In the winter my fine, naturally curly hair is generally just about manageable provided I use the right products and some clever styling techniques. But, come late May, it's a whole different story. I'll leave it to Cara to illustrate the point...
After spending my first Hong Kong summer GHDing my super-sized afro into submission at least four times a day, I decided it was time to try out something a little more hardcore. So, the summer after, I gave the Brazilian Blow Out a go. The results were swishy, straight, glossy hair for the next three months - complete hair Nirvana. Or so I thought... Sadly, after a few treatments in a row, my hair generally seemed a bit frazzled and to add insult to injury, I heard whispers of health risks stemming from the Brazilian Blow Out products which allegedly often contain dangerously high levels of carcinogenic Formaldehyde. Maybe not the magic solution to my summertime hair woes after all.
So, it was back to the drawing board, and I've been on the look out for a Brazilian Blow Out alternative ever since.
And then the answer to all my hair prayers pinged into my inbox a few weeks ago, news of an all-natural hair smoothing treatment - Discovery by Ybera. Promising to combat frizz and give mirror-like shine as well delivering much straighter, smoother, healthier hair using 100% Formaldehyde-free products - this definitely seemed like the beauty wonder I'd been searching for. Several salons in Hong Kong offer the treatment (full list here) but I chose to book in with a tried and tested favourite, Glow with Ceri Silk, not least because the salon's a super convenient hop, skip and a scuttle down the escalators on Queen's Road Central (perilously close to the brand new Zara - gird your purses on the wander past girls...).
If you haven't discovered Glow yet, add it to your Beauty Rolodex pronto - this is a salon that genuinely cares about making sure it offers only the very best treatments. Case in point, I blogged a year ago about Glow's lash extensions being the best in town, and this was my go to spot for Bambi eyes until I called recently and discovered that they'd stopped offering the treatment. It turns out that after the salon's lash expert left, rather than replacing her with any old lash technician and offering a less than stellar service, Glow has decided to temporarily take lash extensions off the Glow menu until they can find a new therapist that they believe can match up to the last one. Hopefully a new eyelash magician will be on board very, very soon, but in the meantime you can rest easy in the knowledge that when Glow starts the service up again it will be top notch.
Anyway, back to the mane event...(sorry couldn't resist) - my hair. First up you need to understand the issue in hand, so here's a little before snap...
I know... pretty horrific stuff. Luckily Glow didn't bat an eyelid and without further fuss unleashed Ybera specialist, Vikky Sheridan, to tackle my nightmare tresses head on. Settling me in a chair with a glass of wine, Vikky carefully and knowledgeably talked me through the various steps of the treatment and the aftercare needed to get maximum results. And then the great battle of taming my crazy bird's nest commenced...
Step one was to scoot over to the sinks for the first of not one, not two, but three hair washes of the evening. Then it was back in front of the mirror to have a quick blow dry before the first of the Discovery potions was applied to my hair section by section. As the Ybera treatment is completely natural, unlike with the Brazilian Blowout, there's no strong chemical smell (in fact it smells fresh and appley) and the formula is gentle enough that Vikky didn't even need to wear gloves as she smoothed it through my hair. Once that was done, it was time for the setting stage, which involves donning a bubble-wrap shower cap so that the treatment can do its magic for forty minutes. Cue the perfect opportunity for a glam little Ybera selfie...
Another glass of wine and a few gossip magazines later and it was back to the sink for the cap to come off and the second shampoo of the night. Post-wash Vikky and I chatted about the best new bars in Hong Kong while she roughly dried my hair and applied stage two of the Discovery potion. Once the lotion had been blow dried into my hair, Vikky painstakingly flat ironed my hair to poker straight perfection. By this stage in a Brazilian Blowout, the fumes from the lotions are usually at choking level and the acrid smoke that the straightening causes usually has my eyes stinging and streaming. With Discovery, absolutely no fumes and nothing but that fruity, appley scent.
Next stage? Yup, more washing! But my last trip to the basin was simply to rinse out the Discovery solution and condition my hair with the Discovery Shine & Strength Mask. Ten minutes of deep conditioning later and I was back in front of the mirror for a spritz of Discovery Finishing Spray and a final blow dry. Post-treatment your hair feels slightly product laden and heavier than usual but the results were super sleek and beyond straight...
Three hours in the salon chair had whizzed by in a haze of lathering and laughing peppered with blasts from the hair dryer and lots of white wine. Sort of like a girls night in but with the added bonus of new shimmery, swishy hair. Win, win! I left armed with a Discovery Shampoo and Leave-In Conditioner with instructions not to wash my hair for the next couple of days.
As with any straightening or smoothing treatment, initially your hair can feel a bit flat and lacking in body and bounce. Pre the first post-treatment wash, particularly because I have very fine hair, I needed to be quite generous with the dry shampoo and backcombing to get some much needed oomph. After that first wash though, my hair was pretty much back to normal but minus the fuzz-factor. I even noticed a distinct lack of a halo of baby hair frizzing around my hairline something which even the Brazilian Blowout has had trouble tackling in the past. Vikky had warned me in advance that the Discovery treatment wouldn't leave my curly hair completely straight and the results are definitely more wavy than after I've had a Brazilian Blow Out, but, I like the fact that my hair still has movement and bounce. After a (very amateur) home blow dry, minimal GHDing gives me poker straight hair and if I leave my hair to dry naturally it's beachy wavy (unlike pre-treatment when it was more homeless person who doesn't own a hairbrush and has just put fingers in a socket...).
A few days later I took my new hair on holiday to see how it would hold up in the heat - Cambodia during the rainy season seemed like a pretty good test bed... Vikky had warned me that to get maximum results I should avoid chlorine and salt water or at the very least give my hair a good rinse after swimming. I tried my best on that front, but inevitably my lazy holiday self slipped up a few times. Despite that, I noticed a marked difference in how much more manageable my hair was and that neither the humidity nor the odd, unexpected downpour left me with my trademark pre-treatment crazy frizz. Just one more selfie to illustrate this - my new hair after a day's sunbathing...
The best thing about Ybera's Discovery is that the more you treat your hair the smoother, straighter and healthier it gets. So, in three months time when the glossiness starts to wear off and the frizz creeps back, I'll be zipping back down to Glow for a top-up. I'll keep you posted...
9/F Parker House
72 Queen's Road Central
Hong Kong
+852 25255198
Awesome, thanks for the review - it sounds like the perfect solution to my fine and frizzy (worst possible combination!) hair. I'm going to book myself in at Glow now xx
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