u/Jacobmb_Music

So I’m not completely sure what my hair texture is. I know the top is different from the sides and back.

The top will coil when medium-high hold products like gels and curl creams are used and thick clumping is allowed to occur. The sides and back tend to be looser.

I am growing it out to be much longer, but for the time being it’s just a pain to manage.

I included 6 photos.

Photos 1 and 2 are using mousse paired with high hold gel originally applied when soaking wet. (These look like 3B top and 3A sides)

Photos 3 and 4 are with none to minimal product and intentionally combed out when it was damp to see how it would behave without hold or curl encouragement. I think a little anti frizz cream was used on the top but that’s it. (These look like 3Aish top and 2C ish sides)

Photos 5 and 6 are my hair goals. Yes, I understand that I will never get a 1:1 match to Andrew Lincoln or really the Kit Harrington either for that matter, but I think the general shape, style and direction are achievable.

Here’s my conundrum. I have curly hair, but I’m an outcast in the curly hair subreddit because they remove posts about trying to do this with curly hair. All advice and style suggestions online just push you towards big round styles and curl enhancing methods, scrunching with a diffuser, etc… and that’s just not what I want. I don’t like round hair styles.

I don’t want to give my hair a curly-specific routine and curly specific products that encourage my hair to be more curly than it already is, but that’s all the curly subreddit can ever recommend to me. I do want to keep it happy and healthy and moisturized as it does still require more moisture than looser hair types.

I will not use heat styling and I can’t use sulfate containing shampoos (I’ve tried and it kills my hair). I also don’t really want to rely on methods that involve using clips or wraps or banding, etc.. as I am quite clumsy and I have very very dense hair, so it’s hard for me to do that without it being a lot of hassle.

What I’m imagining - there has to be some kind of serum or cream or moussethat I can style with that holds my hair looser and still allows it to be soft and flowy. Or perhaps a nice rich and heavy conditioner or leave in conditioner that doesn’t encourage further curling.

Like I said, I don’t expect or need a 1:1 match to my references, but looser and more flowy is the goal. The closer to the references the better though. Any advice appreciated- thanks!

P.S. I appreciate that some of you will probably like the coils and won’t understand why I would want to lose them - but I just don’t enjoy them. I’ve tried to like them, but I just can’t. I like curly, not coily. I like waves and looser curls and directional flow.