Here you will find some general information about Wigs and Hair Extensions and, the definition of some common terms that are used to describe them.
Color
Manufacturers of artificial hair use a standard scale to classify the hair by color. The lower the number is on the package, generally, the darker the color. 1 usually denotes darkest black. These colors vary greatly from one manufacturer to another, and certain specialty hair suppliers also create their own signature patterns and colors. The highest the number the lightest color, this is white or a very light colored blond.
Texture
Textures of artificial hair vary from very straight to extremely curly, or kinky. Each brand have their own lines of curl patterns, synthetic hair offers an endless possibility of patters, some examples of packaged textures include:
- Silky Straight – Straight and smooth, East Asian like hair.
- Yaki – Straight, usually mimicking the texture of relaxed Afro-Caribbean hair.
- European – Straight European hair; less straight than Asian hair. May have a tiny amount of wave.
- Deep Wave – While generally not a true ‘wave’, it can be made to look like spiral curls.
- Loose Deep Wave or Romance Wave – Looser version of the deep wave, softer, more romantic curls.
- Jheri Curl (sometimes colloquially known as ‘nappy tracks’) – Usually sold in very short lengths, it is often used to recreate the full ‘afro’ look.
- Wet and Wavy, also known as Spanish Wave or Indian Wave – Usually made of human, and is either naturally curly or permanently waved to appear so. Characterized as having soft, natural-looking curls that revert back to a curly state when wet.
Quality of Wigs and Hair Extensions
The quality of the hair is often specified.
- Virgin hair: This is hair is not colored or processed in any way. The “virgin hair” is collected by tying off the hair to maintain the direction of the cuticle and then cut. After the hair is cut and collected; it is sold in bulk form and then used to create several products such as weft, pre-bonded, wigs…
- Remy is a term used when all of the hair is human plus when ‘close to’ all of the strands (e.g. in one weft) are strictly organized with the roots in one direction and the tip to the opposite end. Remy hair in general lasts much longer than non-Remy and tends to stay shiny and “tangle free” longer. This is based on the fact that every strand of hair is biologically keratinized skin cells organized in layers overlapping one another. However, this description is no longer accurate. The word “remy” is being abused in the market, and sometimes it is used to describe processed hair.
- Single drawn is of a slightly lower quality than double-drawn hair. The hairs will have up to a 2″ difference in the tips; that is, some hairs will be up to 2″ shorter than their original lengths.
- Double drawn indicates that the collected hair of a certain length has all of the shorter hairs in the bundle manually removed twice, hence the ‘double’ drawn. This means that hair extensions that are double drawn will have (nearly) as many hair strands at one end as the other and appear much thicker and not wispy at the ends. This process is very laborious, and therefore makes the extensions very expensive.