involves fabrics and wrapping techniques that minimize frizz and breakage. Here are the different plopping techniques:
Plopping
This is the most popular plopping technique, also known as dry plopping. This technique may remind you of the usual towel turban wrapping where you twist the hair into a towel. What you probably didn't know is that the towel's harsh texture causes frizz and the wrapping can result in breakage from the tension. This technique is great for wavy and curly hair.
When dry plopping, you gently 'plop' your hair into a soft microfiber towel or simply a cotton T-shirt. Place the towel or T-shirt on a surface, bend over, and let the ends of your hair touch the towel, then slowly move your head down towards the ends, allowing your curly pattern to scrunch up naturally. Once your head reaches the towel, the goal is to hold your hair in this scrunched position by wrapping the towel around your head.
Your hair porosity essentially determines how long it will take for your hair to dry:
Low porosity takes a long time to dry, so leave it on for 30 minutes
Medium porosity takes some time to dry, so leave it on for 15-30 minutes
High porosity takes less time to dry, so leave it on for 15 minutes
Micro Plopping
This technique is a great follow-up after dry plopping or you can skip dry plopping and only do micro plopping - generally recommended for coily hair. Again, use a soft microfiber towel or simply a cotton T-shirt. Place the towel over your hands and 'plop' sections of your hair by gently scrunching upwards to your head. To create more volume at the root, move your head from side to side and upside down and repeat the scrunching. This technique removes excess water and speeds up your hair's drying time.
Wet Plopping
This technique is similar to dry plopping, but the purpose is to enhance product absorption in your hair - especially recommended for low porosity, where the absorption takes longer time due to the closed hair cuticles. For this technique, you’ll be using a shower cap. After applying your styling products, lean forward and ‘plop’ your hair into the shower cap by placing the ends of your hair in the cap and slowly moving your head downwards into the cap. Leave it on for 10-20 minutes. Follow up with dry plopping and/or micro plopping.
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