Hair Width Types & Hair Curl Patterns for Natural Hair
We have fine, medium and thick width, no matter your hair is straight, wavy, curly or kinky. Width is used to describe the thickness of each individual strand of hair.
Hair Width Types
- Fine Hair. Fine hair can be easily damaged because of its fragile texture. It can tend to be oilier than other hair types. It is difficult to hold a style for people with fine hair because it is light and can fall flat against your head. Volume is often desired, but it is not often attained. Structurally, fine hair usually consists of a cortex and a cuticle. Fine hair can become weighed down with heavy products, causing the hair to look stringy.
- Medium Hair. Medium hair is the most common hair type. Usually, it looks thick and covers the scalp very well. Structurally medium hair has two hair layers including the cortex and cuticle, and may contain the medulla. Medium hair holds style fairly well.
- Thick or Coarse Hair. Think hair appears full, holds style well. Structurally, thick or coarse hair has three hair layers – the cortex, cuticle and medulla, thus the hair texture is strong. The medulla, the innermost layer of the hair shaft is pretty much a series of empty spaces, and is filled mostly with air and protein. Thick hair can tolerate heat well and resist breakage better than the fine or medium hair, and this hair texture usually takes longer to dry than others.
Hair Curl Patterns
- Wavy. Wavy hair has s-shaped curls down its length. Or, wavy hair has slight bends towards the ends of the hair while much of the hair can appear straight. Wavy hair can frizz fairly easily.
- Curly. Curly hair tends to do so down the entire length of the hair shaft. Frizz, shrinkage and dryness are the greatest challenges for curly hair types. Strand thickness can range from fine to coarse, but is most often fine.
- Kinky curly. Kinky curly can range from fine to coarse with s-shaped and z-shaped curls with everything in between! Kinky-Curly is the most fragile of the types. It is almost an impossibility for kinky-curly hair if curl definition is a challenge for curly hair types. Besides, there are long-term worries about the shrinkage and dryness.
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