Things You'll Need:
- doll or toy with synthetic hair
- boiling water
- a hair comb
- drinking straws, perm papers, and sewing pins, if you wish to curl the hair
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Step 1
This doll has kanekalon hair. It's been cut into a cute short style!Figure out what kind of synthetic hair you're actually working with! That's an important thing. If you rerooted the doll on your own, then you probably know what kind of hair she has already. But here's all the information you need to figure it out:
Barbie dolls are factory rooted with either saran hair or doll grade kanekalon. Most of the collector dolls have saran, and most of the playline dolls have kanekalon hair (please differentiate between doll grade kanekalon and human grade kanekalon, which is inferior!), but this is by no means a hard and fast rule. Barbie styling heads and My Size Barbie dolls are factory rooted with nylon hair.
The majority of Japanese dolls (Takara Jenny, BJDs) will have rooted saran hair or saran hair wigs.
Robert Tonner dolls are all factory rooted with saran hair.
Blythe and Pullip dolls are all factory rooted with either nylon or polypropylene hair.
Ashton-Drake dolls are all rooted with nylon hair.
My Little Ponies, Strawberry Shortcake dolls, and all Hasbro toys are rooted with nylon hair.
Patti Playpal dolls are factory rooted with nylon hair.
If you're still wondering what kind of hair your doll has, you can snip off a tiny piece of it and hold a flame to it. Nylon and polypropylene will melt and liquefy. Kanekalon will burn and turn to ash. Saran will mostly just dissipate, but you will see some melting. If you've decided that it's either nylon or polypropylene, you can take the testing a step further by putting the snip of hair into a bowl of water. Nylon will sink, polypropylene will float. This is because nylon hair is porous, and polypropylene hair is not porous. -
Step 2
This doll has been rerooted with blonde saran hair, and she's been given a boil perm.It's important to determine what kind of hair you're dealing with because different types of hair need to be styled with different water temperatures.
Nylon and polypropylene can be styled with room temperature water, but the hair won't respond quite as well as it would if you use simmering water. That's just the thing, though: nylon and polypropylene hair cannot withstand rapidly boiling water because it can cause the hair to frizz and melt. Therefore, nylon and polypropylene hair should NOT be styled with water that is any hotter than a mild simmer. What I mean by this is that the tiny bubbles of air at the bottom of the pot are JUST beginning to come to the surface.
All OTHER types of synthetic hair, however, can withstand rapidly boiling water. Kanekalon is very easy to style and doesn't NEED rapidly boiling water, but it won't be hurt by it. The same goes for acetate hair. Saran, on the other hand, is very difficult to style and you probably won't attain your desired results unless you DO use rapidly boiling water. -
Step 3
If your doll just has a case of unruly hair, all you need to do is pour the boiling water over her head, comb it through, pour the water one more time, follow that up with a dowsing of ice water to shock the hair into place, and let her hair air dry for 24 hours. This will give her sleek, straight hair.
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Step 4
If you want to CURL your doll's hair, however, here's how we do it! We doll artists refer to it as a boil perm. I prefer to use drinking straws for my boil perms because they're much easier to use than curlers or perm rods, and I get the best results with drinking straws. There are standard size drinking straws, of which, I'm sure, you're very familiar. There are also coffee stirrers, those thin little straws that you'll see at Starbuck's, and there are also those lovely, thick McDonald's straws. Pick up a few extras the next time you're there; they come in quite handy!
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Step 5
Cut your straws into 2 inch long pieces, and wet your doll's hair and separate it into smaller sections.
Take a perm paper (or a small piece of tissue paper if your local beauty supply store doesn't carry perm papers), and fold the perm paper in half. Then, encase the end of a section of hair inside the perm paper. Perm papers are crucial, as they prevent the ends of the hair from getting curled in a bent way, and they also prevent the ends of the hair from coming loose from the straw.
So with the perm paper on the end of the section of hair, roll the hair around the straw. Once you reach the doll's head, grab one of your sewing pins and push the pin through the straw (perpendicularly) and into the doll's head. This will secure the curler and assure that it won't come loose, and you also won't have any indentations in the hair, like you would if you were to use perm rods or curlers. -
Step 6
While you're rolling the rest of the sections of hair, start your water boiling. Remember to get it at the right temperature according to what kind of hair you're dealing with!
Also, get out a bowl of water and put some ice cubes in it so you can be ready with your ice bath.
Once the hair is all rolled up, and once your water is at the right temperature, dunk the doll's head into the boiling water. Leave it in there for a good ten seconds.
After that, dunk the doll's head in the bowl of ice water. -
Step 7
Let the doll sit for 24 hours, until her hair has air dried, and then take the straws out!
No matter how tempted you may be to brush her hair, don't do it. You'll end up with a frizzy mess. If you want to soften the curls a bit, just rake through the hair very gently with your fingers.
If you feel that it's just a bit too curly and you want to loosen the curls, you can pour water over her head and comb her hair while it's wet. The temperature of the water can range from room temperature to warm, depending on how much you want the curl to loosen. The warmer the water, the more the curls will be loosened. Then, just let it air dry.
Wet hair can be combed or brushed, but dry hair will end up becoming frizzy if it's curly and you brush or comb it. -
Step 8
Lastly, I would like to address the subject of using a curling iron or straightening iron on synthetic doll hair. Yes, these items can be used, and they often come in very handy. The important things to remember are as follows:
1) ALWAYS make sure that the hair is wet before you use any kind of hot styling tool. Dry hair is much more likely to melt and frizz than wet hair is.
2) ALWAYS protect the hair from the tool. I like to sandwich the hair between two paper towels. Never allow the hair to come in direct contact with any kind of hot metal styling tool.
You always run the risk of frying the hair when you use hot styling tools, so I recommend that you only use them if you're more experienced with styling doll hair. For the newbies, I recommend that you stick with the boiling water methods until you have a good understanding of how the synthetic hair reacts to heat.
