How to Get Dreads for Just a Day

Temporary dreads are ideal for most hair types.

Actual dreads, or dreadlocks, are thick, matting locks that take months to establish in someone’s hair. However, there is a way to form temporary dreads in your hair so you do not have to commit to the long-lasting hairstyle. Dread your head for a day if you are dressing as a pirate, Rastafarian or bohemian for a Halloween costume or theatrical performance. Or, style your hair in the day-long dreads if you are curious to whether more permanent dreadlocks are a style that would work for your lifestyle.

Things You'll Need

• Rattail comb
• 4 hair elastics
• Teasing brush
• Hair wax
• Hair spray
• 2 deep-conditioning treatments
• Clarifying shampoo

Instructions

1. Wash and dry your hair; do not add any styling products when drying, such as silicone-based heat protecting treatments.

2. Part your hair from the center of your hairline in the front of your head straight back to the center of the nape of your neck; use a rattail comb for parting. Tie the left side of your hair back with a hair elastic.

3. Part the right side of your head of hair by starting in the center of the head in between the hairline located on your forehead and the nape of your neck. Use the rattail comb to part perpendicularly across the section of hair toward your ear. Tie a hair elastic around each of the two sections of hair. Part the hair on the left side of your head in the same way; you will have four sections of hair.

4. Use the rattail comb to remove a 1-inch square area of hair from the section on the back of your head; start with either the right or left side. Tease the roots of the hair with a teasing brush.

5. Apply a dollop of hair wax -- use approximately a quarter-size dollop for hair that is medium length -- to the hair. Rub the wax all through the 1-inch segment of hair from the roots to the ends. Add more wax if necessary; it is better to use too much wax than not enough.

6. Twist the waxed lock of hair starting at the roots and all the way to the ends. Tease the roots again using a teasing brush.

7. Spray the lock with hair spray. Twist the remaining hair in the same manner in each of the back sections. Finish the hairstyle by twisting the front sections of hair; graduate to the front of the hair last so the dreads are not in your face while you work.

8. Remove the dreads by starting with a deep-conditioning treatment. Wash your hair using a clarifying shampoo. Rinse and repeat shampooing until the wax is removed. Follow up with a second deep-conditioning treatment to help the hair repair itself after the teasing, twisting and products.

References

• Teen Vogue; Temporary Dreadlocks -- Cool!; Eva Chen; April 2009
• Beauty Fool; How to -- Fake Dreadlocks; May 2010