On my recent post I wrote on how you should untangle your hair properly without breaking it so easily and keeping it safe.

Now that you know how to do this during and after the shower, if you need something else to help you untangle your hair besides your fingers, you must know the right type of combs and brushes for your curly hair. Please don’t forget that wet hair is very fragile and you must be extremely careful combing it.

Not all combs and brushes are safe to use in curly hair. There are some that are more specific for straight hair or for drying with an air dryer and here we will learn to distinguish them.

For starters, you must see what best fits to your hair routine to be able to choose the best comb and/or brush.

For example, in the shower, I like to untangle my hair with my fingers and a brush after applying conditioner. To place the leave in cream on my hair I use my fingers or a wide-tooth comb. With dry hair, I love to give some volume with my best friend: the hair pick.

This is what I do and you can choose a different routine from me, like detangling your hair after showering and before placing the leave in cream. Whatever your routine is, as long as you’re very careful with your wet hair and you use a good brush, everything is acceptable. Never forget that wet hair is more fragile hair.

How to choose a good comb or brush?

Do NOT use on Curly Hair:

• Your brush should not have the famous “spheres” on the end of it. These spheres, while you’re brushing your hair, have the particularity to gather your untangled hair on the ends, not being able to brushing it properly, demanding more strength from you to untangle it, breaking your hair more easily. This type of brush is great for thicker, smooth and resistant hair (everything that curly hair is not) since it helps to become smoother. The spheres of these brushes help to hold the hair strands while combing, massaging the scalp and dragging the oiliness from the scalp to the hair ends, helping to nourish straight hair.
• Never use a thin comb, or a comb with teeth too close to each other to untangle curly hair as it will break it. In addition to this, it will end up removing the leave in cream. Curly hair is too thick and bulky for this kind of combs.
• Do not use cylindrical brushes, these are used to air dry the hair with a dyer. If used in another context, it will easily break your hair.
• Do not use brushes with tiny and very small bristles. The main goal for these is to add volume to straight and flat hair.

DO use in Curly Hair:

• You should use a wide brush with no stiff bristles (flexible preferably) and without spheres in the end of it (indicated for thinner hair, like curly hair). These bristles are the best to untangle wet hair without breaking it. There are several types of these brushes and all of them have the same purpose.
• Because these brushes are often used in the shower, ideally, they should be easy to clean (to prevent proliferation of microorganisms), ventilated and flat as shown in the pictures on the right.
• Usually, the longer the hair, the larger the size of the brush should be, since it will facilitate you to detangle your hair.
  
• To help you on your hair routine after you shower, you should use a comb with wide teeth, since it will help you separate hair strands and to define your curls by crushing them with the curl cream.
• The brush or comb should be made of wood, if possible, since it does not conduct static electricity thus reducing frizz.
• There is also the hair pick, which is perfect to add that volume we love so much on our hair. It is not mandatory to use it because you can do this with your fingers on your hair roots.

Now that you know this, you can have more attention next time you go to a supermarket! There are also very good options online for the several brush types mentioned above.

My Combs and Brushes

Here are a few examples of brushes that I use in my hair routine. I bought them online at eBay:

After stop using my brush with the spheres beads as mentioned above, I started using this one on the shower and I noticed less breakage on my hair. It is very soft while untangling hair and very easy to clean and remove left over hairs, which makes it very hygienic. This is the brush that revolutionized my hair routine.

You can see similar brushes on eBay on this link and this link.

The kind of brushes that can work to untangle your hair on the shower and to help you style your hair with curl cream are the famous Denman Brushes, which are well known in the curly world.

After washing and untangling your hair, you need a comb that helps you to separate your hair strands in order to be easier to spread the styling curl cream. For this purpose it’s better to have a wide tooth comb and it can be found similar to mine in these links: here for the first photo and here for the second.

When your hair is dry, the important thing to do is to give the volume that we ambition so much on our curls. I have these two combs and my favorite is undoubtedly the second from the bottom photo, the regular hair pick. The first hair pick gives a good scalp massage, but I don’t think it gives as much volume as the second one and it also tangles easily my hair. You can check the first hair pick from the picture here and the second one here.

If you want to check some wooden combs to reduce frizz, I advise these on this link and these in here.

A very cute accessory I bought and it’s great to clean left over hairs on your brush, it’s this one. I strongly advise you to have one to keep the your brushes hygienized.

So what is your favorite brush or comb? 😘