Secret to longer, thicker locks? Skincare for your hair...

Better...not younger

FIRST, the body became the new face in terms of beauty obsessions, and now it’s the turn of our hair. The ‘skinification of hair’ is a phrase that will either make you think: ‘Hmmm, sensible: our scalps are also skin, and hair, being dead, needs all the help it can get’, or ‘Ye gods, what new neurosis is this? Isn’t life complicated enough?’

Still, the deployment of novelties such as masks, tools and facial ingredients on our heads is now becoming a daily ritual for legions of British women.

Indeed, so-called ‘skincare above the forehead’ is now such a phenomenon that it’s emerged as a key beauty trend for 2023.

Tomas Warwick, a beauty-buying lead, tells me: ‘As we’ve started to consider scalp care as an extension of our skincare, we’ve seen customers invest in products including bond treatments, scrubs, masks and oils, meaning our haircare regime has become as important as our skincare one.

‘Bond-building brand Olaplex is up 63 per cent on 2022, while sales of A-list favourite Ouai have soared by 112 per cent.’

It used to be that haircare was akin to make-up — used to transform your appearance only. Now it’s more like skincare in the sense that it attempts to address problems at the root. But do you really need a head routine in addition to your face one?

ONCE, I was firmly of the ‘life’s too short’ camp. Indeed, I asked top hair stylist Andreas Wild what I could do to improve my hair. He lifted a lank strand and deadpanned: ‘Brush it?’

This was a fair cop. I washed my hair, I conditioned it, then I left it to its own devices, not even drying it. I judged shampoo and conditioner on their ability to render my hair reasonable without any effort. I was also of the view that, scalpwise, if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it — or, at least, don’t irritate it, as irritation is the cause of dandruff. Less is more and all that.

Then YouTube started feeding me guides to historic haircare, having worked out that I am now so old I’m practically Victorian. And I realised that this ‘skinification of hair’ thing isn’t new. Our grandmothers always used the ‘tech’ they had available to nurture their crowning glories as much as — if not more than — their complexions, with clay, eggs, vinegar, oils and boar-bristle brushes.

Next I saw my goddaughter, Bea, who told me that after she began scalp-scrubbing, her hair had grown several inches longer than it had been able to reach before.

Suddenly, this made perfect sense. Not only was she sloughing away dead skin and product build-up, but she was also increasing circulation to the tiny blood vessels at the base of every follicle, which spurs growth.

Bea’s top product is Umberto Giannini Grow Scrub Scalp Scrub €12.99, boots.ie). Indeed, she rates the brand’s entire growth range, most of which is contained in its Grow Long Kit (€48.99).

Bea also massages in rosemary oil as a further growth accelerator, washing it out the next day.

Could this twopronged approach work on a fine-haired oldster? I set to work with Fable & Mane SahaScalp Wild Ginger Purifying Scrub (€33.60, cultbeauty.com) because it smells divine.

Then I anointed my scalp with TikTok phenomenon Mielle Organics Rosemary Mint Scalp & Hair Strengthening Oil (€12.53, amazon.co.uk). Like all Mielle wares, this natural fusion of 30 essential oils and nutrients, including biotin, was designed for Black people with textured hair, but it works on all hair types if used sparingly.

I added some Grow Gorgeous Hair Growth Serum Intense (€35 for 30ml, lookfantastic.com), a formula packed with hyaluronic acid and caffeine that’s proven to increase strand thickness by up to 13 per cent in a month. I slept in a slickly fragrant heap, then applied Viviscal Densifying Gorgeous Growth Shampoo & Conditioner (€14.99 each, hollandandbarrett.ie) to wash it all off come morning.

Not only did I rather enjoy myself but, once dry, my hair immediately looked longer. And this wasn’t merely my imagination — others commented on it.

Had my traditionally rigid scalp relaxed a little? Either way, I’m actively looking forward to my next strand-care session.